Caregiving consumers need to know how to navigate their healthcare universe. As the second phase in their effort to empower caregivers across the country, Wiland-Bell Productions, producers of the PBS outreach project, & Thou Shalt Honor... broadcast nationwide in October 2002, are staging a series of 12-15 Caregiving Town Hall Meetings in PBS cities across the country.

The goals of each forum are to enlighten, empower, and encourage activism among caregivers and their families. We also seek to alert them to services, providers, benefits, and policies available to them in their communities.

In each Town Hall Meeting, a Moderator will seek answers and provoke solutions from a group of diverse experts and caregivers. The panelists will be surrounded by an audience of 100-150 people, capable of adding their responses to the content. The two-plus-hour ad-lib discussions will be videotaped, then edited to 60-90 minutes, and distributed to the regional public through local PBS stations, supported by aftermarket outreach activities that will extend the life of the Event.

Each PBS Town Hall Meeting will contain a short "historical root": the reason why we are holding one in that particular city. In Kansas City, it was because Harry Truman had first called for a universal health care policy while president; in Denver, because it is the Baby Boomer capitol of America; in Milwaukee, because a senior rally in 1977 called for their state legislature to honor their elders with programs.

The ultimate goal is to launch a National Town Hall Meeting in Washington, DC in the Fall of 2004, to be televised nationally on PBS, hosted by Georgetown University. Broadcast date: early 2005.