Vote Green Michiana!

The St. Joe Valley Greens are the producers of GreenTV, a weekly 30 minute public access program that has provided a valuable alternative media source for Michiana citizens since 2003.

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Comcast Closes Public Access Studios in Northern Indiana

by Tom Brown

Amy Hansen, Production Manager for Comcast Cable Communications Inc., announced on August 28 the giant cable company is closing all its public access studios in northern Indiana.

Effective September 28, the following studios will be closed.

• Hammond Studio
  844 169th Street, Hammond, IN
• Portage Studio
  2225 Locust Court, Portage, IN
• Mishawaka Studio
  4045 Edison Lakes Parkway, Mishawaka, IN

Affected are communities, citizens and cable subscribers in a broadcast area which includes counties in Indiana and Michigan. Comcast’s cable broadcast monopoly stretches from the Illinois border on the northwest to Elkhart County in north central Indiana.

Comcast claims it will reserve public access channels in northern Indiana for an unspecified time in spite of closing the studios.

Telecommunications giants AT&T and Comcast persuaded the Indiana General Assembly to pass legislation, written by the telecom companies (we think mostly by AT&T), which allows the companies to centralize all franchise agreements in one statewide commission rather than negotiate franchise agreements city by city and county by county. Included in the new law is a provision for telecom companies to abandon public access requirements and contracts if competitors do not also offer public access to its network.

Shutting down public access to media further consolidates the power of the telecom giants and diminishes grassroots access to media.

Is Cable Access Dead in Indiana?
Tom Brown, St. Joe Valley Greens, April 17, 2006

Bad FCC
Tom Brown, St. Joe Valley Greens, December 23, 2006

Public Needs YOU to Stop The FCC Now!
Alliance for Community Media, December 18, 2006

Challenging corporate control of the public’s air waves
Joanne Cvar, Green Pages, Vol. 9, Issue 4

Digital TV: Leaving viewers in limbo
Marc Gunther, FORTUNE, January 19, 2006

Tom Brown is a producer for GreenTV in South Bend, IN.

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Article published Oct 21, 2007

Comcast to shut off ‘Public Access’
Dec. 15 2006 bill alters cable companies’ obligations

CASSIE BELEK
South Bend Tribune Staff Writer

“Wayne’s World” will live on forever as everyone’s favorite fictional public access program, but in the real world of Northwest Indiana, public access is on life support.

George Lane, producer and host of “Government Accountability” on public access Channel 99, was “shocked to death” when he received notification in late August that Comcast was shutting down its Mishawaka public access studio.

The letter from a Comcast production manager in Chicago stated that as of Sept. 28, Comcast would cease operations at the Hammond, Portage and Mishawaka studios — places that public access producers rely on for filming and editing their shows.

The studio closings, however, weren’t the most disturbing news for Lane.

The letter also stated that because of statewide telecommunications legislation enacted on July 1, 2006, Comcast’s public, education and government — or PEG — access obligations had been significantly altered. The cable company is no longer required to provide public access producers with personnel, equipment or studio space.Although Comcast is still obligated to provide the capacity for a PEG channel, maintenance of that channel will be transferred over to local municipalities. In the meantime, Comcast will continue to air programs until Dec. 15.

Public access television is a free forum in which anyone in the community may produce a program and have his or her voice heard. PEG channels were initially required of cable companies by cities as a kind of payment for allowing companies to install cable lines. Programs on public access are typically religious, political or even sports- and music-related.

Comcast spokesperson Angela Amores says that there is no way to track exactly how many people tune in to public access, but Christine Becker, assistant professor in the department of film, television & theatre at the University of Notre Dame, says that viewership is probably small.

“My assumption is it’s minimal and it’s very much niche-oriented,” she says.

David Heidt, co-host of the sports talk show “Sports Frenzy,” knows that his program didn’t have many viewers, but he loved doing the show anyway.”It gave us a chance to vent,” he says.

Facing a blackout

With the studio now closed, it means that public access in the area faces a blackout — something that the producers want to avoid at all costs.

“The longer we’re black, the longer and harder it’s going to be to get back up,” Carol Davis says.

Davis, who produces and sometimes co-hosts “Your Right to Know” with husband William and others are now scrambling to find people who can help tape and edit their programs so that they can air before Dec. 15. After that date, the future of their programs is uncertain.Kevin Cramer, Heidt’s co-host and brother-in-law, says that they were notified of Comcast’s decision at the same time as Lane.

“I was very upset by this because we’ve been doing this show on and off for 15 years and we take it seriously,” Cramer says.

Heidt was disheartened by the short notice Comcast gave them.

“I think if we had been given more of a warning, it would have been easier to take,” he says.

In fact, the majority of the public access producers knew nothing about the 2006 legislation until they received the Aug. 28 letter from Comcast.”This thing has been going on since 2006, and none of us were ever notified,” “Man on the Streets” producer and host Saint Clair Poindexter says.

Reform legislation

Last year’s House Bill 1279 not only changed video service providers’ PEG obligations, but it also transferred franchising authority from local municipalities to the statewide Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission. Video service providers can opt to transfer their franchise agreements and negotiate with the IURC on a statewide level instead of negotiating franchise agreements with individual cities and counties.

The bill goes on to address the changes to cable companies’ PEG obligations, which is the part of the bill that specifically affects public access producers.

Heidt and other producers are baffled that they were not informed about the legislation’s eventual effects on public access earlier than this August.South Bend City Attorney Chuck Leone says that the City was aware of the legislation right away, but the effects were not clear.

“I don’t know that all of the implications in terms of what the cable companies were going to do were obvious at that point,” Leone says.

Indiana is one of several states, including including Michigan and Ohio, that has introduced such reform.

Jane Jankowski, Gov. Mitch Daniels’ spokesperson, says that the legislation has made Indiana a leader in telecommunications.

“What it is doing is it is resulting in more investment and more competition that in turn creates lower prices for consumers,” she says.Public access producers have slowly received word that telecommunications giant AT&T played a significant role in lobbying for the bill. Indiana Speaker of the House Pat Bauer (D-South Bend), who voted against the bill, confirms that AT&T pushed for the legislation.

Although the past year has seen a great deal of investment by AT&T in Indiana, the promise of lower prices once AT&T does expand its video services is in question.

In a June 2, 2006, article in Broadcasting & Cable, now- retired AT&T chairman Edward Whitacre said that even though legislators across the country have been touting promises of lower prices to get telecommunications legislation passed, AT&T isn’t interested in a price war.

“I don’t think there’s going to be a price war,” he said in the article. “I think it’s going to be a war of value and of services.”

Bauer says that throughout the passage of the bill, the focus remained on the prospects of increased investment and competition.”The public access question never really came up as I recall,” he says, “but I can’t say it wasn’t known.”

Challenges to community

Despite AT&T’s involvement in the bill, public access producers still remain disappointed in Comcast.

Joe DeKever, sponsor of the pro-life program “Life Talk,” says that public access was an important part of Comcast’s commitment to the community, especially because of all the different viewpoints public access voiced.

“The access channel encourages institutional, education and religious airing of viewpoints to organizations that could never afford to broadcast their message via commercial media,” he says.Notre Dame’s Becker agrees with DeKever that Comcast’s decision hampers people’s abilities to have their voice heard.

“It’s a form of communication for people who don’t have the means otherwise,” she says.

Becker also is concerned that the decision violates localism in television, because the voices of the producers are voices unique to the South Bend community and their programs specifically address the community.

Amores says that Comcast is helping local municipalities take over control of program playback. That means that the survival of public access now rests in the cities’ hands.

Leone says that the transition won’t be easy because the local public access channel serves several municipalities.”One of the issues, of course, that we run into is there’s more than one unit of local government in the area,” he says. “The question then becomes which governmental unit ends up taking responsibility.”

Common Council member Dr. David Varner (R-5th) says that the City of South Bend’s Common Council meetings have stopped airing even before the transition date because Comcast not only used to air the meetings, but filmed them as well. Currently, the council is working with WNIT Public Television for assistance in getting the meetings back on the public access channel.

The majority of public access producers, however, don’t have as many options.

A group of producers, facilitated by the Rev. Sylvester Williams Jr., met on Oct. 4 to plan a collective strategy, but the group failed to reach a consensus on what its next move should be.

Erik Mollberg, the assistant manager at Access Fort Wayne, a not-for-profit that operates Fort Wayne’s two public access channels and one government access channel, says that he is willing to offer assistance to producers and the city to start a not-for-profit similar to the one in Fort Wayne.”We’re here because we want to see those communities succeed, because public access television is the one way for community members to express what the issues are,” he says.

He also says that citizens and producers “need to be vocal” if public access is going to survive.

Something the producers have been vocal about is their disappointment in Mayor Stephen Luecke’s lack of a response to the issue. Poindexter, who has been the host of “Man on the Streets” since 1996, and others want public access to be an issue before the election on Nov. 6.

An uncertain future

As the shock wears off, it appears that any action regarding public access’ future has come to a standstill.Meanwhile, George Lane, a World War II veteran, can’t continue his latest endeavor. For the past six months, he has interviewed fellow WWII veterans on his program. With veterans dying at a rapid daily rate, Lane wants to capture as many stories as he can before it is too late.

In addition to interviewing veterans, he remains committed to holding the government accountable to its citizens. He ultimately believes in the people’s voice, something he is afraid will be lost if public access disappears forever.