Video/Audio Encoding - What's Best for Giving to a Pro Studio?

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Hi all -

I regularly record the local news in my area (Chicago) because the non-profit organization I work for is featured frequently. Being that we're a low-budget, 3-person operation, I designated myself Chief Archivist long ago, and whenever one of us is interviewed by a TV station, I set Tivo to record, then transfer it, etc.

Last year, we did a highlight reel to use at our annual fundraising event. We had a lot of great footage, all thanks to Tivo. The HUGE problem was that it literally took the editors at the professional studio where we did this HOURS to import the video files into (what I think was) Avid. I explained that the files originally came from Tivo, then had been cut and reformatted into mpeg-2's, but even the production and editing staff seemed confused about the length of time their top-of-the-line studio system took in processing/converting the files.

So, same situation this year. I have a bunch of media files and the ability to save them as a number of different file types. What would you suggest?

FYI, I'm going to give the editors both copies of the files, and standard Video DVD's burned at the highest possible quality, so at least there will be more than one option for importing.

I'd appreciate any suggestions or ideas. THANK YOU IN ADVANCE!!

Dan