Paul Bickford
Northern News Services

Fort Smith (Aug 29/05) - While 5,300 CBC workers are locked out across the country, Fort Smith has heard from some of them - on the radio.

A one-hour program called CBC Unplugged from Studio Zero, recorded on a picket line in Vancouver, was broadcast Aug. 23 on Fort Smith's community radio station CHFS 101.9 FM.

George Lessard is president of the Kiskew Radio Society in Fort Smith.

In fact, it was broadcast 15-20 times, beginning at about 3 a.m. on Aug. 23. The station cancelled all other programming for the day.

George Lessard, president of Kiskew Radio Society, says it was a way to show solidarity with the locked-out workers, including those in the NWT.

"This is a wonderful way to support the CBC staffers up here," Lessard says.

Along with other CBC employees across the country, about 100 workers were locked out in the NWT and Nunavut on Aug. 15.

They include reporters, camera operators, producers and technicians.

One of five

Fort Smith was one of only five community radio stations across Canada to broadcast CBC Unplugged from Studio Zero. The town was even mentioned during the show.

There may be more such shows - which can be downloaded from the Internet - coming from the locked-out workers, and Lessard says he will gladly broadcast new ones.

Lessard says the CBC is more important in the North because there are fewer news outlets than in the rest of Canada.

"That's why I thought it was important to support them," Lessard says of the locked-out workers.

CHFS usually broadcasts local programming and K-Rock, a classic rock station in Edmonton.