Harry Boomer attended Northern Virginia Community College, Alexandria, Virginia and The Columbia School of Broadcasting. His career began in Washington, D.C., where he was a Disco Jock, an on-air personality, music director, talk show host and served in various other management positions, including two stints as a news director. Boomer came to Ohio in 1988 to manage and program WBXT-AM in Canton, Ohio. He also worked in public television at WEAO/WNEO-TV in Kent, Ohio and volunteered at WVIZ-TV 25 Idea Stream in Cleveland. While covering assignments for WOIO/WUAB on a part-time basis in the early 1990s, he was heard regularly on WCPN-90.3 FM, Cleveland the NPR affiliate, where he served as assistant news director for more than five years. He was also a reporter, producer and major contributor to National Public Radio. Among other things, Boomer debuted a statewide news magazine program entitled Infohio for the radio station. Boomer took a full time reporter position at channels 19 and 43 WOIO/WUAB and is currently an anchor/reporter and talk show host for the stations. He is the longest tenured, continuous on-air personality at the stations celebrating more than 27 years as of 2017. Boomer received the Silver Circle Award in 2015 from the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences/NATAS, a distinction given for at least 25 years in television. Boomer is the president of the Greater Cleveland Association of Black Journalist/GCABJ, a position he has held for a third time. GCABJ is an affiliate chapter of the National Association of Black Journalists. Twice during Boomer's leadership, the chapter has been named the NABJ Professional Chapter of the Year, most recently in 2016. He is a valued member of the editorial board of Cleveland 19 and CLE 43 in Cleveland, Ohio. He is the executive producer and host of CLE 43 Focus, a weekly, half-hour public affairs show. In 2014 Boomer was named a HistoryMaker and an oral video of his life's story is part of a permanent archive at the Library of Congress. He was named in 2016 as president of the Cleveland Police Athletic League and to the board the Historic League Park in the Hough community of Cleveland. He has served on the boards of the Ohio Associated Press, The Ohio Center for Broadcasting, First Tee Cleveland, the Citizens Committee on AIDS/HIV, the North East Ohio Health Services Board of Directors. He served a member of the Continuing Education Committee at Cleveland State University.
Personal
Boomer is active in the community, often serving as master of ceremonies and keynote speaker at events throughout northeast Ohio. When he's not working, he enjoys talking politics and visiting friends and family around the country.
Awards
1996 Cleveland Communicators' Awards Best Hard Single News Story
1996 Cleveland Communicators' Awards Best Public Service Program
1996 Ohio Educational Telecommunications Network Program of the Year
