New ideas and new management will birth a new culture at LTV, said Michael Clark, the public-access broadcaster’s new executive director.
Mr. Clark, who assumed his role on Monday, brings a wealth of management experience. Though he may be best known on the South Fork as proprietor of Crossroads Music in East Hampton and later in Amagansett, he served for 20 years in a management capacity with Verizon, in Manhattan. Prior to that, he held management positions in the hospitality industry. Crossroads Music closed at the end of 2015.
He also created and produced some 40 episodes of “East End Underground,” a music program on LTV, which will return, he said on Monday, this time with a live audience and, possibly, simulcast on a local radio station.
Mr. Clark, who succeeds Eric Glandbard in the executive director’s role, will work with Angela LaGreca, LTV’s creative director.
“Essentially, this job is managing people and managing the facility, dealing with the day-to-day operations,” he told The Star, “really trying to drive what I feel is an overall culture change at LTV. Our mantra is going to be ‘LTV Is You TV,’ and we’ll really focus on driving the message of LTV out into the community so that they know and understand the benefits of having a public access station right in their own community. A lot of people are unaware of that now.”
LTV’s programming will continue to offer government, public, and educational programming, but Mr. Clark pointed to “new community outreach initiatives, advertising, promotion, public relations, and the possible creation of intern scholarships” among new initiatives. “We’re going to continue the good stuff, but we’re looking to better meet the needs of the community and the sponsors in today’s ever-changing media environment.”
From a management perspective, he said, “it’s important to focus on the people that are working here, and on the other hand focus on the board as well. In the middle is me, keeping those lines of communication open, that important two-way process.”
He is thrilled at the prospect of collaborating with Ms. LaGreca, an award-winning actress, comedian, and producer. “She has an extensive background in entertainment and network TV production,” Mr. Clark said. “That’s exciting for me, to be able to work with that talent, to be able to soak in that knowledge. I think, working together, we’re going to come up with some new and exciting big things. She’s got a list a mile long already of things that are really cool and exciting.”
LTV is funded with the franchise fee Cablevision pays to East Hampton Town and Village. Cablevision also grants LTV an annual fee for equipment upgrades. Additional funding comes from contributors, underwriters, grants, production services, and membership fees.
Mr. Clark will seek to grow the latter funding sources, he said. “Like anything else, the biggest driver in public access is dollars and cents. That drives the decision-making process. Because we’re only minimally funded in terms of what we need in order to provide a good quality product, we need donors, sponsors, underwriters.”
“That’s what we need now: more fiscal responsibility, someone who understands how businesses work,” said Jonathan Olken of LTV’s board of directors. “Even though we are nonprofit, we are a nonprofit business. We have to run more businesslike.”
Mr. Clark, he said, “possesses the skills from his previous lives that we think will be the skills we need as we go forward.”
“We’re very excited about Mike,” said Diana Weir, chairwoman of the board of directors. “Mike has been with LTV as the originator of one of our most popular shows, ‘East End Underground.’ He brings a world of management experience and budgeting from his years as a manager at Verizon. We’re excited about it — it will be fun, different.”
Mr. Clark “has the perfect personality for what we need, the perfect skill set for what we need as we try to go forward,” Mr. Olken said. “He’s a smart guy, he’s an amiable guy, but he’s a guy who will do what he has to do to make things work properly.”
Mr. Clark said he was “exhilarated” to “put my corporate hat back on, to a certain extent — tilted, I guess — and use the good tools I was taught and trained on.” Introducing those tools, he believes, will “make the even more creative people excel, motivate them to come up with even more creative things.”