Letter to the Mayor from the Board President
On behalf of the Board of Directors of WPAA-TV, thank you for the opportunity to submit materials in support of our request for inclusion in the Town’s FY 2026–27 budget.
We are grateful for the Town’s consideration and welcome this process as a chance to be more transparent about who we are and what we provide for the entire Wallingford community. WPAA-TV has served Wallingford residents for more than 30 years — without membership fees,
without service fees, and with a consistent goal of making our community’s own voices visible and accessible to everyone. Beyond locally produced programming, we have distributed government and education access content for years. Our work complements Town services.
Our request is modest and specific: $1,500 annually to underwrite the bandwidth cost of 24/7 streaming on our website. Streaming allows anyone in Wallingford — not only cable subscribers — to access our full channel. Adopting this request to underwrite the internet simulcast bandwidth of the WPAA-TV channel can ensure stability in community-wide content delivery at a cost of less than $1 per household.
We will restore this service on April 1, 2026, and we are committed to sustaining it.
Enclosed, per the requirements of your public letter of February 20, please find our funding request details & WPAA-TV Operating Budget. Thank you for this opportunity to demonstrate our value to the community we share.
Budget Request
$1,500 annually for streaming bandwidth, creating community-wide accessibility to all content via our website: WPAA-TV.
Who Can Watch: Less Than We Want
Historically, viewership was limited to cable subscribers who underwrote community media. Use of able fees is restricted to traditional community media services, which excludes non-cablecast distribution. So, anyone could make content, but not everyone could see it.
Our content distribution beyond cable TV began in 2005. We had on-demand availability of locally produced content underwritten by a local vendor. In 2015, we began simulcasting our channel with a 24/7 stream on our website. Anyone with internet access could watch all WPAA-TV content: Public, Government, Educational, and global news content in English & Spanish.
The GAP
Our simulcast was suspended as of June 1, 2025. The intent is to resume on April 1, 2026. Vendor capabilities impeded our ability to stream the mission-critical #greatGIVE06492 benefit concert in May 2025. Concurrently, a modification to the State of CT capital funding cycle impacts the ability to secure revenue for any annually recurring costs, such as bandwidth for channel simulcast via an internet stream.
STATUS: New vendor capabilities have been identified to restore streaming functionality. Start-up costs were covered in the 2025 CT PEGPETIA grant. The grant is now biennial, unpredictable, and structured in a manner that makes annual costs difficult to cover. The annual minimum bandwidth cost is $1500. This annual cost is what we would like to be considered in the Town’s budget.
Rationale
- Limited impact on Town, significant impact on WPAA-TV
- Supports access by the entire town to services we provide to nonprofits and civic
- organizations
- Unlike town meeting coverage, we cannot stream to YouTube: Reasons include eligibility
- of creators’ free speech content, agreements limiting distribution platforms, and
- noncommercial requirements
How We Operate, Our Mission
Our work is to support whoever walks in the door, governed by: To provide a brave, safe, and
creative space for a diversity of expression from within our community. We empower the people
- Local churches have shared services for 30 years and cablecast the same day since 2005
- Since 1990, we have carried government content not considered eligible for WGTV
- Since 2008, STEaMc: (Science, Technology, Engineering, ARTS, Mathematics & CIVICS, aka Education Television, not provided on WPS-TV) content contracted from various educational sources begins daily at 5 am
- In2Languages – Language Literacy in collaboration with SCOW midday since 2013
- About Books in collaboration with Wallingford Public Library since 2008
- We are not a member organization. We have never charged for services rendered.
Questions & Answers
Q1: Are there other costs associated with simulcast streaming?
A1: Yes, the technical infrastructure for streaming, website, and service fees. We will continue to
pursue covering these costs with technical infrastructure grants.
Q2: In 2025, WPAA-TV gave YSS $3,000, so how can requesting funds be justified?
A2: A volunteer provided uncompensated services to the teen program, conditional upon his pay being
used to support the expansion of the program to after-school hours.
Q3: Why can’t you use YouTube?
A3: It is complicated by contracts, free speech content, and advertising constraints.
Q4: Why should the taxpayer pay anything for WPAA-TV?
A4: The value of content access is unpredictable. You never know when someone you know will be on TV or when the convenience of the simulcast for curated content can make a difference in your life. One performance, one piece of knowledge, one chance encounter could be priceless. The support request is less than a $1 a year per household.
Q5: If this expense is not added to the budget, what will the impact be?
A5: Streaming without interruption depends on our ability to secure alternate funding. Per regulations, cable fees are for content creation and cablecast distribution. Support will send a clear message about our value to our community.
Q6: Is this relevant to Social Services?
A6: Much of our content is related to education and the well-being of the community, a social services designation is appropriate.
Update:
On March 24th, The Mayor confirmed inclusion of WPAA-TV in the YSS budget with an allocation of 50% of the requested amount ($750). Within the letter of acknowledgement and confirmation of action were two considerations. The 1st was to be aware that the Town Council has the ability to alter the budget. And to stay engages in the process by attending two public meetings:
- Budget Workshop: Wed. April 8 6:30 PM
- Public Hearing: Monday April 27 6 PM
The Acknowledgement: April 7
On behalf of the Board of Directors of WPAA-TV, thank you for your letter of March 24th affirming your budget recommendation of $750 within Dept. of Youth & Social Services FY 2026–27. As previously shared, we are grateful for the Town’s consideration. We welcome this process as a chance to be more transparent about who we are and what we make available to the entire Wallingford community. The modest request was for $1,500 annually to amplify our investment in the community with 24/7 streaming of our cablecast on our website. We did restore internet streaming on April 1, 2026, and we are committed to sustaining it.
Our cablecast includes collaborations with local nonprofits such as About Books – Author interviews represented by Wallingford Public Library, In2Languages – Language Literacy initiative with Spanish Community of Wallingford, several local feature stories, and our nationally recognized TeenTigerTV youth training program.
In fact, on May 4th beginning at 7 pm, we will LIVE stream the Annual Be The Seed Benefit Performance in support of 18 Wallingford-centric nonprofits providing direct services, training and entertainment to Wallingford and beyond. We use the monies WPAA-TV raises during #greatGIVE06492 to cover expenses for the Be The Seed community performance and Spanish content for In2Languages. We serve soup we purchase from Soups On and refreshments we buy from local business.
WPAA-TV has served Wallingford residents for more than 30 years — without membership fees, without service fees, and with a consistent goal of making our community’s own voices visible & accessible to everyone. Beyond locally produced programming, we have distributed both government and education access content for decades. Our work complements Town services.
Supporting our request helps ensure stability of community-wide content delivery at a cost of less than 9 cents per household. I am copying the council, which as you indicated, can alter your budget recommendation. Your recommendation invests a nickel from every household in the services that we consider priceless.
Since we have community programs on the Workshop & Public Hearing dates, I am copying the final arbiters of the budget, the Town councilors, with the most current information provided in for original request. WPAATV_2026OperationsBudget032026.pdf, updated & approved April 6, 2026, Original WPAATV Grant Request FY 2026–27 budget.pdf
Thank you for this opportunity to demonstrate our value to the community we share.
cc: Town Council with ancillary documentation