Welcome!

Thank you for visiting the Washington DC Chapter of the Society of Broadcast Engineers. We're glad you're here!

Chapter 37 is a very diverse group, including a variety of media professionals in the Nation's Capitol. Our members include local radio and television engineers, national and international network technicians, consulting engineers, electronics manufacturers and Federal employees working in broadcast related positions.

Regardless of your area of broadcast interest, you are sure to find a warm welcome at the Washington DC Chapter of the Society of Broadcast Engineers. Please join us at our next meeting and try us out for size. We hope you will enjoy your visit.

Upcoming Events

Please check out details of our next meeting. We hope to see you there!  Future SBE meetings include: 

• June 9, 2020 (6:30 PM):  Brian Wright and Sale Lilly from Cielo Networks, manufacturer of mission-critical, IP microwave equipment will discuss point-to-point IP microwave systems for the broadcast industry.  During the same week, Cielo will also be presenting to SBE chapters in Baltimore, Richmond, and Hampton Roads.  Please see our next meeting page for more detail.   

SBE National News

Ennes Educational Trust Creates New Scholarship to Recognize Gino Ricciardelli

Trust also increases scholarship amount and agrees to fund an updated SBE CertPreview

The Harold Ennes Educational Foundation Trust, the educational foundation that grants scholarships and funds presentation of broadcast engineering-related educational programs, seminars and workshops, and helps underwrite costs with publishing technical books and manuals, has added a new scholarship to its current offerings. The new scholarship is in recognition of Gino Ricciardelli, an SBE Charter, Life and Fellow member who died in 2018. Ricciardelli, a long-time supporter of the SBE and the Ennes Educational Trust, and member of SBE Chapter 1, willed a significant part of his estate to the Trust.

With the new addition, the Trust now offers five scholarships:

• John H. Battison SBE Founder’s Scholarship (open to anyone)
• Harold E. Ennes Scholarship (open to anyone)
• Robert D. Greenberg Scholarship (open to anyone)
• Gino Ricciardelli Scholarship (open to anyone)
• Youth Scholarship (specifically for graduating high school seniors)

The addition was made at the trustees’ meeting on May 19, 2020. In addition, the trustees also voted to increase the amount of each scholarship from $1,500 to $2,500. Scholarships are awarded annually based on eligible applications received by July 1.

Ennes Trustee Dale Scherbring, CPBE, provided insight into creating the new scholarship. “Gino was a great example of a dedicated broadcast engineer. His leadership throughout his career will be honored by using his generous financial gift to continue to grow and educate youth and professionals in the broadcast Industry. I am honored to assist in recognizing Gino Ricciardelli.”

On the creation of the scholarship, Paul Kaminski, CBT, chair of SBE Chapter 1 Binghamton, said, “Gino was instrumental in making the transition from analog to digital television in the Binghamton market. At an age when many engineers would have retired, his contributions to the process made that transition easier for all involved. His legacy of professionalism, competence and dedication will live on through the Ennes Scholarship that bears his name.”

Separately, the Trust also approved a proposal to fund a new version the SBE Certification sample test software called SBE CertPreview. While the SBE Certification Committee develops the new ATSC 3.0 Specialist Certification, it will also need to add sample test questions for CertPreview, which is due for a program update.
About the Ennes Educational Foundation Trust
The Harold Ennes Scholarship Fund Trust was initiated by Indianapolis Chapter 25 in 1980 in memory of Harold E. Ennes, author of many textbooks for broadcast and broadcast-related communications training and a member of the Indianapolis chapter. Ennes (pronounced “ENN-ess”) was a member of the SBE’s national Certification Committee and made many contributions to the early development of the Certification Program. To encourage greater growth, the Scholarship Trust was transferred by Chapter 25 to the SBE national organization to administer in 1981. The name of the Trust was changed in 1995 to the “Harold Ennes Educational Foundation Trust” to fully embrace its expanded role.

Three trustees are appointed by the Society of Broadcast Engineers Board of Directors and are responsible for the operation of the Ennes Educational Foundation Trust. They are Douglas W. Garlinger, CPBE, CBNT, Fishers, IN; Tony Peterle, CPBE, Miami, FL; and Dale Scherbring, CPBE, Timonium, MD. The Trustees appoint a scholarship committee to select the recipients of the Ennes Scholarships each year. More information about the Ennes Educational Foundation Trust is available at sbe.org/ennes.

SBE Provides Session for NAB Express

With the 2020 NAB Show in Las Vegas being cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the National Association of Broadcasters has created the NAB Show Express, which will stream live online May 13 and 14, 2020. Registration for the online event is free.

The Society of Broadcast Engineers is a presenting partner of the NAB Show Broadcast Engineering and IT Conference. As part of the online event, the SBE will present the SBE Ennes Multiplatform SuperSession. The SBE had planned a longer Ennes Workshop for the Las Vegas event, and with the shortened online program comes this one-hour SuperSession.

The SBE session will air on the BEIT Express channel on May 14, 2020, at 8 p.m. EDT and May 15, 2020, at 4 a.m. EDT. There are three parts to the program:

• ATSC 3.0 Update: ATSC President Madeleine Noland provides an update on the continuing progress of ATSC 3.0 and various market-transition activities.

• Panel – Multiplatform is Key: Multiplatform has become a business necessity, but it’s also extremely complex. No wonder it’s been top of the must-see list at trade shows and conferences for several years. In this panel we examine what multiplatform actually means today, across creation, repurposing, management and monetization, with tangible examples. The panel is moderated by IABM’s CTO Stan Moote and considers various opportunities to simplify workflows.

• Closing Remarks: SBE Executive Director John Poray concludes the session.

The SBE NAB Show Ennes Workshop is organized by industry consultant Tom Mikkelsen and Stan Moote, chief technology officer, IABM.

Register now for the NAB Show Express, and set aside May 13 and 14 to view the presentations.

SBE Awards: Recognize Excellence

Who will the next SBE Engineer of the Year award recipient be? It could be you, it could be someone you nominate. This will be the eighth year that the Chapter Engineer of the Year award is nominated by SBE Chapters. The chapter honorees are then entered into consideration for the Robert W. Flanders SBE Engineer of the Year award. Each chapter can establish its own criteria for the chapter award. Individuals can also be nominated directly for the national award. For the national award, nominations need to be submitted to the National Office by June 15.

There are other honors as well. The James C. Wulliman SBE Educator of the Year; the SBE Technology Award; Facility Innovation of the Year; Best Technical Article, Book or Program by an SBE Member; Best Article, Paper or Program by a Student Member; and the Freedom Award are among the accolades. There are also a series of statistical awards.

Of the 13 awards recognizing chapters that are presented each year, a local chapter or SBE member make nominations for 10 of them. Many SBE members are highly qualified and deserving of recognition. Likewise, many chapters do an excellent job promoting the ideals and goals of the SBE. Please nominate these members and chapters so they can receive the recognition they deserve.

For information about these and any of the SBE National Awards, please visit sbe.org/awards or contact Megan Clappe at mclappe@sbe.org. Recognition by your peers is the highest honor. Honor your colleagues today.

Chapter Awards Nomination Form

Individual Awards Nomination Form

James Leifer, Ralph Beaver Named SBE Fellows

The Society of Broadcast Engineers has elevated James Leifer, CBPE, and Ralph Beaver, CBT, to the membership rank of Fellow. The SBE Board of Directors elected them at its meeting held April 24.

James Leifer, who originally joined the SBE in 1986, is the senior manager of broadcast operations for American Tower Corp. He is based in the Boston area. His broadcast career began in South Florida. From 1987 to 2017, he handled engineering responsibilities for various broadcast groups, including Paxson, Ion, and iHeart Media. In 2017 he moved to Massachusetts to join American Tower in his current role.

Jim’s SBE activities began with SBE Chapter 53 South Florida. He served that chapter as chair from 2008 to 2012. In 2009, he was elected to a seat on the SBE Board of Directors for one term, then elected secretary in 2011 for four terms. He was the vice president for two terms (2015 to 2017) and then president from 2017 to 2019. He continues to serve on the SBE Board of Directors as immediate past president.

Ralph Beaver originally joined the SBE in 1975. He moved to Tampa in 1973, and he has been an active member of Chapter 39 Tampa Bay Area for many years, including work on the chapter’s annual Chapter 39 Broadcast Engineering Symposium. He served on the SBE Board of Directors from 2002 until 2012. During that time, he chaired the EAS Committee for one year, and then chaired the SBE Frequency Coordination Committee, where he worked extensively with the SBE/NFL Game-Day Coordinator program when the two groups worked together. He started working with the NFL in 1999 as the Tampa game-day coordinator and Super Bowl coordinator in 1999. He was named NFL general manager of frequency coordination in 2011. In addition, he is the CEO of Media Alert LLC, a company he founded in 1994.

In the letters supporting Leifer’s nomination, there are several references to him being a talented, competent and technically capable broadcast engineer. More recently, Jim has been involved with projects relating to the TV repack, and nomination supports note that he goes beyond the technical duties of the project with his willingness to help in any way he can. One nomination also noted that Jim is “brilliant in the area of technical regulatory advocacy work involving the FCC.”

Several nomination endorsement letters for Ralph Beaver cite his work on EAS alerting, working with Florida on creating the state’s Child Abduction Alert system, and his extensive work in frequency coordination, first around the Tampa area and then with the National Football League. Among the nomination endorsements, one letter stated that Ralph is “not only an expert at radio broadcasting technology, [but] also a master of spectrum allocations and spectrum compatibility studies.”

“I have worked directly with Jim and followed Ralph’s accomplishments in their various capacities within the SBE, “said Wayne Pecena, CPBE, 8-VSB, AMD, DRB, CBNE, president of the Society of Broadcast Engineers. “They both possess and regularly demonstrate the skill, attitude, professionalism and dedication to broadcast engineering that are the benchmarks of an SBE Fellow.”

The Fellow honor is the highest membership level in the SBE. Members must have made significant contributions to the broadcast engineering field or the SBE. Candidates are nominated by their peers. Since the Society’s founding 56 years ago, 81 members have been honored with the Fellow rank.
Leifer and Beaver will be recognized for their election to Fellow during the SBE National Awards Dinner on Sept. 23, 2020, in Syracuse, NY, during the annual SBE National Meeting, which will be held in conjunction with the SBE 22 Broadcast & Technology Expo.