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Home My WebLink AboutMN-CABLE-2017-04-04 City of Ithaca Cable Access Oversight Committee Meeting Minutes Access Oversight Committee (AOC) TUESDAY, April 4, 2017 at 5 PM Meeting Room, PEGASYS Access Center, 519 West Green St., Ithaca, NY Present: Chair Rich DePaolo, members Sue Perlgut, Wayles Browne, Common Council liaison Ducson Nguyen; studio manager Lauren Stefanelli. Absent: Vice- chair Wies van Leuken (excused). 01. Call to Order by DePaolo, 5:08. 02. Agenda Additions and/or Deletions: none. 03. Public Comments: none. 04. Approval Minutes of the March 6, 2017 Meeting: approved as submitted, 4- 0. 05. Access Studio Coordinator Report (attached) a. Spectrum TV’s Recommendations for 2018 Budget: no proposal now. Coordinator will research possibilities for upgrading playback facility to High Definition--including a HD Nexus--at some point next year. We will then have about $12K accumulated. b. Annual Equipment Purchase Report Re: previous year's purchases. See 06a. c. Usage Fees Report for 2016 showing receipts, uses & final balance. Stefanelli still has no designated account to put these fees into, so there is no report yet. But she can see that the total will be less than last year. d. Studio Upgrade - update. Dick Linn, the vendor technician, did come today. All equipment has arrived except for cameras. When these arrive, he can schedule the upgrade, preferably from a Wednesday to the next Tuesday so as not to interfere with Tuesday evening shows broadcast live from the studio. Time Warner Cable/Spectrum has a place right on the premises to collect superseded components for recycling. 06. Member Reports a. AOC's Annual Equipment Purchase Report to City: for next meeting. Vendors have been paid, and hope to have upgrade installed by then. b. Report Publicity and Outreach Ad-Hoc Committee: Perlgut will hold a meeting with producers after the studio upgrade. She and Stefanelli have developed a draft text on outreach to nonprofit organizations; they will distribute it to AOC members by e-mail. The Committee will next meet in May. c. 2016 Franchise Fee Reports from City, Town and Village. DePaolo: the Town of Ithaca received a payment for the fourth quarter of 2016 (Q4) today, but without the report that is supposed to accompany it. Nguyen: the City is still waiting for the Q4 report. d. Communications RE quality of PEG cablecasts, faulty entrance door. DePaolo has written once again to Chris Mueller, the Director of Government Relations CNY Division, Northeast, about the quality of PEG cablecasts, and also asked about inclusion of PEG channels on the Spectrum streaming app. We hear that Lockport PEG has its channels listed on the on-screen program guide, so evidently this kind of listing is technically feasible. Re the door, replacement of all 3 doors has been approved (see Access Studio Coordinator's report). 07. Old Business a. Franchise Agreement: no report. b. Spectrum - update: It is not yet clear if PEG is officially rebranded as Spectrum or is still named Time Warner Cable--Charter. c. PEGASYS' Access Rules: no updates. 08. New Business. Nguyen: many City of Ithaca committees have been reconfigured or merged, but AOC exists just as it was. Nguyen: the City Clerk is aware of the problem with outdated slides about City events (dating back to 2015). Stefanelli: I now cover 3 Wednesday-evening City meetings per month, and I could also offer a further Wednesday evening for a broadcast if the city wishes, e.g. a PowerPoint presentation. 09. Next meeting. Discussion: Tuesdays are preferable to Mondays for meetings. Our next meeting will be Tuesday, May 2, 2017 at 5 PM. 10. Adjournment Contact information for AOC members: City of Ithaca: Wayles Browne, secretary <ewb2@cornell.edu>. City of Ithaca: Ducson Nguyen, Common Council liaison 2016-17 <dnguyen@cityofithaca.org>. City of Ithaca: member Sue Perlgut <scperl@verizon.net>. 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@charter.com> April 2017 Access Studio Coordinator Report • 2016 Equipment Fund: Studio Upgrade to HD Dick Linn, our vender installation technician, is coming today to prepare for the equipment installation, which includes a complete tear-down of our current studio control room. • 2017 Equipment Fund I am proposing no major equipment fund purchase for this year. The studio upgrade is the last element in the equipment and facilities upgrades we have undertaken in the last 5 years. We now have up-to-date field equipment, editing computers, and a refreshed building decor. After the studio upgrade, the next large project will be upgrading our playback facility to HD, which will improve our on-channel quality, even when down-converted to an SD channel [as it has done for ICTV]. I will start researching our needs this year; by next year, our equipment fund should be sufficient to do this upgrade. • PEGASYS Facility Maintenance The project to replace all 3 of our exterior fire doors has been approved. Contractors are preparing bids and examining our doors. We should have the project underway shortly. • PEGASYS Equipment Maintenance and Repair One of our JVC digital camcorders is down. No improper use is suspected. It does not power up. The camcorder, along with a wireless mic that has a crackle in the audio signal, have been sent to be looked at by a video engineer in our system in Rochester. • 2017 PEGASYS Awards Our 2017 PEGASYS Awards were held on March 24. We had very good attendance by community producers and ICTV students. Awards were given in 8 categories plus 4 best public and educational access in a live awards program on channel 13. Our 4 “best of” programs were sent on to compete in the national Hometown Awards. You can see more on our website: http://pegasys.webstarts.com/community_bulletin_board.html • New Local Series on Channel 13 We have a very interesting series in pre-production and training at the moment. “Food Pantry Kitchen” is being produced by Martha Taranto, who wants to show how she is able to use and preserve the odd assortment of food items she receives from her monthly food truck allotment to feed her family. She plans to include food preservation how-to’s as well as food justice interviews. Her group of 6 people are all training with me this month. • Public Relations Committee The AOC’s “Facebook Phobia” meeting was held on March 16. Sue and Tony were able to give one-on-one help to a couple people who were very technophobic. • Digital Program Submission Coming Soon We are preparing to introduce the capability for producers to upload program files to us. The system is completed and tested; the rules/paperwork are being completed now.