Someone mentioned the city's local cable operation to me recently and it reminded me that we have not heard anything for some time about franchise renewals.
Checking on the state Board of Public Utilities, I found a chart of all the franchises and their renewal schedules. There are certain phases to franchise renewal, all of which are noted in this guide. The city has a Cable Television Advisory Board which is supposed to play a role in this process, but all members' terms have expired.
The BPU's chart lists an Aug. 3, 2009 date for expiration for the Comcast franchise. In April 2009, Comcast representative Charles Smith III said the company expected to exercise its right to a five-year automatic renewal. That would place the need for discussion on renewal soon, it seems.
Verizon's statewide FiOS franchise is listed as expiring on 12/18/13, which certainly seems imminent. There is a notation on the chart that Verizon's FiOS video service is not currently available to all municipalities in its franchise territory.
There are a number of technical and practical questions that need to be answered regarding the two local community channels, PCTV 96 (Comcast) and 34 (Verizon). Every City Council meeting is taped for viewing on these stations, but the most recent schedule posted on the city web site is for May 6 and the council meetings are from April. How can the presentations become more timely? How much is it costing to record meetings and events per month? Regarding the Plainfield Cable Television Advisory Board, how can it be rejuvenated? The last PCTVAB blog post is a year old. The top show from April 2012 is still in the May 2013 rotation.
Oversight, operations and communication with the public on local community programming all need to be addressed. The BPU used to publish subscriber numbers, which once stood at about 70 percent of city households for Comcast. How have times changed? Residents may be using other means of content delivery than the traditional TV set in front of a couch.
And what happens with those franchise fees? Who is in charge of expending the funds?
I'm sure subscribers have many such questions. As long as the city has local channels, the public deserves to know how they are being managed. Maybe in weeks to come, some answers will emerge.
--Bernice
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Bernice,
ReplyDeleteThe mayor has not made any appointments to the cable advisory board, and no one seems to be in charge. Other commission appointments have also expired--the Youth Commission (where the mayor appointed 4 people from the SAME family--and no one else--in 2006), the Plainfield Advisory Commission on Hispanic Affairs, and others. Yet, she wants to start a new commission--how about dealing with the ones that have vacancies first? I have asked about these--no response.
Rebecca
I suggest that Plainfield Action Services be removed from under the city umbrella and re-established as an independent non-profit with a tri-partite board of directors. It would be the contractor for the WIC program and provide recreational and senior activities, along with running the cable TV station. There is absolutely no reason why these services need to be cooped up within City Hall, no matter who the next mayor is. If we got the politics out of this we could make great strides.
ReplyDeleteI was put on the Technology Committee nearly four years ago by the City Council and we never met. Sharon is full of something, but not full of doing things for the city. Most of us know by now that Sharon is mostly hot air and little gets done by her.
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