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By Allan Zimmerly

I was talking with Connie O’Conner, Executive Director of Tuolumne County Arts Alliance, a few months ago and she mentioned that the Arts Alliance had just started broadcasting over the air on their newly built radio station. The Arts Alliance had acquired a low power FM radio license and had been streaming on the internet for several months, but had only recently gone on-air from an antenna on top of the Cassina dome. The station manager was looking for programming related to the community and an agriculture program would be perfect.

Have you ever spoken out in a haze of enthusiasm before fully engaging the brain? Me too. Those fatal words “I can do that, that would be easy” came out of my mouth, and I was committed. Well of course I could find a way to produce a radio program, but it would not be as easy as I first imagined it would be. My idea was to interview members and supporters of Farms of Tuolumne County about what they did and how they did it. The goal would be to educate the listener about what it takes to get food from the field to the table, and to promote our local growers, ranchers and related businesses.

Four months later I had eight, 30 minute interview shows “in the can” ready for broadcast; however the radio station, KAAD 103.5 FM LP, has a very limited coverage area, and in fact, the 103.5 FM full power radio station from Sacramento covers more of Tuolumne County than does KAAD.

So we decided to make these interviews available here, on-line. We divided up the shows into fourteen interviews. Just click on your favorite neighbor from the list below and hear about their love for what they do.

 

Audio Interviews