News station has new approach to Flagstaff
marissa luck - March 12th, 2008What would it be like to turn on news that wasn’t filled with ideologies and heart-breaking news updates? Flag News created such a newscast to establish an archive of Flagstaff culture and provide topical reports of interest in a positive way. Airing at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Friday on channel 59, Flag News voices the people of Flagstaff for the Flagstaff community.
“It is nice to work on a show I could feel comfortable watching with my 7-year-old nephew or my 67-year-old grandma,” said Laura Roach, a volunteer and Administrative Assistant for Flag News. “There is a place for hard-hitting journalism about the injustices of the world, but in the spirit of balance there is also a place for a show that makes you feel agape love for your fellow human being.”
Avoiding profanity or violence on the show, Flag News is non-corporate, regularly produced media in northern Arizona which offers news, entertainment and documentary shorts that examine local culture.
“Our goals with this show are to entertain, inform, educate and archive moments of significance,” said Tyrus Coursey, producer and director for the show. “We hope to achieve a richer understanding between the different groups that live in this area, as well as provide a window into our culture for the rest of the world.”
Reaching cultures all over, Flag News provides a regular Native American news segment. A new project for Flag News, the show allows Native Americans to decide how they are portrayed on TV, what issues they would like discuss and what they have to say about issues such as their history and culture.
“One facet we hope to reach and invite more is the Native American perspective and their stories,” said Derrick Harvey, who works on getting stories from the Navajo Nation. “They are a part of Flagstaff and the community. Their voice should be heard.”
Roach agrees and also hopes to further the Native American Show’s impact.
“I love the idea of a show made for Native Americans by Native Americans,” Roach said. “I would also love to see this show on in a format that is accessible by the Internet, like Flag News, so that people on the reservations nation-wide can watch it, especially the 12-to-18 [age] group that use the Internet and need positive role models.”
With each story, the Flag News crew looks to satisfy two main criteria on whether the story reflects local culture and has an inspiring quality.
“I think the shows ground people; it brings them a sense of humility that associates them with their surroundings,” Harvey said. “You feel at home and a part of the community. The show gives you a personal perspective of your community and gives you the ‘good’ characteristics of your surroundings, and you can feel a pride and thankfulness of where it is that you come from and where you are.”
Teaming up with Harvey two years ago, Coursey started what was then Flag Noon and morphed it to Flag News almost two years ago. Flag News has been airing five days a week on channel 59 for over eight months now. Coursey and Harvey’s vision for the show was to present powerful infotainment that shows a healthy way of looking at the world.
“It’s all about the show at the end of the day,” Coursey said. “We don’t need to live in a culture of fear everyday, so we thought it would be fun to have something that’s positive… The world is not that frightening. The world is a beautiful place.”
Flag News interacts with the community by receiving updates about sports from local schools, about what’s happening from city hall, and about interesting stuff around town from the Flagstaff Bureau.
“It is a work in progress,” Coursey said. “It’s always morphing into something else, but we try to always stay true to the core thesis of providing an archive for the future of the culture and providing information and entertainment to the people of Flagstaff.”