To Community Access Television Supporters:
Last night, Thursday, November 8, was very disappointing. AB207 passed 23 to 9 in the Wisconsin Senate. The bill must go back to the Assembly for minor adjustments to make both versions match, but additional changes are not likely to be made by the Republican-controlled Assembly. The AT&T lobbyists were positively giddy toward the end of the evening. Their bill had passed with barely a change, barely a nod to the concerns of Wisconsin residents.
The only (but critical) PEG-friendly amendment that passed – unanimously - is one that would require video service providers to continue paying PEG (Community TV) support fees to the communities that have these fees for three years. That means, except for our communities relying on cable companies to manage PEG stations (in-kind support), and except for those that have to invest in AT&T conversion equipment and except for those that start getting carried at less than broadcast quality by AT&T in the near future, we have a three-year reprieve.
Governor Doyle has not yet signed this bill into law, and he has the power to either veto it completely or make changes to it. Let's keep up the pressure. Here is what Mary Cardona, Executive Director of WAPC, wrote the Governor today:
Dear Governor Doyle,
WAPC represents 50 public access stations with a long history of service to our communities. I was deeply disappointed that most of our senators ignored every plea from every consumer organization involved in this bill and did NOT amend this industry pact one iota (except to make true what bill authors have been claiming all along: that PEG stations get a three-year sunset on current PEG fees).[1]
Governor, they even ignored your plea to send you a bill with more consumer protection.
The Wisconsin AFL-CIO recently withdrew its support. The only Communications Workers of America local with a full-time staff, the one with the most on the line, the one with half the AT&T workers in the state, the one which generated informal support from Green Bay, Oshkosh/Fond du Lac, and Eau Claire locals was ignored. Pleas from AFSCME were ignored. Pleas from every major city and their representative organizations (WAC and WLM) were ignored. Pleas from the Wisconsin Towns Association were ignored. Pleas from the League of Women Voters, WISPIRG, CUB, and Citizen Action of Wisconsin were ignored.
All of these groups joined us in asking for amendments, including more support for PEG. We wanted the bill to require video corporations to invest some of their profits back into supporting community-enhancing television through cable subscriber fees. Texas, Illinois, Michigan, California, North Carolina, Indiana, New Jersey and others have ALL contained provisions to support PEG channels long-term. Opponents of the 1% on video revenue said we should be treated like any other non-profit. We are not like any other non-profit. We bring diversity, localism, and open government to the cable line-up. Video providers should be required to ante up to bring this balance to the top-down corporate commercial product they offer our residents. Cities that currently assess a PEG fee have not reported any complaints from subscribers about paying a few cents each month for gavel-to-gavel coverage of city meetings and other locally produced programs.
We do not want charity from corporations. We want our right to speak.
What has happened to our progressive, consumer-friendly state? When did our legislators stop being servants of the public and turn into industry power brokers deaf to their constituents?
You are our last hope. Please don’t allow this disaster of a bill become law. Please insist that any state video legislation protect the people of this state. Please veto this bill and force our legislature to be responsive. Use your bully pulpit to rail against this kind of excess.
2 ways to contact the Governor.
Governor's office: 608-266-1212
E-mail: Governor Jim Doyle (e-mail generator) http://www.wisgov.state.wi.us/contact.asp
As you can see from the Senate's Web Site, http://www.legis.state.wi.us/insession/senate/index.htm [1], pretty much all improvements to the bill were rejected. Sen. Kathleen Vinehout introduced a sweeping amendment to make our state franchise law be consumer-friendly like the one the Illinois Governor signed into law on June 30. This amendment contained extensive and enforceable consumer protection, build-out (non-discrimination) and PEG-friendly provisions such as allowing cities to add local channels if they demonstrated a need. This was rejected by an 11 – 22 vote with Democratic Sens. Carpenter, Coggs, Erpenbach, Jauch, Kreitlow, Lassa, Miller, Risser, Robson, and Vinehout as well as Republican Carol Roessler (R – Oshkosh) voting for this excellent compromise legislation.
Other PEG-related amendments were shot down by similar margins:
SA4 – Would have allowed municipalities with access channels to collect up to a 1% PEG fee on video revenue to support local programming and would have required local cable providers to honor PEG support provisions in local agreements until expiration. (Rejected 12 – 21 with Lehman and Sullivan joining the minority noted above and Roessler joining the majority defeating it.)
SA10 – Would have allowed PEG stations to earn revenue through ads. (Rejected 22 – 11 with Lehman and Sullivan joining the minority noted above and Coggs and Roessler voting with the majority defeating it.)
SA16 – Would have required PEG channels to be carried on the local broadcast tier, companies to pay the cost of converting the standard PEG signal to their format, and would have required PEG channels to be carried at the same technical quality as other commercial channels. (Rejected 21 – 12 with Lehman and Sullivan voting with the minority and Roessler voting with the majority defeating it.)
**** If you can, thank our supportive Senators! They were TERRIFIC! ****
Also rejected were these individual pro-consumer amendments which would have:
· Required video providers to maintain customer support call centers in Wisconsin. (JOBS)
· Required incumbent cable operators to maintain their local franchises until a competitor arrives so that enforceable consumer protections would remain in place where there are monopolies.
· Required a 10-year limit on the length of state-issued franchises (the law passed grants licenses in perpetuity with the right to transfer to any company without state review).
· Required video providers to follow local ordinances regarding the placement of TV equipment (AT&T's "refrigerator boxes") in city rights-of-way if the location of that equipment would have a negative effect on nearby property values.
· Required continuing free cable TV service to schools and public buildings.
Also lost was a city’s right to charge telecommunications companies permit fees and an amendment that would have required the state to do a report on the effect of the state franchise bill on telecommunications in the state. (I guess the majority doesn't want to know.)
Please do NOT give up the fight before it's over!
AB207, or the so-called Video Competition Act, is still "just a bill."
I do want to pass this on from Mike McCabe of the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign [2]:
Thanks to you all for your tremendous efforts to promote the best interests of the public in the cable TV debate. This morning we released something that says a lot about what you were all up against and why the vote went the way it did. It's at http://www.wisdc.org/pr110907.php
A telling statistic that's not in the report.... Senators who voted for AB 207 yesterday have received $1.2 million in campaign donations from interests that support the bill since '99 and less than $90,000 from opponents of AB 207.
Post from: Mary Cardona of Saveaccess Wisconsin [3]