Nestled in an unassuming warehouse space on Industrial Road in Wainscott is Local TV Studios, known as LTV for short, the South Fork’s public television access broadcaster.
While it’s commonplace for small towns across the nation to have some sort of public access station, the content available through LTV is anything but run-of-the mill. In fact, it’s downright captivating, as the station, now in its 40th year, not only keeps residents apprised of what’s happening in local government but provides content created by their fellow East Enders. It’s engaging, it’s interesting and it’s here just for you.
“It’s a communication vehicle for people on the East End to get their message out,” says executive director Michael Clark. “Our goal is to increase visibility, keeping the balance with what’s going on in the community.”
Since its inception in 1984, LTV has served as what Clark calls a public educational and government station that reaches residents from Montauk to Quogue. While Channel 22 certainly does offer access to town government and school board meetings, shown around the clock on Altice (that’s Cablevision for anyone over age 25), it’s within its other public access effort — broadcasted on Channel 20 — that LTV is really making a difference.
Many of the studio’s public access programs are filmed and produced on site by locals or visitors, delivering content that showcases community news, with a special knack for depicting daily life on the South Fork.
“It’s become quite a novel collection of life on the East End,” says Springs resident and longtime LTV archivist Genie Henderson. “It’s become the voice of the local people.”
Since joining LTV as executive director in October 2019, just before the pandemic, Clark has been working with associate producer Josh Gladstone (former artistic director at Guild Hall) on an awareness campaign for the studio.
“We weren’t as diverse in the beginning as we are now,” he says of the station. “We’re really trying to get more people in the building, so us acting more as a community center, having events here, etc., is a great way to do it.”
This summer alone, LTV will host a plethora of multi-media, multifaceted events, including live music and dance performances, comedy shows, plays and staged readings and a slew of concert series and artists receptions. All are focused on highlighting the talents of East End locals, as well as those from across the nation and the globe. Most events are affordable, if not free.
With its bare bones staff of 13, including five full-timers, the nonprofit churns out dozens of broadcasts each day on its non-government channel, most of which feature locals showcasing their individual messages every week, year-round. Anyone is welcome to film a program at the studio and/or submit finished content for airing.
LTV operates seven studios on site, most of which are available for the public to rent. All are outfitted with state-of-the-art broadcast technology, offering endless possibilities for content creation. Versatile and varying in size, the studios range from a small, soundproof room that’s perfect for recording podcasts to another multi-functional space that’s unique on the East End. This mega-studio has 40-foot-high ceilings, a 39-by-18-foot white wall, a flexible (or removable) stage and at 3,750-sqaure feet, can seat 200 people comfortably.
Additionally, LTV is home to a fully-equipped kitchen studio, where cooking shows are filmed. Its regularly broadcasted talk shows cover the arts, health, wellness and lifestyle as well as the struggles, difficulties and hardships of life on the East End.
“Our focus is about bringing some name people into the mix, sure, but more importantly, it’s about who is doing these things at the local level,” Clark says. “It’s all kind of full circle.”
LTV Studios is open Monday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. and is located at 75 Industrial Road in Wainscott. For more information, email [email protected] or call 631-537-2777.
