Member Profile: John Duddy Written by Lisa Smith

The week before this interview, SCAT member John Duddy was running around Somerville getting food donations for the Project Soup food pantry for Thanksgiving. “I was at the Market Basket and Foodmaster picking up and dropping off donated turkeys around town.” Born and raised in Somerville, he has been giving back to the community since he was a boy. “I have been doing charitable fundraising since I was 11 years old.” As an adult, John has served on the Board of Directors of quite a few of Somerville’s non-profit agencies. He is also a recipient of the Paul Harris Fellow Award for distinguished community service by the Somerville Rotary Club.

When asked how he first got involved with SCAT, John says, “It was about 7 years ago at a Rotary meeting, I was approached by Cindy Glacy (a SCAT member). She asked if I could produce a television show for SCAT on how people should invest their money.” You see, not only is John a nice guy, but he is also a certified estate planner, stock, real estate and insurance broker and, since 1974, president of Financial Planning Network, Inc. located in Winter Hill. With technical assistance from Cindy’s husband Todd, It’s Your Money began airing on SCAT.

“The mission of my show,” he explains, “is to educate and inform the public on a wide array of financials: how to protect your money, make it grow, manage it, and how to hold on to it.” John Duddy makes managing finances seem easy on It’s Your Money; although he feels he doesn’t posses the technical skills for making television shows. Rather, he remains in front of the camera, as producer and host. “A good teacher is someone who can take complex information and communicate it in a way that makes it easy for people to understand”.

John is especially interested in helping the aging and elderly protect their assets, particularly if they should suffer a long term illness. “It’s the elderly in the middle class that get into financial trouble if they get sick.” He knows the laws and the legal loopholes to help people navigate estate laws.

Taped monthly in SCAT’s studio, John is joined each time by an expert in some aspect of finance. When he arrives at the television station, he always has a funny story or anecdote for the SCAT members and staff who happen to be in the lobby. With more than 70 shows under his belt, John is grateful for the help of Todd Glacy, who directs the shows. “Todd is a pleasure to work with. A genuinely nice person, and we work well together. We produce two 30-minute shows at a time, starting at 11 AM and we are done by 12:20.”

Sometimes John is recognized around town. “People I don’t know come up to me all the time and say ‘Hi John’ like they know me! I come into their homes through television. I don’t make anything off this show, but it does build good will with the community.”

You too can learn from an expert on how to manage your finances by tuning in to It’s Your Money on SCAT Channel 3, Mondays at 8:30 PM and Fridays at noon.

Somerville Community Access Television
90 Union Square, Somerville, MA 02143
Phone: 617-628-8826 | Fax: 617-628-1811
Email: info@access-scat.org
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