HomeMy WebLinkAboutMN-CABLE-2016-03-14City of Ithaca Cable Access Oversight Committee (AOC) minutes
Monday, March 14, 2016, 4:30 PM
Meeting Room, PEGASYS Access Center, 519 West Green Street, Ithaca, NY
As approved May 2, 2016
Present: chair Rich DePaolo, vice-chair Wies van Leuken, AOC members Wayles Browne,
Common Council liaison Ducson Nguyen; studio manager Lauren Stefanelli; member of the
public Pieter van Hoof
01. Call to Order by DePaolo at 4:40.
02. Agenda Additions and/or Deletions: none.
03. Public Comments: we met Mr. Pieter van Hoof, from a telecommunications firm in the
Netherlands.
04. Approval Minutes of the February 1, 2016 Meeting: approved 4-0 with no changes.
05. Access Studio Coordinator Report: submitted in writing (attached). Stefanelli: a vendor will
put in a quote for repairing doors, but really we need 3 new ones--either repair or replacement to
be paid for by Time Warner Cable (TWC).
AOC: hopes for replacement.
Stefanelli: The old studio cameras would cost $10K to replace, but new digital ones would cost
$5K, so this is the year to replace them.
a. Usage Fees Report for 2015 showing receipts, uses and final balance: attached.
b. Subscriber Fee Report ($0.15/subscriber/month revenues): still not available. DePaolo will
add this to the list of "asks" when he speaks to Mr. David Whalen of TWC Government
Relations. Ducson Nguyen: Common Council is concerned about possible underpayments to the
City of Ithaca.
c. Capital Purchase Report from TWC. Stefanelli: everything has been purchased except
the sign for the building. The sign is still somewhere inside TWC's system. The report should be
ready next month.
d. 2016 Budget: untouched.
e. Recommendations for 2017 Budget: Stefanelli will have these next month. By the end of
April she will get an expert to advise about transition of the studio to digital. This will provide us
with a better-looking signal.
06. Member Reports
a. Vacancies and Term Expirations - update: Van Leuken needs to be reappointed by the
new Village of Cayuga Heights mayor.
b. Funding for Educational Institutions - recommendations. Stefanelli will send out letters
as last year, with a request to send in programs to be broadcast.
c. PEGASYS' Access Rules. Van Leuken sent a red-line version to DePaolo, who has now
sent it on to City Attorney Ari Lavine to look at. DePaolo asks about the indemnification clause
in the user agreement: should the user always indemnify for legal costs in case of a lawsuit, or
only indemnify when he/she is guilty of something? AOC considers it is better if DePaolo asks
Whalen before changing the existing language on this. We will revisit the question when
DePaolo hears back from Lavine.
d. AOC's Capital Purchase Report to City: see 5c. AOC needs to get this from TWC and
give it to the City.
e. Fourth Quarter/2015 Franchise Fee Report from City, Town and Village: no report on
Q4 from the Town of Ithaca yet. For the City: Nguyen should talk to City Controller Steve
Thayer.
f. Home Page – discussion. DePaolo: Manhattan TV has a website with archived
programs, all shared on Vimeo for $200 per year. It does support HD video. DePaolo will bring
up the question of archiving PEG programs when he talks with Whalen.
g. TWC’s transition to All-Digital: as has been announced to subscribers, it will be in
April.
07. Old Business
a. Franchise Agreement. DePaolo: City Attorney Lavine told me not to wait for the City's
review but to send the term sheet [list of desires for the next franchise] to the other
municipalities. DePaolo hopes to meet with representatives of the other municipalities before
AOC's next meeting.
b. Charter/TWC/Brighthouse Network merger. The New York State Public Service
Commission approved it; it seems to be still pending at the national level.
08. New Business: none.
09. Next meeting: Monday, May 2, 2016, 4:30 pm.
10. Adjournment: 5:55.
Notes by W. Browne as AOC secretary.
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Contact information for AOC members:
City of Ithaca: Wayles Browne, secretary <ewb2@cornell.edu>.
City of Ithaca: Ducson Nguyen, Common Council liaison 2016 <dnguyen@cityofithaca.org>.
City of Ithaca: member TBA.
Town of Ithaca: Rich DePaolo, chair <rd@richdepaolo.com>.
Village of Cayuga Heights: Wies van Leuken, vice chair <pmv4@cornell.edu>.
Web site for the PEGASYS studio, with program schedules:
http://pegasys.webstarts.com/index.html
studio location: 612 West Green Street, Ithaca, New York
mailing address: 519 West State Street, Ithaca, NY 14850
phone (607) 272-7272
fax (607) 277-5404
PEGASYS staff: studio manager Lauren Stefanelli <lauren.stefanelli@twcable.com>
March 2016
Access Studio Coordinator Report
- Building Improvements
A contractor fixed our toilets and they are working properly now. He will be back to fix the
water taps in the men’s room, which is hard to turn off completely.
I have started discussions with various affected departments about the idea of moving our
playback equipment to the 517 building. Response is positive so far.
- WiFi
I have gotten a lot of positive comments about the free Wifi in the building.
- Equipment and Facility Maintenance and Repair
Our studio camera 1 is still down. The identical model cameras were offered by another
TWC system and we tried them, but they must have a different multi-pin set-up, because they
do not work with our camera cables. Our camera and the replacements were sent to our
engineering department to see if any fix is possible.
Our studio preview monitor died. It is an older TV and not repairable. However, luckily, our
engineering department gave us their excellent analog monitor, which they no longer use.
2 camera dollies had broken locks. They were able to be repaired and will be back soon.
1 of our new tripods was damaged. The fitting that holds the tripod mounting plate in place
was broken from rough handling. Our service department was able to find a replacement part
and it will be back soon. I am giving warnings about this to all producers taking out tripods.
- Equipment Fund Update
The last item on our 2015 equipment fund, the building sign, has moved forward, with a
deposit invoice in our system now. When the venders get the deposit, they will make the sign.
Our new edit computers came online in February, with Jim completing the software
installation and activation. I reworked the desks and repurposed the old monitors so that both
editors now have dual monitors and an Adobe Premiere layout that uses them both. The
computers are so fast that HD material and DVD files can be edited in real time with no
freezing or lagging, as we hoped. It was like moving from a moped to a Jaguar in terms of
speed. They are now great tools for current editing needs.
The 2015 equipment fund report will be provided next month, when the sign is
completed and I have this last invoice.
- Recent PEGASYS Staff Productions
2 episodes of PEGASYS Presents, one featuring the local group Circus Culture, and one
featuring Photographer Sheryl Sinkow and Gallery Night participants.
1 90 minute program, “History Center: Harvest,” covering an event at the History Center
with the producer of “Harvest” showing clips of his PBS production on local agricultural history,
plus other local panelists giving supporting presentations.
PEGASYS Awards. Our 2016 PEGASYS Awards ceremony was held on Friday March 11. I
think the event went well and was well-attended. It was live on channel 13 with reruns all
weekend, and it was preceded by a barrage of video promos on the channel during the
preceding week.
PEGASYS Usage Stats
PEGASYS Equipment Usage, Channel 13 Usage and Producer Usage Fees statistics for 2015
are attached below.
Attachment #1: 2015 PEGASYS Equipment Usage and Channel 13 Program Analysis
Equipment Usage By Group and Type
1/1/2015 to 12/31/2015
Number of Uses Hours of Use Dollar Value
Editing
Edit 3 Laptop Adobe Premiere CS6 Editor Laptop 21 2,390.50 $4,983.36
Edit 4 Laptop Adobe Premiere CS6 Editor Laptop 37 2,367.00 $7,400.07
Edit 5 Laptop Adobe Premiere CS6 Editor Laptop 63 2,860.50 $8,931.30
Edit Station 1 Adobe Premiere CS6 Non-linear Editor 22 68.00 $3,400.00
Edit Station 2 Adobe Premiere CS6 Non-linear Editor 39 159.00 $7,950.00
Group Totals Editing 182 7,845.00 $32,664.73
Port Cam
Camcorder GoPro Gopro Hero3+ 10 1,556.50 $1,946.25
Camcorder GY150 JVC GY-HM100/150U SD Card Camcorder 113 6,817.50 $19,891.50
Camcorder NX5 Sony HXR-NX5U AVCHD Camcorder 7 892.00 $2,601.67
Camcorder X10 Sony DSR PDX10 Mini DVCam Camcorder 22 4,947.50 $14,425.80
Group Totals Port Cam 152 14,213.50 $38,865.22
Studio
Studio 1 3-camera studio, 15x34' 220 453.00 $49,830.00
Studio 2 Ministudio 118 404.00 $44,440.00
Group Totals Studio 338 857.00 $94,270.00
Programming Analysis
For Schedule Dates: 1/1/2015 to 1/1/2016
Number of Different Hours Played Number of Plays Programs Played
All Programming
First Run 585.70 767 767
Repeat 4039.87 5719 979
Total First Run and Repeat 4625.57 6486 1045
By Origin
Other Local
First Run 59.58 64 64
Repeat 86.30 158 18
Total First Run and Repeat 145.88 222 73
PEGASYS
First Run 347.78 503 503
Repeat 3006.48 4374 717
Total First Run and Repeat 3354.27 4877 727
Syndicated
First Run 178.33 200 200
Repeat 947.08 1187 244
Total First Run and Repeat 1125.42 1387 245
Attachment #2:
PEGASYS Usage Fees Expenditures v. Collections Report 2015 Final
Total remainder from 2014: + $43.60
Total Usage Fee Collections through year end 2015 * $340.00
Total Funds Available $383.60
Total Expenditures for temp staff 2015 [pay rate $12; bill rate $14.05]
May 27 Wed] 4 hrs $56.20
Week of 10/29 [Thu] 4 hrs $56.20
Week 0f 11/2 [Mon/Thu] 8 hrs $112.40
Week of 11/9 [Mon/Thu] 8 hrs $112.40
Week of 11/16 [Mon] 4 hrs $56.20
Total expenditures $393.40
Total remainder 2015: - $9.80
* Usage Fee Collections 2015