Glenville Town Board meetings to be televised, voted delayed over past customer charges
Glenville residents have been without Town Board meetings being televised on public access for months now, but a solution is in sight that will leave residents baring the cost of a few cents more per-month for the next 10 years.
The Town Board held a public hearing on Wednesday, Dec.1, to address Glenville’s renewal of their franchise agreement with Time Warner Cable, but the vote scheduled that night was tabled for a later meeting. Delaying the vote was due to a recent finding that more than the previously contracted amount has been passed customers without any agreement from the town.
We did have a local resident ask for the contracts and review them and he did discover a fairly significant point that we want to get right, said James MacFarland, director of operations for Glenville at the meeting. `The old contract indicated a 2 percent pass through allowance. It appears that bills currently are passing through the full five percent we want to make sure we get that right before preceding with it.`
The FCC regulates a maximum of 5 percent of the fee can be passed on to individual subscribers. A final version of the contract is planned to be completed by the next board meeting on Dec. 15 and voted on by board members, said MacFarland.
`We worked together for about a year on this contract, on this agreement, and it was a productive process with a lot of give and take,` said John Mucha, director of Government Relations for Time Warner.
To rewire and make programming available and provide a `modest` portable HD camera and equipment is estimated to cost $24,000, said MacFarland. The rewire and camera equipment are each estimated to cost $12,000.
Time Warner can legally pass the charges onto customers, which will customers in the Town paying a `rough estimate` of 5 cents more every month for the next 10 years, said MacFarland.
The previous 10-year contract expired in 2004 and the town is hoping to gain additional sources of revenue that were not included in the previous contract and address the lack of board meeting coverage on television.
`Technologies have allowed for more revenues and those technologies were not written into the contract 10 years ago,` said Supervisor Christopher Koetzle.
An additional $30,000 in revenue is estimated to be generated through the negotiated contract, said Koetzle. The previous contract didn’t address revenue sources for the cable company such as `On Demand` paid movie rentals, Roadrunner broadband internet and DVR service to record programs.
`It is a more inclusive language to define what revenue is for Time Warner,` said MacFarland. `It is really all forms of revenue that is allowed under FCC guidelines.`
One drawback for some Time Warner customers in the town is the company will no longer offer a senior citizen discount for new cable subscribers, said Koetzle. Although current discounted subscribers will be allowed to keep their rate.
`We do have a senior discount, kind of a rarity among contracts these day,` said James MacFarland, director of operations for Glenville, about the discount being cancelled. `That is a fairly strong position that Time Warner took in these negotiations.`
When Open Stage Media took over SACTV and controlled public access television in Schenectady County. When the switch was made all three public access channels began to be used too, which are channel 16, 17, 18. Now channel 16 is for public access programming, channel 17 is used for government programming and channel 18 is used for educational programming. This change shut out Glenville residents from viewing Town Board and County Legislature meetings.
`For whatever reason, back before Time Warner was involved we got feed out of Saratoga County,` said Koetzle.
Before the switch, all public access was on channel 16, including government meetings. Since Glenville gets its feed from Saratoga the switch knocked out Town Board meetings being broadcasted. Koetzle said since August the meetings have not been televised and the town did not have input on the switch.
`What is important to us is to give our residents in the interim a way to view the meetings and streaming off the web solution came up,` said Koetzle. `I think it helps our residents view the board meetings on their time when it is convenient for them.`
The website hosting the video will be provided by the town, but Time Warner is providing the town with an HD camera to record meetings for online viewing, he said.
Negotiations were on going form the previous board, but Koetzle said the administration weren’t able to finalize negotiations.
`We pushed as hard as we could for our town, residents and subscribers,` said MacFarland. `I think we would both like to move it along and get something current in place.`
Glenville also did an audit and was in negotiations regarding how revenue was calculated in the past and if the town is owed an unpaid amount. MacFarland said Time Warner has agreed to pay the town $2,600 from that audit. MacFarland said the Town Attorney thought it was a fair amount.“
