About Community Access Television
A Brief History of Community Access Television
Today there are as many stories about how community access television began, as there are community access TV stations in the United States.
There is a nearly apocryphal video program called "Everyone's Channel," a copy of which any member of MassAccess could provide on request. Part of the story involves the beginning of cable TV itself, and some Pennsylvania coal miners who couldn't watch the ballgame in their local bar because a hill, that was their mine shaft, stood in the way of over-the-air broadcast signals. In response to this and countless other communities beyond the reach of broadcast television, pioneering entrepreneurs built community antenna TV systems (CATV) where broadcast waves could not go. Instead, cables hooked up to antennae on high spots or tall buildings carried the broadcasts to TV's. These CATV entrepreneurs were the men and women who began what we call Cable TV today.
Quickly thereafter, two facts converged: CATV operators learned they could carry more channels - as many as twelve - than broadcasters were providing (6-8 in the 1950's and 1960's), and in communities where local CATV operators built the nascent cable systems, people thought "Can they cover our local issues like broadcast affiliates do in big cities?"
Add to this mix the academicians and philosophers of media and culture who came up in the 60's. Marshall McLuhan said "the medium is the message," talked of a "global village," and a man named George Stoney felt that the time was ripe for his film documentary students to do more than make personal statements. He wondered whether they could teach "ordinary people" to make their own TV programs.
Although he detests the term, George Stoney is the father of Public Access Television.
Born in 1916, George Stoney studied journalism at the University of North Carolina and at New York University. After working as a freelance journalist, an information officer for the Farm Security Administration, and a photo intelligence officer in World War II, he joined the Southern Educational Film Service as a writer and director in 1946. In 1950, he formed his own company, and by 1980 had made over 40 films on subjects ranging from birth control, insurance, and the mentally ill, to the nature of the Baha'i faith and the situation of indigenous people in Canada. An early advocate of video as a tool for social change, Stoney was the Executive Producer of the National Film Board of Canada's Challenge for Change/Societe Nouvelle from 1966-70. In 1972, Stoney co-founded the Alternate Media Center with Red Burns at New York University, which trained the first generation of public access producers/activists. In 1976, George was a founder of the National Federation of Local Cable Programmers, today known as the Alliance for Community Media. In Massachusetts, Rika Welsh was one of these early "Johnny Appleseeds" of public access, and continues fighting for community media today.
Mr. Stoney was instrumental in getting the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to mandate that cable operators modestly fund public access for equipment, training, and airtime. "That was in 1972, and at that time the people on the FCC weren't beholden to the broadcast industry," he says. "Now the broadcasters can own the cablecasters."
In Manhattan, George was instrumental in the founding of the Manhattan Neighborhood Network, one of greater New York's many access centers. And even today, if you attend an ACM International Conference, you can easily meet and talk with George Stoney, now 89 years old, and he can tell you all of what we don't have room for here!
The all-encompassing image that fits community access TV everywhere is that our Bill of Rights protects individual citizens' rights to free speech, and that in the electronic media present, the ancient soapbox is now provided by public access TV and Internet videoblogging.
The history of public access contains a key element: public-private partnerships. Unlike telephone, gas and electric, cable television is not essential, not a "lifeline" service. Therefore, the U.S. Congress decided that the for-profit cable operators should be able to provide benefits to the local communities in which they string their cables. These benefits have taken shape as community media centers. This "give back" by cable operators has become mutually beneficial. Communities get a vital media communications resource, and cable operators get exclusive, locally targeted programs which help sell their product in exchange for their access to the community's public rights of way.
Today, public, educational and governmental access television stations across America, and around the world, annually produce more hours of original, non-repeated programming than ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox Network combined,
The Alliance for Community Media
The Alliance for Community Media is committed to assuring everyone's access to electronic media. The Alliance advances this goal through public education, a progressive legislative and regulatory agenda, coalition building and grassroots organizing.
A nonprofit, national membership organization founded in 1976, the Alliance represents over 1,000 Public, Educational and Governmental (PEG) access organizations and community media centers throughout the country. It also represents the interests of millions of people who, through their local religious, community and charitable groups, use PEG access to communicate with their memberships and the community as a whole.
Local community groups, public schools, religious institutions, colleges and universities, government officials, the disabled, and second language communities as well as national institutions such as NASA, the US Department of Education, and the US Army, to name a few, all use PEG facilities and equipment to advance their causes through cable television and the Internet.
The Alliance for Community Media provides critical support services for these community media centers and for the primarily volunteer staff that keep these electronic outposts of democracy in operation. The Alliance's activities in providing technical assistance, grassroots organizing and opportunities to share experience promote the broader goals of supporting our nation's communities and families and promoting effective communication through community use of media.
The Alliance's public policy program is dedicated to promoting legislation and regulation which supports PEG access. To achieve this, the Alliance works with Congress, state legislatures, the Federal Communications Commission, state public utilities commissions, and coalition partners and brings suits when necessary in courts around the country.
How Can They Show That on TV?
Community Access Television is for everyone. It is programmed by residents who choose to place programming. Most of the programming you see on these access channels is actually produced by members of the community the channel serves -- either private individuals, community-based organizations, or the town government.
Community access television is an electronic forum for free expression by the residents of town or towns the center serves. Sometimes, viewers say "There ought to be a law about what I saw on the station last night!" There IS a law: the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and its guarantee that "Congress shall pass no law abridging the freedom of speech..." Basically, any resident of the town the center serves is free to say or do anything he or she wants on their own program, provided that they can assure us that their program does nor contain any illegal content.
We have agreed to maintain a public forum for the free expression of ideas -- even ideas you or I might not agree with! -- as long as we prohibit all of the following types of content in programs:
1. Commercials or advertising
2. Libel or slander
3. Obscenity and pornography
4. Any violation of copyrights, publicity rights, or invasion of privacy
5. Any violation of FCC regulations
6. any violation of any local, state, or federal law.
If you see something on an access channel which does not fall into one of the above categories, but which upsets you anyway, you have the right to become a member and learn how to produce your own program or message on the channel, to counteract the programming that upset you. As Supreme Court Justice Brandeis said: "...avert the evil by the process of education... the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence."
If you'd like to know how the FCC defines obscenity, and the very different type of content called "indecency," you may read their Consumer Fact Sheet at http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/obscene.html.
Community Access Television FAQs
What is local access television?
Federal law provides that states or local communities may require a license or negotiate a non-exclusive cable franchise with cable TV operators wishing to market their services locally. As part of the provisions of such a license or franchise agreement, cities and towns may require the cable operator to provide what the Telecommunications Act of 1997 calls “public, educational, or government (PEG) access” channels on the local channel lineup, for unrestricted use by citizens, school districts and municipalities. In Massachusetts, many such existing agreements also require that certain equipment and funding be given to the towns. The laws provide and court cases have upheld that such channels provide equal access to all potential users, and that they are public electronic forums for free expression.
Is there only one kind of access station in Massachusetts?
No. There are almost as many different types of access centers as there are cities and towns, since they are set up to meet individual community needs. Potential users are best advised to contact their city or town hall and ask for information on who to contact about the local cable access center, studio or station.
How do access centers operate?
There are three basic operating structures possible for access centers:
* Operated by an independent non-profit corporation
* Operated by a municipality or by a school
* Operated by a cable company
Also, under any one of these operating structures, the access center may be only a “public access” facility where individual citizens or groups have equal access and produce their own TV programs. It may be only an “education TV facility,” usually affiliated or located in a school primarily used for educational purposes. It may be only a “municipal” or “government” access facility usually housed in a town building and operated for municipal communications purposes by the city or town. Or, finally, an access center may be a multi-purposed facility. Many access centers in the Commonwealth are responsible for all types of access, “P” “E” and “G.” Again, local government officials are the best first call for such information. The Massachusetts Cable TV Division can also help at (617) 305-3580 or http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=ocaagencylanding&L=4&L0=Home&L1=Government&L...
So, what do access centers do? Do they produce TV shows for all these users?
No. This is perhaps the most misunderstood role of PEG access operations. Access centers are TV studios, but unlike broadcast stations, they are not usually staffed with TV producers, camera operators, and technicians. An access center is more like a combination school and equipment library where individuals and organizations are trained how to use TV production equipment, how to make TV shows, and then are provided the free use of equipment and cable channel time to produce and air their shows.
But the cable company runs my town access center, and they produce shows! How come?
Many access centers, regardless of how they are operated, have certain requirements under the agreements with the local community to produce certain programs, like Annual Town Meeting, or even coverage of a local parade. But these requirements are specific to the community, and they do not change the fact that citizens may make their own programs. They also do not mean that the access center is like an independent TV production company, available to carry out every request for programming. Many access centers are an interesting mix of all these things, but all access centers have a common goal of facilitating the production of TV programs - of, by and for the local community.
So, why don’t all access centers just produce all the programs?
Most independent or municipal access centers are funded by a small cable license fee (usually from 1 to 5% of the local cable company’s revenues) which pays for facility upkeep, utilities, and a small part-time or full-time staff – usually 1 to 3 people, although some urban centers have several more. And it is these employees’ job to manage the public resources, train people in TV production skills, and facilitate the telecast of programs on the local channels. It is neither possible nor appropriate for them to be in the TV production business, for access TV is “Do It Yourself” TV.
If access centers don’t produce shows, how can elected officials and government employees get important programs on the air?
Community volunteers who either want to hone their skills in TV Production, or have an interest in the program topic or content do much of the programming produced at access centers. So, parents of athletes often produce high school football games. The League of Women Voters may cover a town meeting. A town department may find an interested worker in the department to prepare information for a department program or service that needs publicizing. Many access centers recruit college and high school interns to help produce programs. Several state and local elected officials already produce shows in their districts using such volunteers, as well as getting help from their communications or public information staffers, and supporters. These and other community-based resources are the primary means of getting programs or events videotaped in local access centers. The local access center staff can provide any elected official or municipal employee with the information and contacts necessary to begin production of a local show.
Isn’t it hard to produce a TV show?
TV production is not a complicated as you might think, and the skills necessary to produce simple but effect TV shows are well within the grasp of most people in the community. Access centers across the state have people ages 9 to 90, from every educational or career background doing hands-on TV production.