HillTV officially released a written apology to the Syracuse University community Thursday night as part of the stipulations handed down by the appeal panel.

‘We worked together on this apology because we felt all of us were involved in the whole process and it wouldn’t be right coming from just one individual,’ said Emily Wasco, entertainment director at the station. ‘There was a lot of collaboration among the executive staff members.’

While HillTV did broadcast an apology on its former Web site on Oct. 18, this apology is one of the necessities in order for the station to be taken off probation on Feb. 1, 2006.

‘It’s not that different,’ Wasco said. ‘This is to reiterate the fact of how sorry and remorseful we are … we’ll do everything in our power to make sure this doesn’t happen again.’

APOLOGY:

To the Syracuse University and State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry Community:

On behalf of all the members of HillTV, we offer our sincere apologies to the members of the Syracuse University and SUNY-ESF community who have been deeply hurt by the offensive content of the program ‘Over the Hill.’ The events of the last couple of months have exposed serious issues concerning the station’s oversight of its own programming. Although the station had policies in place to deal with offensive content, they were not effectively followed as the station dealt with ‘Over the Hill.’ In hindsight, the station should have moved more quickly to cancel the program after these issues were brought to light.

Moving forward, the station will take steps to ensure that members of the Syracuse University and SUNY-ESF community do not feel alienated, threatened or harassed by any HillTV program. As a small part of this effort, the station will be selecting a faculty adviser and working with a board of advisers and a committee on cultural competence to help us fulfill our obligations not only as a student organization, but also as a student-run media outlet.

We realize, however, that we cannot move forward alone. The broader community must be involved. We invite you to send your feedback and suggestions to the e-mail account that we have established for this purpose: tvstationfeedback@gmail.com. In addition, we encourage you to attend the general interest meeting that we hope to hold early next semester.

The HillTV Executive Staff

Published on December 8, 2005 at 12:00 pm