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Winnipeg Free Press Article #2 re. Bumping Community TV Off Basic Cable Tier
What Will Become of Community TV? (Part 2)
If you were following this column 2 weeks ago, you’ll know that for the last 10 years, citizens in Winnipeg have not had access to their “community-access channel” (channel 9). These days, the channel is entirely programmed by Shaw staff, despite CRTC requirements that at least 30-50% of the content be “access programming” (initiated and executed by members of the community at large). Gone are the days of cult shows like Math with Marty, What’s New Pussycat, or the Pollock and Pollock Gossip Show, let alone hours and hours in every genre covering local sports, children’s, multicultural activities and local affairs.
The latest nail in the coffin for community TV is the current CRTC proposal to remove the requirement that the community channel be carried on the basic cable tier. Canada’s Broadcast Act says that there are three tiers in our broadcasting system: public (the CBC and provincial educational broadcasters), private, and community. Since there are so few public and community channels compared to the vast array in the private tier, the few there are should be as widely available as possible; for example, the CBC and provincial educational channels are available over the air as well as through cable and satellite. Ideally, the same would be true of the community channel. When cable was the only game in town, the community channel (the sole representive of that “tier”) was available to most Canadians. Up until 1997, approximately 80% of Canadian homes had at least basic cable service. Since 1997, satellite customers have lost access to the community channel. If the community channel is removed from basic tier, it will become even more of a rare bird, more likely to be neglected by cable operators, and to lose further funding. (Financial support for community channels fell from 5% to 2% in 1997).
Winnipeg Free Press Article #1 re. Status of Community TV
This article appeared in the Winnipeg Free Press in September. Winnipeg had one of the most active and avant-garde community programming in the country at its height.
"Channel 9 : Take Back the Airwaves!"
Do you remember Wayne’s World? How about the original Tom Green Show? Do you remember when you could tune in to VPW 13 and see interactive programs made by volunteers… shows that recruited cult followings in their time, like Math with Marty, What’s New Pussycat? or the Pollack and Pollack Gossip Show?
If your memory is hazy, it’s because those days are gone. In 1997, the CRTC stopped mandating community access to “community TV channels”. The response by most cable companies, including Shaw, was to kick the public off its channels, and see whether they could be turned to a competitive advantage. Shaw hired professional reporters and came up with their now-familiar newswheel, with a weather strip along the bottom and the same one hour of local news repeated all day. Before the format change, Videon and Shaw aired more than 30 hours a week of volunteer-produced local programming in every imaginable genre, including kids’ shows, pet shows, multicultural shows, music shows (Alternative Rockstand, The Cosmopolitans), sports, variety, and even drama, often showcasing works from the Winnipeg Film Group (Survival, Apocalypse Now).
The other thing that has changed about so-called “community TV” is the ads. Prior to 1997, you could sponsor a program and the community channel and your sponsorship could be acknowledged with a verbal thank you or text credit. You couldn’t show moving video. If you’ve watched channel 10 lately, you’ll know it’s rife with ads and product placement, making it indistinguishable from commercial TV.
Community TV in Campbell River B.C. Under Threat
Larry Widen of Campbell River, Vancouver Island, submitted this letter to his local paper. It concerns an offer by Shaw (delivered in the form of a letter to every homeowner) to buy the co-op-owned cable system for $3,000 per person. Read on...
THE CRTV QUESTION ~ IT’S ABOUT COMMUNITY PRIDE
I cannot remember the year but it was, I think, in the early 1970s that I had the privilege of serving as the president of CRTV. I am proud that during my term as president the extremely rigid provisions that must be met to sell CRTV were written into the bylaws. I mention this to make it clear that I have a personal and sentimental bias in my arguments that CRTV should remain a community owned and operated enterprise.
To support my argument for continuing with a community owned CRTV it is necessary to take an all too brief and incomplete look at the community spirit that is Campbell River.
· Some fifty years ago a small group set out on an impossible dream to bring cable TV to Campbell River at a time when no private enterprise had any interest in doing so as there was no profit to be made.
· A need for a public boat ramp in Campbell River resulted in a small group doing the organizing, fund-raising and getting the authorization and producing a public boat ramp on the spit.
· Jack Caldwell, the first lawyer to set up a practice in Campbell River, and others worked long and hard to realise their objective of our own hospital for Campbell River.
· In the 50s I recall meeting a chap named Ed Meade who was promoting the establishment of a museum in Campbell River. Today we have a wonderful museum that is second to none.
· Campbell River’s Maritime Center is a tremendous project that has now to be given national status.
· The Rotary Club’s sea walk is a prominent example of what the many Campbell River service clubs have accomplished.
Submission to the CRTC 2007-10: Keep Community TV in the Basic Cable Package
Here is a copy of my submission to the CRTC's call for comments about removing community television from the basic cable package. The deadline for submitting comments was today. Michael Lithgow
PS. The IMAGE accompanying this blog is from the poster for Too Art for TV, Too.
CRTC October 19, 2007
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0N2
Re: CRTC 2007-10 / 2007-10-2
1. I do not want to appear at the hearing.
2. In paragraph 73 the Commission writes that it “considers that it might be appropriate to eliminate the regulatory requirement that the community channel, if offered, be distributed as part of the basic service” and asks for comments.
3 I want to strongly urge the Commission to maintain the current regulatory requirement that the community channel, if offered, be distributed as part of the basic service.
4 Community access television was created in Canada as a way for cable companies to contribute to Canadian culture in return for privileges awarded through telecommunications policies, privileges that have allowed them to grow into some of the largest and most profitable companies in Canada, and into competitive and profitable participants in global markets.
5 The community channel, from its inception, was also intended to play a critical role in the Canadian broadcasting system – in fact, the third part of a three sector system alongside private and public broadcasting, as delineated in s. 3 of the Broadcast Act.
6 The community channel is recognized in s. 3 of the Broadcast Act because of its ability to do what neither the private nor the public aspects of the Canadian broadcasting system can do: namely, allow Canadians to participate in cultural expression through the important medium of cable television and ensure that local expression makes up a part of the cultural reality of Canada’s broadcast system.
CRTC Proposal Threatens Community Television in Canada
Community access television in Canada is once again at risk of being destroyed as an access medium for the Canadian public. The CRTC wants to remove the community channel from the basic cable package, a move that would, in effect, gut community television as an access medium. Canadians are being urged to write to the CRTC and demand that community television remain in the basic cable package. The deadline for submissions is October 9, 2007.
If you want to respond immediately, here's what to do. Click here, to see the CRTC's call for comments in CRTC 2007-10. Paragraph 73 proposes that community television be removed from the basic cable package. Find paragraph 105 and follow the links to file an electronic response. You can also write your response in a separate file and attach it to your electronic submission.
If you would like to know more about this issue, where to find supporting documents such as existing regulations for community television, or the names of organizations working to save community tv in Canada, keep reading...
Pirate TV Station in Toronto Challenges CRTC
In a recent press relase, Jan Pachul, creator of Star Ray TV has thrown a gauntlet down at the feet of the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission. Accusing the CRTC of corruption after 10 years of trying to get a license for a low-power community station, Star Ray TV is on the air and broadcasting in Toronto, Canada without a license.
According to Pachul, the CRTC will not grant a hearing to ask the public if they support Star Ray's application for a low-power community license in the Toronto area -- a refusal that Pachul says goes against a 1971 Supreme Court of Canada decision affirming an applicant's statutory right to a hearing when an application is filed with the CRTC. Says Pachul: "Past CRTC actions in regards to Star Ray could best be described as shameless bald-faced fraud. These actions include returning our application as "incomplete" over a year after we answered all deficiency" questions, manufacturing a complaint using a fictitious person, taking almost one year to answer correspondence, inventing a regulation to stop the processing of our application, violating our privacy rights, in sum denying Star Ray TV any due process to become a legitimate station."
Pachul's complaints against the CRTC are not limited to his own community license stand-off. Pachul also recently accused the CRTC Diversity" Hearings scheduled for next week as being "a charade that they have put on to mask the truth that the big private broadcasters effectively control them."
Fearless TV: Television from Canada’s Poorest Neighbourhood
Fearless TV was born in the poverty and resilience of Vancouver’s Downtown East Side (DTES), Canada’s poorest and most vulnerable neighbourhood. Occupying a 25 block radius a little east of Vancouver’s business district, the DTES is home to over 5,000 intravenous drug users, and staggering levels of poverty, HIV infection rates, and social malaise. But it is also home to a vibrant creative community of residents, activists and artists. Fearless TV is television made in the DTES by people who live and work there.
The show was created on the heels of television activism workshops offered this Spring and last Fall by local organizer Sid Tan, founder of Access TV and long time community television activist. Tan explained that the workshops were designed to introduce people to community television and how to use it as a tool for social and political change. The response was so positive, they decided to make a show.
Fearless TV brings together creative resources from a number of community groups -- the DTES Community Arts Network (DTES-CAN), des media, Access TV and Gallery Gachet. Together, they are working to share the stories and points of view of the people who live in the DTES with the wider community.
How Much Money Did They Make? The CRTC Releases Its Annual Report On Television In Canada
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has tallied up the winnings, I mean, earnings of the television industry for 2006...
Canadian conventional television stations generated $2.2 billion in revenue in 2006. National advertising remained steady at $1.5 billion. Local advertising increased 3.4% to $375.4 million. Profitability, however, declined from $242 million industry-wide to $91 million according to the report.
Other interesting tidbits include:
Spending on foreign programming increased 12.2% from $613.2 million in 2005 to $688.3 million in 2006.
Spending on Canadian programming increased 6.3% from $587 million in 2005 to $623.7 million in 2006 (including $144.7 million for independently produced material, up from $138.5 million in 2005).
Genre expenditure breakdowns include: $328.1 million for news programs; $101.6 million on general interest programming; $73.9 million on drama; $66.3 million for other information programs; $35 million for musical and variety shows; $9.3 million for sports; and $5.7 million for game shows.
The industry employed 8,197 people in 2006.
To read the report go here. For more information, go the CRTC’s website.
Tectonic Plates Shifting Under Cable Services (Community Access Still Protected, At Least For Now)
The CRTC is reassessing what basic cable means in preparation for the digitalization of the television industry in 2010. What is at stake are millions of dollars in revenues for broadcasters and how we organize and define what channels are "selected" for the least expensive cable service, the basic package.
Details of the hearing are expalined in Broadcast Notice 2007-1, items 7-18. In a nutshell, what is being determined in part is who gets to be included in the cable "basic package" (the question of why we have a "basic package" is not on the table). It is a money question. For every cable subscriber who receives a channel, the channel gets a fee. For example, the Weather Network gets 23 cents each month per subscriber. With 12 million subscribers, it collects about $2.76-million monthly. If your channel is in the basic package, everyone in Canada who has cable is a subscriber. Community channels are currently included in the basic package, but do not receive subscriber fees.
How channels are selected for inclusion in the basic cable package is a bit of black box magic and a bit of legislation. Some criteria are set out in the Broadcasting Act. For example, the Act states that subscribers should have access to a basic service that: (1) fosters the growth of Canada’s cultural, social, economic and political aims; (2) is varied and comprehensive, providing a balance of information and entertainment programming, at an affordable cost; (3) is drawn from local, regional, national and international sources; (4) includes educational and community programs; and (5) reflects and contributes to Canada’s linguistic duality and ethno-cultural diversity, including the special place of Aboriginal peoples in Canadian society.
