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TC 03-06-96 Telecommunications Commission Regular Meeting March 6, 1996 CALL TO ORDER The meeting was called to order at 7:04 p.m. by Chahman Mike Wincn. ROLL CALL Present: L.T. G-uttadauro, Bill Mannion, Ernest Tsui, Paul Rodwick, Mike Winch Staff: Douna Krey De Anza College: Ron Fish Guests: Linda Grodt and Don Yaeger APPROVAL OF JAN. 3, 1996 MINUTES Paul Rodwick made a motion to approve the minutes as written; Ernest Tsul seconded and the motion passed unanimously. COMMUNICATIONS Oral: Linda G-rodt and Don Yaeger introduced themselves to the new commission members. Yaeger brought the commission up to date on his attempts to get access programming in the city of Sunnyvale. He said he is still working on that and is at this point trying to contact city officiais in Sunnyvale. He also distributed a copy of the Community Media Review, which is a publication from the Alliance for Community Media, and in this publication, Yacger's access show, On the Move, was featured prominently in three or four articles along with special articles about his daughter, Donna Yaeger. Written: Donna Krey distributed to commission members info~,,ation on the new Telecommunications Act of 1996. The infommtion relates specifically to municipal authorities. She also distributed a newspaper article from the San Jose Mercury describing a 15 percent increase in cable rates. In addition, she handed out infom-mtion from a service provider and said she would bring similar materials to the commission meetings for review. Guttadauro offered to be a clearinghouse for examining some of this promotional material and reporting back to the commission. OLD BUSINESS Discussion of Work Plan and Goals for 1996: The commission discussed five goals for the coming year and made a couple of minor changes to the list. The goals include: (1) developing a calendar of activities; (2) working as a liaison with the educational community; (3) working as a liaison with the public and service providers; (4) producing an annna! report to the city council, (5) creating and collecting information about telecommunications that is relevant to the residents. On this final goal, the commission wanted to make sure that there was a mechanism for collecting input from the community. This might include a survey or some other way to obtain feedback from the public. Guttadauro suggested targeting specific groups, like the educational community, to determine what their needs were. Rodwick said that there could be an e-mail address or some other central location for obtaining input from the community. Mannion suggested the commissioners use The Better Part access show as a vehicle for dispersing information about telecommunications to the public. On the calendar of activities, Krey offered to develop a calendar which would be included in the commissioners' packet every month and which could be updated as new dates were plugged into it. On the educational goal, Tsul offered to develop an action plan for that. Wincn volunteered to develop a timeline for the annual report to the city council. At the next meeting in April, this timeline would be included in the packet along with the calendar and a question and answer sheet which will be developed by Mannion and Tsui. This question and answer sheet goes back to'the informational materials and it will include just basic questions that an average resident might ask concerning telecommunications. Once the question and answer sheet is developed and approved by the commission, the commission will determine how it should be distributed. The goals and workplan for the commission will be discussed at the April meeting. Consideration of grants proposal/Reforming of Grants Ad Hoe Committee: Rodwick asked that Krey distribute grant guidelines and the application to the new members. He also explained the grants program and recommended that the grant from David Cain be approved. This grant is for $250. Rodwick made a fomxal motion to approve the grant; Guttadanro seconded the motion and it passed unanimously. Krey explained the recommendation would be forwarded to the city council at its next meeting for their final approval. Discussion of Strategies to Promote New Public Access Channel Location: The commission discussed buying paid advertisements in the Cupertino Courier but felt that that was probably not a good use of money especially in light of the fact that TCI has offered to pay for some of the costs associated with publicizing the new location. Krey offered to develop a generic ad that might be put into the Courier and the Metro about public access which could be paid for by TCI and would just run a couple of times or maybe on a periodic basis. Ron Fish explained that money had been spent on banners, on magnetic car signs, on stationary, on mini-banners, and said that those things would need to be replaced with the new channel number. He was requested to come up with a list of things that needed to be changed along with estimated costs. This will be presented to TCI with the advertisement developed by Krey in the form of a proposal at the next meeting. Marmion volunteered to contact station officials at KKUP radio station to see if they would be interested in doing spot ads for the public access channel. Fish also explained that the public access channel will be on site at opening day of the little league program and would be videotaping the first game. The commission agreed that that would be a perfect opportunity to pass out notices about the channel encouraging parents to watch the game on television. There may be other opportunities during public events for the public access channel to gain exposure and Fish was encouraged to look into any upcoming activities in the community where that might occur. This item, too, will be continued to the next meeting. One other comment from commissioners was that the public access channel should work on getting an identity that is un~lated to the numerical location. City of Cupertino: Krey explained the budget process to the commissioners, saying that the funding source is not as it used to be now that there is a new franchise agreement with TCI. The commission will be funded from the city's general fund just like all the other city commissions. She said that she would be getting together with Chai,man Wincn to discuss any changes in the budget for the Telecommunications Commission. She suggested other commissioners who have questions, concerns, suggestions on the budget, contact Wincn and these would be considered when the budget is being written for the commission. Krey also told commissioners that the second educational channel, 63, is now on the air and is focused on programming for elementary and high school students. Rodwick said that he had watched the channel and his one comment is that it is a very loud channel and seems to be over-modulated. Krey said she would pass that information on to those numing the channel at Cupertino High School. Rodwick also expressed appreciation to TCI for its response to him on shared channel noticing. In other news from the city, Krey told the commissioners that the County District Attorney's office had asked to see the city's files on TCI and spent several hours reviewing those files and then asked that about 800 pages be Xeroxed and sent to them. She explained also that this process was going on in other cities in the county as well as San Mateo County. Krey told commissioners that she would be involved in the city's SWING program March 11-15 in which 450 students would be coming to city hall and participating in events and activities designed to familiarize them with the local government. De Anza College: Fish passed out monthly statistics on studio use and access programming. He told commissioners also that the channel has a Web page and encouraged people to look at that. He expressed concern about the fact that the channel operation is now at full capacity and does not have any extra time for studio and editing hours. The commission asked Fish to broach this problem with the officials at De Anza College to see if more space could be made available. He promised to keep commissioners infom~ed on this problem. Fish told the commissioners that 20 public access tapes had been submitted to the Hometown Awards and he indicated also that he would be attending the national convention in Washington sponsored by the Alliance for Community Media. In addition, Fish said he would be researching the problem of getting insurance for access equipment and he said that he would be looking into this issue when he attended the conference to see how other access facilities deal with insurance. He said at present all the equipment at De Anza College is working and that there is now a much improved capability of making slides. The new method involves only 15 minutes which is a substantial improvement over the old way of creating slides for PSAs. TCI: There was no report. Krey said that Kathi Nee would send it along at a later date and it will be included in next month's packet. ADJOURNMENT Mannion made a motion to adjourn the meeting at 9:23 p.m.; Tsui seconded and the motion passed unanimously. The next regular meeting is April 3, 1996. ATTEST: APPROVED: