Melinda Garfield

Melinda Garfield is executive director of Westwood Media Center in Westwood, Massachusetts and a statewide community media leader through MassAccess, the Massachusetts organization that advocates for and supports public access centers across the state. Before Westwood she served as Director of Production Services at NewTV in Newton, where she built production experience and received regional recognition including an Emmy-related credit for The Folklorist, a documentary series produced at the station. Her career followed a path common in the field: production work, then station leadership, then statewide advocacy for the funding and civic value of local access centers.

Her dual role running a station while serving the broader state network reflects the way community media leadership has always worked in Massachusetts, where MassAccess has been one of the more organized and effective state-level advocacy structures in the country.

Melinda's work connects the daily operation of a small community media center to the policy and funding arguments that determine whether stations like Westwood survive the next franchise cycle.