Letter to CBC re termination of Don Hill

Mr. D. Orchard
Regional Director
CBC Calgary

Dear Mr Orchard,

Thank you for placing a call to me last Friday, March 18th to explain your actions regarding Don Hill and his removal from the position of host of Wild Rose Forum.  While you claim that budget cutbacks were the main motivation for removing Don Hill, it has precipitated a dark cloud  over your decision.  Principally the right of Albertans to express their views or to hear the views of others about topics and issues of concern has been severed and silenced.  Is this the ultimate price tag that has been imposed on a democratic process?

As you are aware, questions were circulating concerning the suspect practices of Enron and the deregulation of power in Alberta. Listeners were interested in gleaning more information about "Project Stanley" given that it reached the highest levels of the Enron hierarchy, namely CEO Jeff Skilling on whose calendar on two occasions the name "Project Stanley" appeared. Evidence of telephone conversations between Project leader Lavorato and Belden implied that they were aware of this scheme.   After February 28th, this conversation was silenced. 

Perhaps CBC was not influenced on this particular issue alone but could years of the battering criticism and flak by the privately funded Fraser Institute have caused the CBC decision makers to succumb to the reactionary agenda put forward by these radical right wing think tanks?  CBC and the public cannot allow the Fraser Institute, the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies, the Frontier Centre for Public Policy or the Montréal Economics Institute to hijack public agendas/programs in the pursuit of their exclusive interests.

Don Hill courageously stepped forward to challenge the status quo.  Well researched, articulate, and well intentioned, he provided a venue for intelligent and civilized discourse on issues that mattered.  In a province such as Alberta, where divergent views are unwelcome, a host of Don Hill's calibre is essential.

If your decision was purely budgetary in nature as you have claimed, I strongly urge you reverse your decision. You have heard from many concerned listeners of CBC radio. You have read how they feel and you have heard what they are telling you.

In closing I would like to quote Martin Luther King who said, "Our lives begin to end when we are silent on the things that matter."  May this be a guiding principle on which you make your decisions.

Yours truly,

Ted Woynillowicz
Friends of Don Hill
Calgary, AB

cc Robert Rabinovitch, President and CEO, CBC
    William Chambers, VP Communications
    Jane Chalmers, Vice president, English Radio
    Hon. Liza Frulla, Minister of Canadian Heritage
    Friends of Canadian Broadcasting