Marblehead appoints 3 to cable board

MARBLEHEAD-Selectmen have made their three appointments to the Marblehead Community Access and Media Inc. board.Board members interviewed Ed Bell, Robert Peck Jr. and Patricia O?Hare Williams Wednesday evening and appointed all three to the access board. Peck received a one-year term, Williams received a two-year term and Bell received a three-year term.Another candidate, Ken Kinna, did not appear for his interview.MCAM?s five-member board of directors, which will oversee the staff and community access TV channels, includes three board members appointed by the selectmen and one member each appointed by Superintendent of Schools Paul Dulac and the Cable TV Oversight Committee.Selectmen were seeking individuals with a background in television, media, finance, fundraising and the law. Marblehead?s own MHTV-10 will be converted from a Comcast local origination studio to a town-run, non-profit Access Corporation on July 15, funded by Comcast and Verizon. Long-time MHTV staff members Jon Caswell and Bryan Nadeau will continue to run the new organization.Bell, who currently serves on the Council on Aging, has 50 years of media experience. He has been a newspaper reporter, television executive on WBZ-TV and WHDH-TV and worked with the Associated Press in Washington D.C.Peck, a lawyer, former selectman and Finance Committee chair, chaired the town?s first Cable Oversight Committee and helped prepare the town?s first cable TV contract.?This is an opportunity to try to generate new interest,” he said.Williams, a local painter and artist, has been instrumental in bringing public art to Marblehead High and the Marblehead Veterans Middle School and said there are plans to bring some examples to the Marblehead Village School as well.In response to a question from Selectman William Woodfin all three candidates expressed interest in expanded programming on local history, particularly oral history.