The Forum’s Board of Directors
FRPC’s Directors, elected annually by the organization’s members, meet regularly to discuss its work. Currently the Board consists of:
Nathalie Blais
NATHALIE BLAIS has been an advisor in the Research Department of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) since 2011. The Research Department is specifically assigned to the communications sector and includes unions represented by CUPE in broadcasting, post-production, print media and telecommunications. For this reason, it is regularly called upon to intervene in the public consultations of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission’s (CRTC), particularly in the processes surrounding the CRTC’s regulatory review of broadcasting which began in 2023 after the adoption of Bill C-11.
Nathalie also represents the emergency telecommunications agents of CUPE-Quebec’s Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) in CRTC proceedings as well as on the CRTC Interconnection Steering Committee’s (CISC) Emergency Services Working Group (ESWG). This working group is looking at several issues related to next-generation 9-1-1 (NG9-1-1). Currently being implemented in Canada, this IP technology will eventually make it possible to communicate by text message and send photos, videos and medical records to first responders in an emergency situation.
As well, Nathalie is involved in CUPE’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) Task Force that monitors this technology and develops materials to help members understand AI and digital technology and negotiate appropriate protections. Determining policy positions on AI is also part of its mandate.
From 2017 to 2021 Nathalie served as coordinator of the Coalition for Culture and Media (CCM), of which FRPC was a member along with 45 other organizations representing citizen groups, unions and employers’ associations. The CCM advocated for the modernization of the Broadcasting Act so that it applies to web giants and for sales taxes to be levied on subscriptions to foreign online company.
Before joining CUPE, Nathalie was a union representative for journalists at TVA (Montreal), Argent and LCN, where she worked (as journalist-editor, assistant to the desk chief and desk chief). Among other things, she participated in the negotiation of the collective agreement merging the company’s four unions. She previously worked at RDI (the CBC Information Network), NTR (the Canadian Press radio) – where she started her career – and at a commercial radio station in St-Hyacinthe, Quebec. Nathalie is a graduate of the Université du Québec à Montréal in political science.
Sjef Frenken, interim Chairperson
Sjef (pronounced, ‘chef’) Frenken worked in private radio in Ottawa and Toronto after graduating from Ryerson. He was a member of the CRTC’s staff from 1971 to 1995, and held several management positions, including director of broadcasting policy, while working on a wide range of broadcasting policy files. Since retiring from the Commission he has taught at the University of Ottawa, and worked as a consultant. Sjef’s role as Chairperson of the Forum from its inception in 2013 to late 2019 guided FRPC through its start-up and subsequent six years of deepening engagement with the CRTC and Parliament.
Following the untimely passing of Al MacKay in early 2026, the Board elected Sjef as its interim Chairperson.
Bernie Lucht
Bernie Lucht is one of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s (CBC) most accomplished radio producers. For over five decades, Lucht has brought radio documentaries and current affairs into the homes of Canadians as executive producer of some of CBC Radio One’s most popular programs, including Writers & Company, Tapestry and Ideas. He has also been instrumental in the annual production of The CBC Massey Lectures in partnership with Massey College in the University of Toronto, House of Anansi Press and universities from across Canada.
Lucht is a graduate of Concordia University. In 1998, he was awarded The John Drainie Award for Distinguished Contribution to Broadcasting by the Alliance of Canadian Cinema Television and Radio Arts and in 2011, was the recipient of the CBC/Radio-Canada President’s Award. In 2013, Lucht was invested as a member of the Order of Canada and received the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal. In 2014, he received an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree from York University.
Al MacKay, FRPC’s former Chairman
Al MacKay was a forty-five year veteran of the broadcast industry. He was a radio and television broadcast journalist, and was a vice-president and station manager during a 25 year career at CJOH Television in Ottawa. He also ran CPAC, the cable public affairs channel, for three years before joining Judith Maxwell’s think tank – Canadian Policy Research Networks (CPRN) – as vice-president, Operations. Mr. MacKay was the primary consultant in developing, on behalf of the industry, its Code for Violence in Television Programming, its Program Rating System, and the on-screen icons and viewer advisories used by all programming services to inform viewers about the content of the program about to be aired. Al became Chairperson of the Forum in November 2019 and resigned in November 2025. We were greatly saddened to learn of Al’s passing in early 2026.
John Harris Stevenson, Vice-Chairperson
John is a long-time community broadcaster and public interest technologist. He was instrumental in the development of CKDU-FM Halifax in the 1980s and managed CFRU-FM Guelph in the early-1990s. As president of the National Campus and Community Radio Association he successfully lobbied to have community broadcasting enshrined in the 1992 Broadcasting Act and established the association’s first national office. A long time policy advisor and operational consultant to community broadcasting, in the 2000s John worked with community media, regulators, and industry stakeholders to establish the Community Radio Fund of Canada.
John has worked in strategic technology planning for international development and has managed the digital presences of government agencies and non-profit associations. He is a founder of the Wellington County FreeSpace, one of southern Ontario’s first community networks.
John holds a PhD in Information from the University of Toronto with research centred on user interface design, Internet governance, and digital media. He also holds and MA in Media Studies from Concordia University and a BA in Theatre Directing from Dalhousie University.
Kealy Wilkinson
Initially trained in engineering and law, Kealy avoided both by beginning her career on air with CBC Radio, hosting and producing a number of programs and series. Then, after a year mastering the CBC’s corporate ropes in Ottawa, she spent a decade working with Graham Spry at the Canadian Broadcasting League before opening Canada’s first broadcast consultancy.
She was invited to return to the CBC as Special Advisor, Strategic Planning and worked closely with senior management at Head Office and in the two Divisions to develop proposals for the Parliamentary Television Service and CBC-II/Télé-II and also authored various Task Force, policy and regulatory initiatives (e.g., Perspectives, The Connections Study).
Kealy has consulted to governments, broadcasters and cable undertakings in Canada, the US, England and Australia, and represented clients at more than five dozen Canadian regulatory hearings, as well as serving as Chair of the Strategic Planning Committee of the Board of Directors of TVOntario, Chair of the Board of Women in Film and Television (Toronto), and as Director of the Alliance for Children and Television. Currently, Kealy is the Executive Director of the CBMF/FMCR.