The TAPING RECORDER July 31, 2001 No. 07-01
News from and about Taping For The Blind Inc.

THE PLAN…Converting our production facilities to digital is the biggest
thing on our horizon. We are expecting to start renovation and
installation for the broadcast and production rooms on October 1, 2001, and
feel we should be operational by November 1, 2001. This will involve some
schedule interruptions, although we hope to keep this to a minimum. We
will be doing the newspaper from the conference room and also using a front
office during the work. During this transition, we will be broadcasting
our programming only while we are manned; and that means we will be relying
on satellite broadcasts after 9 p.m.on weekdays and after 4 p.m. on
weekends. The recording booths are not being changed at this time, so your
work there will remain the same. This is a wonderfully exciting change for
Taping – a really essential one that will enable us to update our broadcast
equipment to state-of-the-art. This will also improve our reliability and
allow us to use locally produced programming 7 days a week, 24 hours a day.

The conversion of recording booths will depend on our ability to raise
funds for this part of the project. We hope to solicit contributions to do
a booth which will then be "sponsored" by that donor. If you think your
company might be interested in doing a sponsorship of this sort, please
contact Cynthia Franzetti or Sam Bertron and they will work with you to
pitch the idea to your company. We expect it will take about $5,000 to
update each booth, so this is a terrific opportunity for your company!

ON THE DESCRIPTION FRONT…Our Description for the Blind (DB) services have
been very active. Thanks to Mary Pedersen for her excellent work
describing the Hobby Radisson Hotel for the American Council of the Blind
of Texas convention which was held June 1 - 3, 2001. The description was
very well received by that group. Thanks to Cynthia Franzetti for her
description work at the Mayor’s Townhall Meeting for People with
Disabilities on July 19, 2001. She described a very well attended meeting
and then turned the mike over to people who translated English to Spanish.
This was a very successful event and we had several clients in attendance.
Thanks also to Ted Pfister for his work describing "Funny Girl" for Theater
Under The Stars at the Wortham Theater.

Upcoming described events include "Woman in Black" at the Alley Theater to
be described by Bill Kreps on August 12; and "Smokey Joe’s Cafe" to be
described August 19 for TUTS (at the Arena Theater) by Julie Fulks. We will
keep you up to date on other upcoming described performances in later
newsletters.

(Information removed by request)

OUR SYMPATHY…The sympathy of our entire organization is extended to the
family and friends of Mr. Ben N. Woodson who passed away recently. Mr.
Woodson served as CEO of the American General Insurance Company and was a
Lifetime Director and advocate for Taping For The Blind Inc.

SUBSCRIBE…To subscribe to the TAPING RECORDER, all you have to do is send a
blank e-mail to tbi-houston-subscribe@yahoogroups.com – then just respond
to the verification message you receive. Very simple!