WV: Department of Transportation Debuts Radio Program

July 08--CHARLESTON, W.Va.-- The state Department of Transportation will be hitting the airwaves this weekend with a new program designed to clear up some misconceptions the public might have about the agency.

Transportation Secretary Paul Mattox, along with his communications director, Brent Walker, and assistant communications director, Randy Damron, is launching "WV on the DOT" -- a one-hour radio program. It will debut at 9 a.m. Saturday on WCHS 560 AM.

The program is building on the success Walker and Damron have experienced with "Cycle Talk" -- the show they've hosted for the past six years on motorcycle safety.

Cycle Talk is aired on 20 Saturdays a year, with funding provided by a federal highway safety grant.

But the station's management needed a bigger commitment to the time slot and thought about seeking another show.

To keep the slot, transportation officials decided to create the new 20-week "WV on the DOT" show as a way to educate the public on the ins and outs of the department. They would take advantage of listeners' familiarity with "Cycle Talk" and use the time slot 40 times a year, enough to satisfy the station.

"We've had great success with that program, so we said, 'Why not expand it?' " Damron said.

"There was just an opportunity to branch out," Walker said "We had this idea to be able to talk about the Department of Transportation and make it the secretary's radio show because there's a lot of things we could talk about with regard to transportation."

Walker said even though the Division of Highways is by far the largest agency under the department's umbrella, people might not realize there are actually eight different agencies involved.

"We're going to touch on subjects that really our listeners won't know," he said. "They won't know about the specifics within our Public Port Authority, or how many bus routes our Division of Public Transit operates, or how much money is spent around the state's airports, or the fact that West Virginia owns some railroads with the State Rail Authority, or even some of the inner workings of the (Division of Motor Vehicles)."

The idea came from experiences Walker and Damron had when they came to the department from the private sector.

Walker had a background in communications, while Damron -- a member of the state Broadcasting Hall of Fame -- hosted radio shows in the valley for nearly 20 years.

Both men said once they joined the department, they gained a different perspective than they had as members of the traveling public.

Like most people, they had experienced frustration with potholes and the need for road paving, but they didn't know about things like right-of-way issues and how road projects are planned and funded.

"We weren't doing a good enough job explaining these types of things, so it became a challenge for us," Walker said.

"The Department of Transportation is so vast, and Brent and I have been there for a few years, and we're amazed at the amount of information we need to disseminate," Damron said.

"Radio's a good medium for this type of info -- it's quick, it's effective and people can get a lot of information by tuning in for however long they stay," he said.

The two have produced a television version of "WV on the DOT" for the past six years. That airs on the state's Library Channel as well as locally on Suddenlink channel 17.

They taped the first radio version at WCHS studios Wednesday afternoon.

On that show, which will air Saturday morning, Walker and Damron interviewed Secretary Mattox about his engineering experience prior to being tapped as the state highways commissioner. They also broadly discussed the roles of the eight agencies within the department.

"We'll narrow the focus down as weeks progress," Damron said. "We may want to talk about New River Gorge bridge and Bridge Day and how highways is involved with that."

They say their goal is to humanize the department for the public.