barnfeline In the Newsroom, News

Goodbye, Radio Humber…

After 35 live @Humber shows, one evening special, numerous newscasts and many more adventures, my tenure in Advanced Radio is over. As a recap of the semester, here’s some of the bigger moments.

Most fun story: Doctor Who’s 50th Anniversary

Best Chase:  Toronto City Councillor James Pasternak, Ward 10, after Mayor Ford admitted earlier that day to using cocaine

Hardest story to cover: Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women

Most nostalgic interview: Dave Feschuk on his and Michael Grange’s new book on Steve Nash

Most moving interview (tie): White Ribbon with Jeff Perara NWAC President Michele Audette after UN Special Rapporteur’s visit Remembrance Day interview with Anna Rijk (Dutch Embassy in Ottawa)

Best Indigenous Word of the Day:

Best reaction from my classmates:

Radio was fun, but I’m looking forward to TV next semester!

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barnfeline In the Newsroom, News

Funeral of Constable John Zivcic: #RIP9284

Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair speaking to officers in the processional at Const. John Zivcic's funeral. Photo by Kateryna Barnes
Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair speaking to officers in the processional at Const. John Zivcic’s funeral. Photo by Kateryna Barnes

It was cold today, but thousands of officers still lined up in a processional and many marched to the Toronto Congress Centre for the funeral of Const. John Zivcic.

Zivcic was killed after his cruiser struck another car. He was 34 years old.

The funeral brought out all the dignitaries, including Chief Bill Blair, Premier Kathleen Wynne and Mayor Rob Ford.

Lynda Webb, a retired nurse came from Pickering, Ont. for the funeral, despite not knowing Zivcic or his family.

“My heart breaks for this young man; I just want to say thank you to all of the men and women in uniform.”

A couple of the officers from 14 Division I sat next to said it’s a hard part of their job to attend police funerals.

I called into @Humber, after running to my car (quieter) and nearly giving myself an asthma attack for this story.

barnfeline In the Newsroom, News

Rob Ford: “The Cat who came back”

Rob Ford Nov. 11 2012
Rob Ford, Remembrance Day 2012, Old City Hall. Photo by Kateryna Barnes

There isn’t much commentary I can add to the Rob Ford saga– many Toronto-based columnists are owning this topic.

This saga is one that every newsroom is fascinated with and no one can’t look away.

In our newsroom, I was the one who saw the news break on Twitter. I was covering social media for my colleague who didn’t show up– this was the only reason why I was watching Twitter while @Humber was broadcasting. As soon as I shouted out “CBC NEWS HAS TWEETED THAT ROB FORD HAS ADMITTED TO SMOKING CRACK COCAINE!” our newsroom fell deadly quiet for a minute, then turned into sheer panic. Some quick rewriting of a Canadian Press wire and we threw it into our line-up for our host. Afterwards, we were ripping clips and running whole new segments in our show.

As a team, we killed it on our noon show on Tuesday. Judy Charles, our professor, informed us that we would have to do another show at 6 pm (when our show is normally a rerun). Five of us stayed until the bitter end: Charlotte Anketell (reporter/writer), Justin Vasko (writer/news reader), Hugh Smith (reporter/host), myself (reporter/studio director/producer) and Judy (professor/everything else).

We managed to get some great interviews, but one that took a lot of time on the phone, even if it meant I accidentally dialed a lot of fax numbers was a City Councillor: James Pasternak, Ward 10 York Centre.

I expect that everyone in news will be keeping a close eye on this story, as it keeps changing. Ford is like the cat that keeps coming back.