CALLAN DEVERY//
D.C. City Council now has its own radio show broadcasting every day from 3-3:30 p.m. on 96.3 HD4 DCRadio.
“Hearing the Council” is hosted by D.C. Council’s Director of Communications Josh Gibson, each episode he interviews a different council member for half an hour about themselves, their backgrounds and the issues they want to discuss in-depth.
The show launched on Feb. 15, with council member Brianne K. Nadeau (D-Ward 1) as the show’s debut interviewee. Since its start, six other council members have been interviewed and the current schedule has the council being interviewed, two every other week, year-round.
The idea for “Hearing the Council” came to Gibson after the D.C. government started a radio station.
“We thought, ‘we’re half the D.C. government, wouldn’t it be great if we had a show?’” said Gibson.
The council agreed with him and signed on to doing a half hour show, viewing it as the best way to communicate their ideas, but also fitting into their schedules.
“Our main goal is to just to make people feel more at ease with the government around them,” said Gibson. “Government can sound like capital T-H-E government, very bureaucratic, but people love this city and we’re all trying to make the city the best we can.”
Gibson is somewhat of a minor celebrity among the Washington local politics world on twitter, as he runs @councilofdc, which has amassed more than 25,000 followers.
“People like the twitter account because it’s interesting, but informal and offbeat, so I really wanted to bring that flavor to the radio show as well,” said Gibson. “We don’t want to be the morning zoo, honking horns and being ridiculous.”
“Hearing the Council” will not be the council’s only presence on DCRadio. Soon, 1 to 3 minute updates, recorded by the council members themselves will start running in between other shows throughout the week.
“The brief segments are more in control of the council members as to topics, so right now they’re trying to figure out what’s worth talking about, how often should these be, basically how to use this tool most effectively,” said Gibson.
DCRadio, 96.3 HD4, launched on Sept. 19, 2017, after the District government partnered with WHUR, Howard University’s commercial radio station, to create a government radio station.
DCRadio is the first government-owned radio station in the District and the second municipally-owned full power radio station in the country.
DCRadio is managed by the District’s Office of Cable Television, Film, Music, and Entertainment (OCTFME), it offers programming featuring music from DC based musicians and several talk shows on news and cultural happenings in the District.