First Post
I’ve been meaning to post for the past few days, but have been caught up in friends graduations, trips, work, etc. Now that I’m writing my first post, I’d just like to take time out to say Thank You to WGBH and those who voted for the opportunity to produce my pitch. I was thinking maybe I should explain how I came upon the topic I did.
When I first read about the contest, I had a few ideas rushing through my head. I’ve been reading Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army and had felt real strongly that this issue of government privatization by the Bush Administration (where Halliburton, etc. receive no bid contracts, with cost plus incentives and other insane stipulations). After some thought, I felt that a project concerning that issue would require massive amounts of interviews/stock footage/travelling and wouldn’t be financially logical.
The second idea I considered was concerning the issue of Lobbyists in Washington and their influence over the laws made and not made in this country. I wanted to show what some people would consider a “Bad Lobbyist” and a “Good Lobbyist”, that there are actually good people out there trying to push good ideas through. Once again, I thought that it would require too much time/stock footage/travelling/funds to produce in the time given.
Which brought me to the third idea. I’d already been traveling for work, filming something for a energy conference, and in each of my stops, I’d casually talk about the election with employees at the various facilities I visited. I would mention either Senator Obama, Clinton, or McCain discussing “Green Collar Jobs” and how they would create “5 million new well paying jobs”. I would mention how areas, especially Michigan, with their high unemployment rates and fleeing Auto Manufacturers could benefit from these types of jobs, especially Wind Blade manufacturing, which is a process that takes many hours to create just one blade (a turbine uses three). We would talk about the enormous buildings that once housed Auto Plants, that lay empty now, and how that many of the people that lost their jobs have been trained with Mechanical Skills and would fit right in with wind blade and turbine manufacturing. Near the end of my work trips, that’s when I realized that the topic of Green Collar Jobs, which wraps two issues, the Economy and the Environment, would be perfect for my pitch.
I know that most people don’t have too many ideas as to what a green collar job is or what one looks like, so I’m hoping I can help change that.
