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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMN-CABLE-2004-08-24Access Oversight Committee August 24, 2004 Held at the PEGASYS studio, 519 West State Street Present: Wayles Brown, Will Burbank, Dan Cogan, Wies Van Leuken; PEGASYS director, Lauren Stefanelli. Called to order approx. 4:30 pm Notetaker - Lauren Stefanelli 2. Approve Minutes Minutes from 6/29/04 meeting approved unanimously. 3. Public Comment No members of the public in attendance. Lauren sent meeting notice to the local papers, which did not include it in their calendars. Discussion of how to publicize meetings and AOC activities better. Agreed that: 1. Lauren will email annoucement of future meetings to all members. Members will rotate the responsibility of forwarding announcement to the papers. 2. Will Burbank will try to line up a newspaper feature about the AOC. Agreed that the new AOC is newsworthy! Wies pointed out that the franchise requires that AOC minutes be sent to Common Council. Agreed that: Lauren will forward approved minutes, via email, to City, Town and Cayuga Heights Clerks with request to post and distribute to elected officials. Will Burbank and Wies van Leuken will provide Lauren with email addresses of Town of Ithaca and Cayuga Heights clerks. 4. Budget Update Lauren reported that the $20,000 2004 capital budget is almost ready to submit for internal approval, as soon as a final quote from a major vendor is received. Of this budget, $3000 was allotted to Boynton - and other schools, as feasible. Lauren reported that all 3 requesting schools can be helped with these funds. Boynton has received enough equipment [roughly $30,000 worth] from Time Warner's initial donation and loar of existing spare and replaced items [some from PEGASYS, some from News], that 2 camcorders would complete their current needs. Boynton video instructor Kelli Hazard claims that they are able to take care of small items on their previous request [cables and mics] with their own funds. Therefore, Lauren told the three requesting schools [I.H.S., A.C.S. and Boynton] that the $3000 would be spent to purchase them each 2 $500 digital camcorders. They were given several suggestions about models that would meet this budget, and are in the final selection stage. Agreed that: Lauren would send a copy of the completed equipment list to the AOC when it is ready for submission. Will noted that TWC's large donation /loan to Boynton was also newsworthy and might be promoted as a feature to the press. Lauren agreed and suggested that we encourage Boynton to hold an open house for the AOC and press when their studio is completed. 5. Hours of Operation Lauren, as a 15 -year employee, receives 5 weeks of vacation. In addition, TWC allots 4 Personal Days and 10 official holidays. Currently, on all of these dates, PEGASYS must be closed, as there is only one staff. Lauren presented a calendar of the upcoming PEGASYS scheduling season [Sept -Dec 2004] with dates when PEGASYS will be closed for these reasons. Discussion about ways Lauren's absences could be staffed: 1. Volunteers could be recruited to serve as temporary staff. However, Time Warner is prevented by labor laws from using volunteers to do jobs for which they regularly pay staff. So this concern would need to be addressed. 2. Hire temp staff for a reduced schedule. Funds could come from either raising the franchise fee funding level of participating municipalities or by bringing in another municipality to the group that support PEGASYS. Lauren suggested that current temps doing city meeting coverage are a good initial group to consider for such temp work, as they are PEGASYS producers with training and familiarity with the facility. Agreed that: Lauren will draft several scenarios of the cost of temp services at different service levels to cover her absences. Dan will discuss this issue with Tom Doheny. 6. Grant Requests from Schools Discussion of current schools housing PEGASYS capital equipment. Only one is outside the participating municipalities: Dryden HS. Lauren reported that Dryden High School was given long -term loans of PEGASYS equipment valued at about $10,000 in 2001 and $4,000 in 2002. They submitted 4 programs in June 2002. None since. Nor have they reported on their current usage or programming efforts. MOTION by Wayles, seconded by Will: to restrict eligibility for access capital from now on to schools within the Participating Municipalities. Carried unanimously. Agreed that: Lauren will draft a letter to Dryden School video instructor [Margaret Grace was the instructor through 2002] inviting her to submit a report on the current status of her video course and plans for future ed access program production. The Dryden rep will be invited to present this report in person, if possible, at the 9/23 meeting of the AOC. Lauren will draft a letter to Jeff Spence, I.H.S. video instructor; Karl Madeo, A.C.S video instructor; Kelli Hazard, Boynton video instructor; and DeWitt video club instructors; inviting them each to prepare a report on their 2004 -05 video production activities, access programming accomplishments / plans, and PEGASYS equipment currently being used / needed. They will be asked to come in person, if possible, to an AOC meeting in either October or November. 7. Fees for users from non - participating municipalities Dan reported a discussion with Tom Doheny about fees, in which he said Tom indicated he might be willing to have Time Warner cover additional staff hours as a quid pro quo if the AOC created fees for non -PM users of PEG. No further discussion due to lack of time. 8. Next meetings - Thursday, September 23, 4:30pm, at PEGASYS. Thursday, October 21, 4:30pm, at PEGASYS. Thursday, November 18, 4:30pm, at PEGASYS. 9. Meeting adjourned at about 6:15pm. Meeting minutes by Lauren Stefanelli.