Blog · Page 4 of 17

Can you be part of our excellence?

WPAA-TV and Community Media Center is More.Than.TV. But our commitment to our primary mission is not only strong, it is recognize for excellence.

#wpaatv is the Alliance for Community Media Hometown Overall Excellence winner – small CommunityTV again in 2022 (2019, 21).
And our youth team wins honors for advocacy videos. A local producer also takes top honors in Children’s programming. (More on this soon in another story.)

Enjoy Raise The Curtain on the Arts #TheGreatGive Special featuring the Mike Casey Jazz Trio May 4th, 8 pm on #wpaatv (streaming & TV) with a replay at midnight and then 5 pm Thursday.

What we do together supports many organizations in Wallingford. Check out the #theGreatGive06492 campaign here.

TheGreatGive06492

Please consider being part of our excellence as a grassroots donor. As little as $5 can bring content in 2 languages to our community, underwrite festival fees for our producers, support our award winning youth training imitative: Team Hercules Youth.

https://www.thegreatgive.org/organizations/wallingford-public-access

All that is missing is U.

Open Letter | Fees & Public Rights Of Way

A position that keeps one’s soul safe, for a short time.

Feb 22, 2022
Open Letter to Members of the Energy and Technology Committee regarding Fees & Public Rights of Way
Re: AN ACT REQUIRING …COMMUNITY ACCESS … TO BE TRUE & CURRENT

I wish to write an able letter with the gravity of turn of the 19th-century letters to newspaper editors. These letters ‘of the people’ stirred public discourse. They contributed to the American experiment, much the way Community Television, another experiment, was intended to do with stories, ideas, and an engaged citizenry—achieving the complex task of living in community as a democracy.

The hypothesis, for both of these experiments, is that public discourse is a vital tool in maintaining the sovereignty of the people. Discourse is intended to lead to change. In a democracy, the expectation is that a public interest is served.

As you are well aware, changes in technology and business practice are already on the horizon which could further distance the intent of any legislation tethered to technology from its intended outcomes.

Which leads us to today, and the proposed Community Access Act before this committee which would take one essential step: affirmation of the long-standing use of public-rights-of-way fees for funding for Public, Educational and Government (PEG) channels. However, it is my highly-informed opinion that updating state law, PA 95-150, to clarify public-rights-of-way eligibility for assessment of fees falls short of the need for legislative and regulatory updates.

History Simplified

Decades of federal & state legislation couples public-rights-of way with public speech.

In 1984, Congress clarified local government’s power to negotiate franchise agreements and establish public access channels (Public, Educational and Government or PEG channels). In 1992, the regulatory hands of state and local authorities were strengthened. After 62 years, the 1996 Cable Act foreshadowed an increase in demand for franchises, and more importantly, use of the public rights of way.

In Connecticut, in the mid-90s, the cable television industry lobbied your peers successfully for regulatory change. Public Act 95-150 emerged. From the pro-competitive, deregulatory intent of federal and state legislation in this era, telephone companies emerged as content providers for television viewers. By fiat, they deconstructed the CT franchise system in 2007, an outcome desired by their competitors in the cable industry. Unfortunately, what is left in the wake of AT&T’s entry into and exit out of the market as a state-wide franchise is chaos exacerbated further by Frontier Communications (AT & T’s successor) imminent abandonment of competitive video programming. 2007 was a tipping point in the further deterioration of community television capabilities and the beginning of public challenges regarding new revenue streams free from obligations to pay for use of the public rights of way. I conclude, as do many of my peers, that the archaic outdated legacy language and mechanisms of PA 95-150, and subsequent acts and regulations, are not adequately serving our communities nor any other stakeholders’ interest.

BEFORE THIS COMMITTEE
The proposed act focuses narrowly on the long-standing intent that PEG channels be underwritten from paid-use of the public rights of way. The authority to legislate fees as proposed is provided for in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (47U.S.C.A. 254(c)1

The 1996 Act provides: “Nothing in this section affects the authority of a State or local government to manage the public rights-of-way or to require fair and reasonable compensation from telecommunications providers on a competitively neutral and nondiscriminatory basis, for use of the public rights of way on a nondiscriminatory basis, if the compensation required is publicly disclosed by such government.”

Testimony from the parties who wrangled consideration of the proposed ‘MVPD fee’ act put forth metrics on revenue losses to community television providers. Losses can be attributed directly to legacy language that does not account for changes in the methods of video content delivery: traditional cables evolution into broadband service (Internet and content streaming). Broadband industry representatives will infer that they are incurring losses. If the question narrowly targets income from legacy systems this is true so what explains escalating profits in this time of cable TV demise.

I have contributed based on Interrogatories to the chorus on revenue loss [1] [[2] [3] in PURA Docket 21-07-26 | The Public Utilities Regulatory Authority Annual Community Access Support Review. Our data affirms that Wallingford Public Access Association (WPAA-TV) revenues are at 2010 levels. They are steadily and rapidly decreasing as Frontier disengages from the market and cord-cutting escalates.

A Broader Lens on Use and Revenue Featuring Comcast
Comcast Business, the predominant cable television content provider in my town, no longer refers to itself as ‘cable TV’. Their public financial reports confirm revenue growth from streaming services. Evidence follows:

Press Release: Comcast Business Continues its Rapid Growth. Its 2021 report declares, The number of devices connected to WiFi has skyrocketed by 12X since 2018 as Xfinity households connected nearly 1 billion devices in 2021.
—devices connected to WiFi during the year – a 14X increase from 2018

As Comcast’s legacy video business continues to shrink, its new streaming venture has grown rapidly. Comcast said its cable segment saw its best quarterly customer relationship growth on record thanks to high-speed internet customer net additions totaling 633,000. … “Driven by our industry-leading platform and strategic focus on broadband, aggregation and streaming, we added a record 633,000 high-speed internet customers and 556,000 total net new customer relationships.

Comcast’s Cable TV Woes Continue Into Q3: Here’s Why It Doesn’t Matter
• Comcast is no longer wasting resources and capital to secure unprofitable cable customers.
• The company is instead making the most of a cable infrastructure that’s no longer limited to delivering cable TV transmissions in one direction.
• Regardless, cable television itself wasn’t and isn’t a must-thrive sort of enterprise for Comcast.

ACTIVE PEG REVENUE PURA DOCKET 21-07-26
I can assure you of one thing, there is consensus from all stakeholders that this docket is structurally flawed. Unfortunately, transparency demonstrates how ill-prepared PURA is to handle this well-intentioned docket: From service list data-errors to flaws in database architecture to well-meaning permissions to ask more, and more, tangential questions. As with most ‘corporate attorneys vs. the people’ forums, the interactions have been passive aggressive, argumentative, sometimes hyperbolic, and rarely, enlightening.

No outcome from this proceeding will solve what is broken. This docket began last July. It takes an even narrower look at Public, Educational and Government or PEG channels funding via the CPI index for per subscriber increases. At this time, there are likely thousands of pages of correspondence. Data base flaws likely account for 700% of the redundancy. This docket shines a light on many administrative flaws in the administration of non-franchise franchises. It demonstrates PURA’s need for legislative authority to effect solution-based, cost-effective change to regulations, service areas, municipal equity. PURA could also be authorize to engage parties to seek solutions, identify best practices, acknowledge fails, and discover opportunities from the decades of data provided in Community Access Annual Reports. If PURA’s franchise duties were funded from the public-rights-of-way fees, ALL stakeholders could see significant direct, and opportunity, cost savings and better outcomes.

AN ACT REQUIRING MULTICHANNEL VIDEO PROGRAMMING
DISTRIBUTORS TO PAY A COMMUNITY ACCESS PROGRAMING FEE

In summation, the state legislature has the authority to extend the long-standing cable fee to other services using the same rights of way. But if the action taken is limited to an extension of the revenue, absent any provisions to update the administrative and service infrastructures, the outcome will be a costly disservice to all stakeholders.

This act can come out of committee with more than a modification to fees for all uses of the public rights. The act can require updating all aspects of management of users of public rights of way for commercial content & delivery services, inclusive, but not limited to:
– franchise fees underwriting the cost of PURA’s franchise administration
– reparations for the unintended consequences of PA-150 (municipality inequity)
– elimination of redundancy (i.e. 14 franchise areas vs. Comcast Connecticut)
– improve data accuracy (How is is it for the public to find their Community Access Station(s)?
– review channel capacity (Can P E G channels be defined as capacity? Or by function? )
– review advisory roles (What has your Cable Advisory Council done lately?)
– identify best practices (Let’s start with predictable programming. )

Fact: A problem continues if you treat the symptoms rather than the root cause. Inadequate revenue for community media is a symptom. Disabling and devaluing the role of citizen media is the relationship problem. The biggest fail for all stakeholders is inequity, archaic systems and acquisition of data without analysis. Echoing Langston Hughes, I am concerned that the community media experiment will continue to fail to fulfill its promise … for all people without comprehensive legislation and regulatory action.

Sincerely,

Susan Adele Huizenga
Volunteer Executive Director
WPAA-TV and Community Media Center

‘What if’ Community TV was embraced by Cable TV?

For over five decades, cable companies have not embraced Community TV a.k.a. Public Education Government Access TV (P.E.G.)

In the 1960s, Cable Cowboys envisioned that an alternative to broadcast TV could be their gold rush. For many it was. They secured air rights and put up poles and lines in communities across America. There are now a few dominant cable television corporations, and several midsize, each with geographically limited service areas. The geography is not limited. Mergers and acquisitions have created giants such as Comcast Corporation with footprints in many states.

Digital TV | The new gold rush is ‘digital TV’. What digital television content providers have in common is the move to streaming services. Cable TV cord-cutters decrease direct cable TV profits, concurrently reducing the expense of community TV. However, cable companies often retain the cable TV cord-cutters as Internet service customers, as there are many people that love watching TV and they even get a full motion wall mounts to watch it more comfortably.

Cord cutters are typically revolting against the high cost of premium packages and their restrictions on choice. But they all need the Internet and a device to stream the content they choose to view. Much of the streamed content, unless provided via satellite, uses the same infrastructure (air rights and poles) as cable TV.

Cable TV corporations are now branding as “Internet Service Providers’. All are represented by trade associations, lobbyists and corporate attorneys. More than $230 million was spent on lobbying and political donations during the 116th Congress (2019), targeted at expanding broadband with government infrastructure investments. Another goal for cable lobbyists and lawyers is the elimination of community TV, or at a minimum, decreasing its expense.

To put it another way:

Cable lawyers are charged with bullying the cable companies way out of obligation to pay for air rights for cable TV; while concurrently seeking billions in government support for 5G infrastructure build out.

An unintended consequence of cable TV cord cutting by consumers is that they unknowingly put deep cuts into their local community TV station’s life-lines. Here is where the lawyers come in to play. They keep the focus of the arguments on the technical language in the laws; language used at the birth of the industry. They fail to concede that the intent of the Cable Acts were to establish payment to communities for air rights—permission to put poles on every street and make a profit.

The last huge and successful push in Connecticut to minimize cable companies out-of-pocket costs for P.E.G. happened in 1995. The passage of PA 95-150 created a statewide franchise, one of the first in the nation. The Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA), it was DEEP at the time, became directly responsible for managing community TV compensation as part of their oversight of all functional aspects of cable TV (CATV) as a utility.

Consequences of 1995 Statewide Franchise | The 1995 law, and subsequent regulations, eliminated the in depth review of actual costs, capital investment in local communities, and overall provisions of service by the cable companies including community TV. It lessened many corporate costs, including legal overhead of the franchise renewal process, as well as any substantive burden of proof of quality services. Local input regarding services, and the capabilities of community TV was muted; some would say “eliminated.” The 1995 Act was a huge win for cable companies. It did, however, retain community TV in every community in Connecticut based on the models adopted in the original franchise agreements. A major oversight in 1995 was that no accommodations were made for the local communities that had NOT recently renewed their franchise. Those with recent renewals have had capacity and financial advantages over their neighbors to this day.

There was another shake-up to the community TV movement in 2007 in which language was central to the discussion and outcomes PA 07-253. At that time AT&T sought a state-wide franchise as an IPTV provider in part to shed responsibility for air rights payments. This shake-up grandfathered franchise areas but alted renewal, franchise by franchise

At this time an Annual Community Access Support Review is conducted. This process has been a cut & past exercise resulting in a CPI index increase in subscriber fee payments until 2021, the year the index increased enough to argue about. Community Access Providers, Cable Companies, and Advisory Councils are to file reports to theses Dockets: Here is the references from 2015 to 2021: The Public Utilities Regulatory Authority Annual Community Access Support Review 15-01-17, 16-01-17, 17-01-09, 18-01-32, 19-02-15, 20-01-09 , 21-02-52

Cable TV cord cutting is slowly defunding community TV stations upwards to 40%.

Is it all about the money?

As every household knows, merchandise and service costs have risen. Until 2021, the CPI has been low; therefore, cable companies had no significant basis to object to fee increases. However, this year, they suggested, using the language of the regulations, that there be an extensive review of ‘what community media television providers’ are providing and their ‘value’?

In 2020, certain Community TV providers requested a docket be open regarding treating all Multichannel Video Programming Distributors in the same manner as cable TV (Docket 20-01-34). MVPD essentially refers to all manner of getting content on your television. The outcome favored the direct meaning of ‘cable’; thereby; outweighing the air rights intent of federal cable law. The decision also signaled that the only mechanism for change was legislative.

DOCKET NO. 21-07-26 | Is the annual review of community TV funding currently underway. It has become a cumbersome docket. In this review, PURA Commissioners need to ascertain if the historic use of CPI will be applied to subscriber payments payable to Cable Access Providers by cable companies. Or, if there are mitigating circumstance such as cord-cutting to take alternative action to increase, or decrease, or adjust payments. According to cable company representatives, only a portion of the cost of community TV is passed through to customers on the bill as a franchise fee. This docket includes bills showing the franchise fee is one of the smallest fees on cable TV bills (often less than 50 cents a month).

What has been an administrative exercise for decades, adjusting per subscriber payments payable by cable companies, is now a battle ground. This docket has reopened wounds from 1995 and provided some transparency on the impact of cord-cutting in local communities. It has provided very little insight into the digital landscape as content distribution changes. More importantly, it has given rise to discrediting community TV through inference and procedural maneuvering by cable company attorneys.

This docket can not directly address the air rights uses of cable companies, or the responsibility of cable companies to cover reasonable capital investments by local communities; all things references in this inquiry. It could, however, determine that a full review of the data collected by PURA since the 1995 law be the basis on which to reform the process in the public interest. An independent, or representative group, could be designated to do the analysis. My suggestion would be a joint contract with nonprofit data analysis organizations. There is one in New Haven and Hartford. No one should have a commercial incentive in any next step and bias is a valid concern.

Confounded by Covid

There was a public hearing via Zoom on Jan 31st. Many individuals, including myself, were listening to the proceedings (as we multi-tasked). An opportunity for public comment was extended at the beginning of the session. No one offered comments. I assumed public comments would be opened again after the planned testimony. Not so.

For more than four hours, the participant interactions were a potpourri of flagrant, confrontational, disparaging, lambasting, obsequious, confusing, uniformed; culminating (in my opinion) in embarrassing, rather than substantive contributions to the public discourse. The proceeding was primarily testimony from cable companies, and self-appointed representatives of the community TV movement.

The roles in this public exchange were all too familiar and (in my opinion) much of the discussion, misdirected. Absent were the community TV representatives whose doors did not close, whose production did not lessen during COVID, who also lost revenue.

The community TV providers ascribed importance to their existence with hyperbole, self-affirmations of years of existence; and focused their contributions to the conversation on losses due to cord-cutting.

The cable companies tried to redirect the conversation to the value of Community TV. Some went as far as to suggest demonstration of community TV’s relevance is nothing but ‘anecdotal’. This is actually true. We are one story at a time. The only data available to community stations is qualitative. Any discussion of value should align with the purpose of community media, a narrowcast of hyper-local citizen media, transparency in government, a partial answer to the digital divide and life-long learning. A case could be made that failure to embrace our unique form of content makes it easier for cord-cutters to choose cutting over community. Value is a very subjective word. The inference that viewer counts measure the worth of community media is an age old tactic. Viewership counts is a whole other conversation.

To put it simply, the hearing was not additive. Nothing new was contributed, no consensus was presented, and no true advocacy for our work was apparent. Suggestion of a collaborative effort to better our mutual service in the public interest was not identified. There was no clear call to action, not even to use the CPI as issued, to update subscriber fees as a minimum outcome.

Conn. Gen. Stat. § 16-331a(k) and §§ 16-331a-1 et seq. of the Regulations of Connecticut State Agencies requires the Authority to conduct an annual proceeding to adjust community access funding to reflect consumer price index change.

Industry lobbyist, including New England Cable TV Association, Inc., NECTA filed correspondence representing the companies purse strings. Their testimony asserts cable fees’ are television specific, not applicable to Internet services, and the CPI increase should be scrutinized based on the ‘value’ of Community TV in the community.

Going on The Record

Among my duties | As the administrator of WPAA-TV, I am responsible for monitoring and responding to various dockets inclusive of filing of an annual report (2021) about what we do with our community. The 2021 Annual Community Access Support Review docket has required multiple replies. We were directly invoked to reply a few times. This was so with questions promulgated by the Office of Consumer Counsel (OCC) regarding amount of, and impact of, losses in cable subscriber fees.[1] [2] [3] WPAA-TV was also directed to reply to Comcast on Feb 4th. It did not go unnoticed that the entity with the staff —the cable company —failed to designate the intended respondents correctly in the docket. Our franchise was not listed and all respondents were linked to all referenced franchise areas. Similarly, these questions may not reach all the designated responders because the service list is faulty. I share this fact, in part, to demonstrate the action by Comcast was to invoke a burden on the proceedings and the little guys, community TV providers.

Today, February 4th, I was compelled to OBJECT to being burdened with questions posed by Comcast, one of two cable providers serving Wallingford.

My reply to Comcast in PURA DOCKET NO. 21-07-26 follows. For context, an excerpt of the Comcast filing is shown after my objection. Of note, this docket was to be nearing conclusion.

Objection To “first set of interrogatories by Comcast” filed Feb 4

Dear Secretary Gaudiosi:

Understanding that Comcast was granted the opportunity to file interrogatories in the public hearing 01.31.2022, I want to express an Objection to this set of interrogatories and any further interrogatories.

Why? Several reasons, but foremost is that this information is in the public record in Annual Reports.* Additionally, data Is in a recent docket on the PEGPETIA process [07‐10‐11RE01] as well as in the responses to the OCC interrogatories in this docket. There is considerable similarity to the Annual Report and these questions. (PURA Report Form)

On behalf of all community TV staff and volunteers, as I am both, we are not in any position to retrieve, compile and summarize data for these questions. Several entities identified to respond to this request have yet to engage in the docket. I suggest that it is not out of disinterest but rather due to inability. Others have testified about staff shortages. Even the OCC referred to the burden of data collection in the recent public hearing. Others of us are too aware of improprieties, injustices, and inadequacies not to engage—even if our days extend into evenings and weekends.

Indeed, a thorough analysis of the data identified in these questions is warranted. But, that is a research project, which in my opinion needs to be staffed and have accountability to report to PURA and the legislature. Perhaps, a conclusion to study can be set forth in this docket.

There are blemishes to be found on both sides of this uncomfortable marriage between cable companies and the community media enablers. The landscape has changed but the intent of the Cable Act remains more relevant than ever. Collectively, we are failing to provide our communities with adequate benefits from use of the airways. There are several approaches to the work, as well as decades of evidence to review what works and what does not. In my opinion, this docket can make some reparations. Specifically, it can address the disenfranchising of some communities which occurred in 1995 when the state law did not account for various stages of ‘franchise renewals’. Herein, selective CPI adjustments can now be a stop gap.

The inference that viewer counts are the measure of our value is far from accurate. Hyper-local means one-person at a time: a producer so passionate about a topic that hours, days, weeks or years are invested to show others why, a senior participating in a weekly church service on TV from the comfort of their home, a youth who completes the census form as ‘white’ can find a place to express their uncertainty because they are ‘other’, an addict can tune in to testimony on TV when they need a meeting, or listen when redistributed as a podcast, or a child can imagine making movies and realize that dream. There is still the magic of “I was on TV”, despite of the ubiquity of the Internet. Community media is about community connectivity, tools & stage, training and uplifting voices—not cablecast views.

In the public hearing, Attorney Bogan inferred that anecdotal and qualitative data is irrelevant. Yet, government meeting transparency has value in the moment and as archival records. A study might conclude that educational programming has a better means of delivery, or can be a better portal, for other investments in content by our government as lifelong learning.

Why the cable companies across the nation have chosen to disregard the opportunities community television can provide, ‘working together’ with community advocates, is baffling. With years of lack of intentional investment, our collective value has diminished. We remain relevant in so many ways partly because we change lives one person at a time. A true examination of the public record, the proprietary withheld data, and viewer, producer and staff interviews, could make the cable tv investment in community media life-changing for many,

So in conclusion, I object to this request by Comcast and further ask the commissioners to reassess the approval for interrogatories as they likely did not foresee this burden in data collection. In seeking clarification with Comcast, they indicated a desire to have this data as part of this docket. If such a need exists, a list of 2016-2021 Annual Report Dockets and the PEGPETIA process evaluation docket, could be entered into the record to meet that need.
Sincerely,

Susan Huizenga
Volunteer Executive Director
WPAA-TV and Community Media Center
* WPAA-TV Annual Reports our accumulated here

STATE OF CONNECTICUT PUBLIC UTILITIES REGULATORY AUTHORITY
RE: THE PUBLIC UTILITIES REGULATORY AUTHORITY ANNUAL COMMUNITY ACCESS SUPPORT REVIEW : DOCKET NO. 21-07-26

FEBRUARY 4, 2022
COMCAST OF CONNECTICUT INC.’S
FIRST SET OF INTERROGATORIES
Comcast of Connecticut, Inc. (“Comcast”) hereby requests responses from BCTV; Bloomfield Access TV; Citizens Television; Inc.; Community Voice Channel; ETV 18/Access; E. H. Comm. TV.; Guilford Community TV; Madison Community TV; Madison Community Access Group; Newington Community TV; Inc.; North Haven Community TV; Nutmeg TV; Rocky Hill Comm. TV; Sheehan High School; Simsbury Comm. TV; Skye Cable XIII; Soundview; Southeastern CT TV; Thames Valley Comm.; TOTOKET TV; Town of EH Access; Valley Shore Community TV; Wallingford Public Access; Wethersfield Comm. TV; WHC-TV; Windsor Community YV to the following interrogatories in the above-captioned proceeding by February 18, 2022.

Financial Information
COMCAST-1 Provide financial statements for your organization, for the years 2016-2021 reflecting the following information:

• Income
• Salaries
• Assets
• Cash on hand
• Expenses

COMCAST-2 Provide your organization’s tax returns for the years 2016-2021.
COMCAST-3 Has your organization applied for a Public, Educational, and Governmental Programming and Education Technology Investment Account (PEGPETIA) grant at any time during the period 2015-2021? If so, provide the amount sought, and if appropriate, the amount granted.
COMCAST-4 Has your organization applied for any PEGPETIA funding in the current round of funding through Docket 21-10-13? If so, please include the amount of funding requested.
COMCAST-5 Did your organization seek any funding through any COVID-19 economic relief programs, including the Paycheck Protection Program? If so, provide the amount sought, and if applicable, the amount granted.
COMCAST-6 Describe any fundraising efforts undertaken by your organization during the period 2016-2021.
Programming
COMCAST-7 Provide the number of regular users of your access studio and the number of programs produced or originating from your access studio for the period 2016-2021, by year.
Statutory Requirements
COMCAST-8 Reference the criteria set forth Conn. Gen. Stat. §§16-331a(c) and 16-331a(k). If your organization is seeking an increase in per-subscriber funding beyond a percentage reflecting the consumer price index for calendar year 2021, explain how your organization’s request satisfies each of the statutory criteria, as set forth below:

(1) The recommendations of the advisory council and of the municipalities in the franchise area;
(2) a review of the organization’s performance in providing community access programming;
(3) the operating plan submitted by the organization for providing community access programming;
(4) the experience in community access programming of the organization;
(5) the organization’s proposed budget, including expenses for salaries, consultants, attorneys, and other professionals;
(6) the quality and quantity of the programming to be created, promoted or facilitated by the organization;
(7) a review of the organization’s procedures to ensure compliance with federal and state law, including the regulations of Connecticut state agencies,
(8) the level of public interest in community access operations in the franchise area,
(9) the level of community need for educational access programming,
(10) the level and breadth of participation in community access operations,
(11) the adequacy of existing facilities, equipment and training programs to meet the current and future needs of the franchise area; and
(12) any other factors determined to be relevant by the authority

Success in U.S. | SCOW Turns 50

The Spanish Community of Wallingford (SCOW) has a track record of providing basic services for the diverse Spanish speaking immigrants in the Wallingford/Meriden area that spans five decades. Its mission, like the culture & heritage organizations a century old or older, is to respond to and assist with the needs of immigrants as they achieve success in U.S. society.

It is common for immigrant communities to establish formal clubs in order to welcome and serve individuals from their homeland. Such clubs include: The Hungarian Club (104 yrs), the Italian Club in Wallingford (111 yrs) formally known as Libero Pensiero Mutual Aid Society, and the Polish National Alliance (122 yrs). Some have strong affiliations with places of faith like the Irish Ancient Order of Hibernian Club, Meriden (186 yrs NYC) and the Jewish Community Center of Greater New Haven with roots 168 yrs deep. Each organization serves as an important base for cultural heritage and community engagement to this day. Unlike many of the cultural immigrant organizations that precede it, The Spanish Community of Wallingford (50yrs) serves the local Latino Community, which arrives from various points around the globe. The new arrivals share a language, some traditions, and the universal desire to succeed in the USA.

A Decade of Language Literacy with local-global TV

A decade ago, during a frank conversation about not being multilingual, the concept of #in2languages #en2idiomas television program was born. This program, a language literacy ‘learn by watching TV’ show, became a collaboration between SCOW and WPAA-TV. The pilot #in2languages #en2idiomas was launched in 2013. Initially, WPAA-TV scheduled programs when the likelihood was high that community members would be in SCOW’s lobby where a television was tuned to WPAA-TV.

When individuals in our organizations, network and experience each other’s programs, we find ways to amplify our mutual interest in public service.

At first, program content was underwritten by a grant and contract arrangement between WPAA-TV and Deutsche Welle, the German media company. When the grant ended in 2017, Ion Bank helped with the acquisition cost of Spanish language content for one year. They also underwrote production of promotional videos for #in2languages #en2idiomas. By this time, content had expanded to three news magazines. The scheduling was midday from Monday to Friday and simulcast on the Internet by WPAA-TV.

Two members of the SCOW community, with the help of Team Hercules interns, provided some transparency on language learning with their personal stories. It may be hard to believe but the ubiquity of television is as old as SCOW. Sitcoms and other serial television programs have been a resource for language literacy for many immigrants since in the 1970s, starting with the AARP generation.

Community collaborations can transform lives.

Within this collaboration, each organization has a role. SCOW commits to representing the content for play as #GoodEnough2Share. SCOW is publicly identified as representing content for local play and as with all Good Enough2Share programs, SCOW assumes some promotional responsibilities. WPAA-TV handles all the administration including contracting, downloading, ingesting, scheduling and processing payment for content.

#in2languages #en2idiomas now includes four news magazines. The latest show added to the line-up is the health news magazine In Good Shape | En Forma. Content is now scheduled midday from Monday to Saturday. This content becomes more than a great source for quality news based on how it is scheduled. The same news magazines, in each language, are scheduled consecutively. This approach creates an opportunity for viewers to learn either English or Spanish while viewing current global news. The 11:30 am-12:30 pm hour is cablecast in Spanish, including Public Service Announcements.

For more about the program go here.

Community Support Keeps Language Literacy on WPAA-TV

Content and administrative costs are about $1,000 each annually. Donations received in the Annual Great Give from friends of WPAA-TV and SCOW help underwrite the cost of the exceptional magazine style content contracted from DW.DE. Grassroots support (donations as low as $5 a year) help us demonstrate the value of this program to the community. If you are just hearing about this for the first time, we encourage you to watch. If you agree with us that it is a excellent public service, we look forward to your support in May during TheGreatGive. 2022 updates will be live April 1st.

You Recorded A Community Event. Now What?

You recorded a community experience on Zoom or a similar application. Now what? Consider how video reproduction and redistribution on community TV can be a vital service to your community organization. There are a few ways. Redistribution and/or reproduction can help increase the reach of program content that has evergreen value. Consider this.

Before There Was Zoom …

Historically, community TV providers said “Let us help by giving you a camera in the room.” Truthfully, that was not as successful as we would have liked. But now by virtue of changes in the world, most organizations have a camera capturing their community engagement with a meeting app such as Zoom, Google Meet or MicroSoft Teams. So you are allset. Right? And you think community TV is not relevant. Right! But, maybe we can actually provide more value than we have historically. First, did you know we can share ‘app captured content’ as television? That is right, our purpose for being is sharing community created content. Previously, we encouraged you to make video content and provided the tools to do so. We still do that. See more about tools a bit later.

Distribution Opportunity: Now More Than Ever

Before there was Zoom, Facebook and YouTube there was community TV. We, WPAA-TV, can provide value to other civic organizations in this new communication landscape in a few ways. We can provide one or more of the following:

1. an additional channel for content distribution. A TV channel.
2. reproduction for ease of listening and/or content promotion
3. secondary redistribution of ‘played on TV content’ on our As Told Here podcast
4. tools are still available including webcams to remote participants, light for your meeting rooms, cloud editing and laptops.

Why reproduce?

Improve ease of listening. Share highlights. Create archives. Reach a broader audience.

If your goal is to have an archive worthy production, a program that respects the secondary listener’s time, or excerpts of key ideas for promotion, a video reproduction/remix can provide value. Many of the videos captured on live calls, or in hybrid meetings, include content specific to the event ‘as it happens’, technical glitch interruptions, presentations with hums, thought words and extraneous mentions by the presenter(s). An hour could become 45 minutes. Shorter is always better. A 30 second or 2 minute sound-byte may be the introduction that brings more viewers to the content.

Reproduction is time consuming. That is why it rarely happens. Three to four hours can easily be spent to ‘reproduce’ a 30 minute segment.

Video reproduction or remix provides a learning opportunity on 2 levels. It increases your contents audience by one or more young people that would never have listened and it develops critical listening & media making skills.

Our youth media training program, turns ‘as it happened’ video recordings into ‘concise evergreen’ video productions. We can also create social media promotional clips. This is coordinated in our Community Service and media training programs. Anyone can take a picture, but everyone is not a photographer. Any event can be recorded, but every recording is not a production.

How to submit content to WPAA-TV

We still need permission to share your content and the organization submitting must accept responsibility for the content. A fillable media release for organizations is on our website in the Deep Dive Section. This form provides us with permission to either share content as sent, or reproduce content to optimization the value and reach. Reproduction works best with source files. Source files can be sent this Email. We can also work with downloads from YouTube links.

In conclusion:

Now that there are more tools, why not optimize how you extend your reach into the community with the comfort and ease of TV? Or provide opportunities for youth to hear your content as they optimize it. Or, provide a listen only opportunity for evergreen content via our podcast.

Spanish Language TV | nuestra misión for More Than a Decade

For a decade, providing the community with Spanish Language TV has been part of WPAA-TV’s core mission. Often people are unaware of what can be seen on community TV or how content is determined. In this season of giving, it seemed to be a good time to share some history about the the gift of learning language by watching community TV.

#in2languages #en2idiomas, our collaborative language literacy program, features four magazine style Spanish language TV news programs produced by DW.de. Enforma , Global 3000 , Enfoque Europa and Vision Futuro are scheduled three time a week, midday (11:30 am to 12:30 pm). The same content produced in English, precedes and follows, this daily hour of current global news in Spanish.

The cablecast of DW.de content as Community TV in Wallingford is possible through a #GoodEnough2Share arrangement with the Spanish Community of Wallingford (SCOW). The cablecast schedule is designed to support language literacy in either English or Spanish by viewers of the local TV channel: Comcast 18/1070 in Wallingford or Frontier 6091 in CT.

Watching television is reportedly one of the most common ways for people from different cultures to learn a new language. The value of our initiative is heightened by the quality of the programs available to us from dw.de. Their news magazines provides useful, informative content to viewers. Our scheduling format provides the opportunity to increased language literacy skills.

As one viewer put it:

#in2languages is much better than watching sitcoms and guessing what is being said.

In addition to watching on cable TV channels, our juxtaposition of this excellent content can be viewed from anywhere in the world via our HD streaming platform on the wpaa.tv website. However, the impetus for the program remains to provide a local language literacy resource.

For viewing information go to our webpage

For more than a decade | Since Oct 2012

Our collaborative Language Literacy Program: #In2Languages #En2Idiomas Initiative began in October 2012 with two world news programs from Deutsche Welle. Now four news programs are scheduled in tandem, weekdays from Monday to Saturday, with the same goal: increasing viewer fluency in either language as they stay abreast of global events. The current programs include health and tech innovation stories.

In the initial years, content was scheduled to play concurrent with a high likelihood that community members might watch on the TV in SCOW’s lobby/wait area.

Spanish Language TV| Mission-centric| nuestra misión

Since its inception in 2012 as a 13-week pilot program, the governance team considered the collaboration mission-centric. In 2013, then Board member Rich Mavrogeanes said, “The Spanish speaking community is underserved with local content. In WPAA’s first Strategic Plan (2010), the organization recommitted to long-standing community media principles of serving ‘underserved populations’. This is how it can be done.”

#In2Languages #En2Idiomas continues to be central to the mission of WPAA-TV even as the latest strategic plan refocuses on local stories: To increase awareness, value and relevance within the community of Wallingford with local stories. WPAA-TV’s commitment to underserved voices remains as strong as ever. The local productions and collaborations selected by WPAA-TV to fulfill its mission are anchored in the fundamental principles of citizen media*, including “inclusion, equity and diversity as critical assets for a thriving democracy.”

Now a decade old, #In2Languages | #en2idiomas remains integral to WPAA-TV thanks to the generosity of community donors. Special thanks to Michael and Zorayda Cocchi whose annual donation to WPAA-TV seeds the community donations for this initiative. $900 is needed to cover the Spanish content cost. The English versions of the same stories remain available via a generous content grant from Deutsche Welle.

Over the years, wpaatv secured grants to cover the costs of all content. Today, the the initiative’s existence is reliant on community support. Friends of SCOW and WPAA-TV donate to WPAA-TV via the community-wide TheGreatGive fundraiser in May. May is when the DW contract renews. Community support reaffirms #in2languages #en2idiomas is relevant. Relevant content is a gift. The volunteers at WPAA-TV look forward to supporting this midday gift of language literacy in 2022.

In 2019, the health magazine In Good Shape | Enforma was added to the program line-up. At the same time scheduling was extended from weekdays to include Saturdays. The video above was produced in 2017.

* The principle sited governs how the organization invests its resources in the public interest. WPAA-TV has no editorial control over local producers nor does it have the ability to restrict eligibility because people do not abide by operating principles.

Community Awards

One measure of success is community awards; especially, from peers. Another is to enable enough community engagement for ‘community produced’ television to happen regularly.

We strive daily for a moment of time from residents, civic leaders and those interested in advocacy, performance and connection. We hope that in brief moments of connection, either intentional or accidental, people find a ripple that leads to more. It could be more TV viewing, or even better, conversations with us and neighbors. As our penguin ambassador shares: WPAA-TV wants to be the feather that tickles you to service, tells you a best-kept secret, supports your voice being heard, and encourages your informed participation in democracy. Our viewers are as important to us as those who explore the “make TV” experience. We can be excellent at content creation, but if no one is watching, we miss out on the community reward of connection.

We presented our year to the judges in a video annual report. #wpaatv cablecasts hundreds of hours of local programming each year. Representing the entire year in 20 minutes is a challenge. In addition to having an overall awareness of the year’s shows, it takes at least 40 hours of production time to prepare the video. We prefer to show and not tell.

Our community project Fire Escape Sessions was judged based on this clip . It was a peek into how we brought CT musicians into our community in true concert style. We shared musician and viewer feedback with the judges as evidence of impact on this page. Thanks again to all who shared their music, that watched, that designed the space and recorded the audio and video. Congrats on being a 2nd place finalist.

Congrats to the other finalist for what you do in service to small communities: Marblehead Community Access & Media and Athol Orange Community TV. And to large station division finalists Watertown Cable Access Corp, Nashua ETV and QPTV.

We participate in the festival as a judging location. We were assigned the Community Impact category for large stations. The theme for most submissions was either coverage of protests or human interest coverage of covid related stories. The standouts were ‘Unity Breakfast 20th Anniversary’, ‘Make It Labs – Fighting COVID One Face Shield at a Time’ (an impressive story), and ‘Civil Unrest in US _Call For Action’. The Call to Action aspect of QPTV is what made it rise above the many others with similar themes as regard ‘impact’.

This category, Community Impact, unlike the other which focus on production quality, requires evidence of community connection.

Discover

Team Hercules 2021, Youth and Our Mission

Program | Team Hercules
Deploying volunteers successfully requires matching skills and interests with opportunities. Volunteers initially need one-on-one time. Our goal is to have as many as possible achieve some level of independence and ultimately be serving others, or with others.

Local youth get to Wear the Paw. Entry into Team Hercules can be via High School Community Service, College Internships, or Summer Workforce Alliance placement. This summer, two of the seven youth in Team Hercules 2021 have leveled up enough to be Roar 1st employees.

The very first Team Hercules summer was in 2015. It was a first job experience for six youth who shared what they learned about first jobs with the world. These 29 stories are as fresh today as they were when released. The community really rallied in support of this project. Everyone is young at heart.

A few members of that team became our first Roar 1st employees. I can vividly recall how impressed a Vietnam Veteran was with Neal-Jay who was assigned to edit the video which is now our most watched production. We are currently seeking funding to restore this youth program. Applications are in with the Napier Foundation and Grassroots Fund’s Young Leader.

Seeing what we enable users to do, especially the youth, says more than any mission statement.

This year’s summer program deliverables were more diverse, but just as remarkable. We hosted seven young people. Most were WorkForce Alliance placements through the Wallingford Youth Services. A few are returning to complete thirty hours of community service hours for high school. And yesterday, a younger brother was brought along to do the same. When it is the last day and they all ask if they can come back; especially, when they had feared they would not make it through until the end, you know something went well. I hope to update this post with some clips of our story and tech coach in action with this team.

We have some incredible content in our It is Local online archives thanks to #TeamHercules2021.

Benny FL’s first video production is epic. See the reviews.

Social Service Folks: Honest, creative, inspirational. So glad this will encourage continued communication, especially with teenagers and young adults.? Incredibly powerful creation by local youth. I’m inspired by our future leaders. Access Station Staff: This is amazing & a great production & great words. Benny FL and everyone rock on/ Thank you for sharing. Senior Citizens: So many messages. I like seeing the words. (Viewer age 72) Wonderful. Your Newsletter was too. (Viewer age 78 who then subscribed to our YouTube). I do not usually listen to rap. But I did. This surpassed my expectations. I liked it. Performance Poets with creds: It is real.
Author #DareToSpeak …it was my aim that Dare to Speak would inspire educators and young people to think more about free speech, and I am so glad to hear that the book influenced Ben’s project. I enjoyed his song very much.

Winners of in 3-minute movie challenges receive gift certificates. The prizes most often requested by youth participants are for Mr. D’s and This Toy Life. We support local business and they are happy we support our youth.

Can you tell which of these movies were produced by young filmmakers? The young filmmakers who participate often in the 3-minute movie challenge were invited to be part of a live stream conversation with the award winning animator, Michael Schleif. We play his Space Bears animations weekdays at 4:30 at the start of story time. A Hercules Team member remixed the original show with some of Space Bears animation to produce Meet the Animator.

And sometimes we help others seeking to help our youth. You never know when something will hit like the lottery. Our fingers and toes are still crossed for this STEM Academy project grant via video application. Our tools and stage were used in the production of this video grant. BTW: We have our own STEaMc program Mon-Saturday on TV. ‘A” is for Arts & History and “C” is for Civics.

Our community is our reason for being and our youth are our future. Remember: There is no need to knock. Just come down and join in. Maybe you will find someone in the youth room.

BTW: Did you check out all the bold links in this post? There is no better way to know what we do than to watch videos of, for and by the people. In this post, the links are mostly to the media made by young people. Thanks for stopping by the blog.

Nothing but Evolutionary

2020-21 has been nothing but evolutionary, eclipsing 1965: the bridge in Selma Alabama, the race riots in Watts, The Voting Rights Act, Vietnam War, Medicare, the Gemini Space Program, Mini-skirts and CT imposing a 9% Gross Income Tax on cable companies that was still being adjudicated in 1990.

A green screen opportunity.
Information here

As people gather virtually, there is a palpable hunger to engage in person as well as an appreciation of conveniences such as joining from home or office. So what is the real and future need for physical spaces to gather and make media?

As it has been since its inception equitable access to resources is part of the equation. And as it has been with technological innovations, we will adapt to support the primary mission of supporting the free exchange of ideas and the building of communities locally as We The People.

Everything this experiment in democracy, community TV, has at its core, remains a vital part of sustaining democratic communities: building community through the production of ideas, opinions, stories, news, information and/or performance while valuing free speech, individual expression, inclusion and diversity.

There is no comparable network of local organizations dedicated to being ‘of, by and for’ the voice of the people. If seen collectively, community TV is the largest television network in America. As a network, Community TV stations, many organized through the Alliance for Community Media, have shared principles and values that keep them from being rudderless, but they are as different as they are alike.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, WPAA-TV had a calendar filled with people-gathering events: drum circles, improv theater, performances, writers’ groups, gallery visits and open houses. I did not foresee the ubiquitous Internet encroaching on this hard won value to our community success. But the virtual public space while not always Ideal has been seen as convenient for many. It will likely not go away and will definitely be the means of public gathering for the next few years.

The perception of our relevance was already compromised by the perception, and misperceptions, of the Internet as a ubiquitous and free to all (Ignoring those pop up ads and digital divide) resource for everyone. Few singular events change a world view. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, I believed that what the Internet could not be, or easily replace, was the potential to meet and gather in person, teach, discuss and share what is local based on the reasonable needs and interests of a community.

Then the socially starved world experienced the rise of the racial justice movement in rallies, protests and online conversations creating more community engagement opportunities than community TV could envision supporting. We remain busy, differently. We still invite you to join us.