What's Happening with SACC?
This webpage is by Gregg Millett, former SACC treasurer,
building manager and board member and currently producer of two public access
shows -- "Visions of China" and "What's Happening with SACC?"
The content of this page is the sole responsibility of
Gregg Millett and does not necessarily represent the viewers of SACC TV-16 (or
Open Stage Media), their staffs or their Boards of Directors.
Below: SACC Board Meeting, March 3, 2010
Video Segment 1: Dave
Watson Addresses the Board (2 minutes)
Dave Watson, an attorney for not-for-profit organizations,
was retained by the SACC Board to assist in the SACC/Protors transition.
Mr. Watson explains some of the particulars in the selling of a not-for-profit
property including the necessity of Board and membership votes of approval.
Video Segment 2: Sale
of the SACC Building (14 minutes)
SACC President, Nick Barber, gives
background and presents a resolution to sell the SACC building to Habitat for
Humanity for $212,800. Discussion and Board approves the resolution. Dave Watson
explains that the sale of the building is contingent on a three-fourths vote
of the membership at a membership meeting at which a quorum is present.
Video Segment 3: Treasurer's
Report, Etc. (4 minutes)
SACC treasurer, Cathy Lewis, says not
too much in or out with a net monthly loss of about $400. Joe Piazzo comments
that they have started streaming video to the web and Philip Morris explains
that Time Warner is in the process of running the cable to Proctors.
Video Segment 4: Status
and Future of SACC (21 minutes)
Doris Aiken suggests that the SACC
Corporation not be dissolved. SACC and Schenectady City Council Chairman, Gary
McCarthy says that the Board already voted to dissolve the corporation. Ann
Parillo says that vote was a "straw vote" and that SACC should be
preserved and that those people who want to preserve SACC should come forward
and take over the leadership. Nick says that preserving SACC will confuse the
public about public access and asks what would be the mission? Ann explains
that SACC has existed at times when it did not run the public access station
and that Philip Morris had stated in his "white paper" that SACC should
be preserved as a support organization. Gary says that Proctors will open new
doors for public access and keeping SACC will stiffle the Proctors effort to
create a new and better public access. Discussion ends with the need to call
a special membership meeting and that Nick, Dave Watson and the co-secretaries,
Ann and Dixie Aniolec, will work on this, and it must be before the closing
on the sale of the building -- possibly the end of March.
Video of the Complete
Board Meeting (48 minutes)
The segments do not cover the entire
board meeting.
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If you would like to send me a comment, I will post it on this page. Send to gmillett@nycap.rr.com
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Below: Web Postings in February
Building
Auction 1/20/10 (12 minutes)
The high bid of $77,000 was not accepted by the SACC building
disposition committee.
Board
Meeting 2/4/10 (43 minutes)
Several interesting issues: (1) a treasuer's
report which seems somewhat fuzzy as to which funds belong to Proctors and which
funds belong to SACC? how much has been spent on new equipment? and unaccounted
for funds both expenses and income; (2) some clarification of the transfer of
the SACC telephone number to Proctors; (3) question asking if the SACC membership
has been involved in the major changes that have been taking place; (4) announcement
that attorney Dave Watson, through the Council of Community services, has been
retained; (5) an argument about whether an executive session can exclude a SACC
member in good standing; (5) building offer contract issues directed to the
SACC building disposition committee and meeting adjourned.
____________________________________
For the record -- the last communication with the SACC membership was in the Fall 2009 issue of the SACC newsletter (none has been produced since then) where President Nick Barber wrote, "We are presently exploring partnering with Proctors Theater to create a more visible, eclectic presence. We will be focusing on new quality programming, including more featuring more arts and entertainment events."
____________________________________
Comment 1 (by Gregg Millett, 2/8/10): I found out early
this evening that the Schenectady City Council had an open hearing on the franchise
transfer. So I went to the meeting and told the council that I thought they'd
made a mistake and should take a good look at SACC and reconsider. What's the
phrase -- "a day late and a dollar short?" If there's any good news
it's that Philip Morris came up to me afterwards and said he "knew how
I felt" and would do his best, to not only make all of us proud of public
access at Proctors, but also to make the "Schenectady Today Show"
a centerpiece. I'm hopeful.
Here's
what I said at the City Council Meeting
Comment 2 (by Gregg Millett, 2/9/10): From the SACC By-Laws
-- Section 12 - CONFLICT OF INTEREST
12.1 Definitions - A conflict of interest exists when a matter to be acted upon
by the Board confers a direct, substantial benefit to any Director, business
or agency from which a Director of the Board derives an income or has authority
in governance
Also from the By-Laws -- Section 4 - PURPOSE
The purpose of SACC shall be exclusively to produce public, educational and
governmental ("PEG") including cultural television programming and
to serve as a major conduit for information, technical training and assistance,
production and advice for all individuals and groups using the available PEG
access channels of the cable television systems. SACC is committed to providing
quality programming that meets community standards with regards to obscenity,
indecency or nudity. SACC is dedicated to serve the general welfare of the viewing
public whereby all operations must be for noncommercial use by the public on
a first-come, first-served, nondiscriminatory basis.
http://www.sacctv.org/policies.html
Comment 3 (by Gregg Millett, 2/9/10): OK, at least for today, I've made up my mind. Too much water under the bridge (conflict of interest or not) for the franchise to come back to SACC. Let's hope (and help) Proctors do a great job with public access. However, I see no reason to dissolve SACC. It takes a lot of effort and money to establish a 501C3 non-profit organization. It will also takes a lot of time and money to dissolve the corporation. As I read the by-laws (purpose), SACC does not have to run the public access station, but to support the whole enterprise. Therefore SACC should continue -- it should support Proctors and it should support producers. The details of this "support" function can be an onging mission of those people who come forward to make the new (or shall I say old) corporation function. And who knows, maybe after a year or two, Proctors will find out that running public access is more than they bargained for, and they'll want to unload it (or give it back, or bring SACC into the Proctors arena to manage it)!
Comment 4 (by Gregg Millett, 2/10/10): Today was a bitter/sweet
day. Ann Parillo, and her volunteer technical team, taped two "Schenectady
Today Shows" ( to be broadcast on February 24 and March 3). Adding these
shows to the February 17th show taped last week, this gives Proctors (Open Stage
Media) a three-week window to be up and running at which time Ann hopes to be
broadcasting live again on March 10th at Proctors. Below I'll post the link
to the March 3rd show, so that anyone interested can see the quality of the
"Schenectdy Today Show" and SACC productions in general, as the curtain
comes down on SACC-TV.
http://annparillo.com/Photo_Page_3-3.htm
Comment 5 (by Ruska Bibic, 2/11): 1. I saw your speech at City Council. It was a good speech, it came from the heart, and I hope they will reconsider the whole deal with Proctors. Proctors is a great institution, does a lot of great stuff for the community, therefore I am surprised to see them doing this. Honestly, I do not see SACC-TV staying the same if moved to Proctors, and that is sad. They should help renovate the SACC building, help expand community programs and services there, not squishing it into some back of the bar removable, mobile, so called studio.
Comment 6 (by Stacy LaComb, 2/11): SACC-TV has been a
significant part of my life, as I am certain that it has touched the lives of
so many people in our beautiful city. I am extremely concerned about the current
state of the station and it surprises me that 16's membership base has not stepped
up to ask more questions about this dicey move.
In my eyes, SACC-TV is a whole lot more than just a television station. It represents
the voice of the community and is invaluable with regard to it's availability
to all who want to be a part of it. To dissolve SACC as a 501(c)3 at this point
would be to unravel more than three decades of free speech, community media
access, hundreds of independent producers and thousands of viewers.
I would call upon the membership of SACC-TV to step up and have your voice heard.
Express your questions and concerns about the future of the station to anyone
who will listen. In fact, I believe the members of SACC are fully responsible
for ensuring that the control of the station is not usurped by parties with
ulterior motives, but rather that it remains as it has always been; in the hands
of the public. Let's keep the PUBLIC in Public Access.
Comment 7(by Gregg Millett, 2/16): Until yesterday I had not seen the document below submitted by Philip Morris to the Schenectady City Council, Directors of Proctors, Directors of SACC and Mayor Stratton (I think the document was submitted in October 2009). It was not submitted to the SACC membership and apparently the SACC Board did not take issue with it. Clearly, it was the key document from Proctors that got the Sch'dy City Council to make the public access franchise transfer. And I will say that it is a very impressive document. At least there is one line that says, "4) Work with the current SACC organization to assist in the transition to Proctors, and changing its core mission into a programming support organization." It doesn't say dissovle SACC! And I must say I wonder why an "advisory managerial role" was turned over to Proctors four months before this document appeared? Do the SACC minutes document this decision?
From: Philip Morris
To: Schenectady City Council, Directors of Proctors, Directors of SACC and Mayor Stratton
Re: Public Access
Over the past 4 months Proctors has acted in an advisory/managerial role with the existing SACC-TV while considering how best public access should proceed in and for the community into the future.
We have met with SACC members, board members, area public officials, staff of SACC and Proctors, the City School District and a variety of professionals attached to the media industry. These meetings have yielded a pretty clear consensus on what the opportunity for ongoing public access is, and some general directions for trying to take advantage of those opportunities.
Clearly, the history of community enterprise and volunteerism that has kept a community based media enterprise going at SACC is a rallying point. For many other communities, public access has meant the right to bring a video project to the cable company and get it aired.....it has NOT meant access to equipment, studio, expertise or education. SACC has kept that dream alive for over two decades.
It is also fair to say that expanding these opportunities have been in front of public access for a number of years, but the effort to accomplish some of them has needed to be greater than it has been in order to succeed. In a changing world for media, entertainment and news, though, the window for success may be as large as it has ever been.
The opportunities are far reaching, but, finally, fall on the ability to entice good, interesting and varied programming for broadcast. The better and more relevant the programming, the more people and communities will want what is available. Its pretty simple to speak of theoretically, just hard to deliver in practice.
The Opportunities:
1) Full use of Public Access, Education and Government (P.E.G.) distribution. P.E.G. programming are the purviews of community based television. Currently, Schenectady has government programming mixed with public access and education overseen by a separate local council who has built a relationship with the Schenectady School system for programming.
There are the opportunities to expand government coverage in such a way that town, city and county activities could utilize nearly all of their own channel. This requires reconnecting with all local governments to advise ways to upgrade equipment and sound capturing methodologies so that shooting and covering local meetings would be a simpler and smoother endeavor. It also requires making access by governments to the public access system simpler than it has been.
2) Building a pool of qualified producers to create programming. As television has gone digital and to the desktop, it has become easier and easier to make media. But making media is only part of what it takes to make television. Broadcasting low quality home videos, while part of public access, puts the resources of public access in a poor light. People interested in broadcast are also, clearly, interested in doing it well. To that end, in lieu of applying limited public access staff resources to helping others make media, we would focus those resources on TEACHING others to make media. The more people who can effectively manage and create programming that raises the bar for public access distribution, the more good programming will be made with the least amount of ongoing staff support.
3) Broadening the scope of public access. This would entail building excellent relationships with the towns in Schenectady County as well as the other regional access points (Albany, Colonie, Troy) so that public access is turned to for local information, interviews, music and even news.
4) Institutional integration. SACC is a small organization attempting to deliver programming with enormous overheads and facilities with limit resources. Eliminating the need to worry about accounting, facilities and even scheduling would add make resources available to entice and train program builders and producers.
5) More student engagement. Media belongs to this generation as never before. Young people want to make media and see it distributed. This is a huge opportunity to connect students to community issues and grow the capacity of the community to make more programming, by growing student media education.
A Proposal by Proctors
Proctors has been successfully working for many years to become a community hub and anchor for activities. This effort included adding new facilities, expanding existing ones, and creating relationships for more events centered around the facility. The Winter GreenMarket, ArtBike, Art Nights, Iwerks, 8th Step, and the Comedy Box have all added new and vibrant energy to the community. In addition, Proctors has expanded its education program for both school aged students and adults. These programs include 8 summer camps, pre-show TheatreTalks, and residency activities throughout the region in schools and with students coming to the facility.
These core institutional agendas tie in well with the opportunities for expansion of public access and broadcast. As an education and outreach program of Proctors, public access could focus on the program expansion that is needed without being burdened with the administrative, facilities and operational components of an organization.
To make this happen, we propose the following:
1) Should the City Council deem it worthy, to move the responsibility for Public Access, Education and Government (P.E.G) access to Proctors both legally and physically. Proctors would establish Advisory Councils in each of the three areas to consider and make current and ongoing proposals to reach the programming opportunities outlined above. Proctors would seek the participation in each of these Advisory Councils by some of the current participants in SACC and the education access council.
2) Working with the City of Schenectady, Proctors would propose a critical equipment upgrade program that would move public access to the digital age, would increase capacity for distribution, and would develop the following:
a) an editing suite and training program that would allow the community to learn and become certified in producing media. This program would help to create more producers which should lead to more program for broadcast
b) upgrade "head end" systems so the station can both store and broadcast on three channels
c) develop "portable studio" capacity, so that, once
trained, producers can be on site for shooting and editing for both live and
later broadcast opportunities.
d) create an environment within the walls of Proctors that anywhere can be a
studio. This is easily done already in spaces that are already theaters, but
Proctors would establish spaces not used in such a way as being both available
and equipped for such use.
e) utilize the internet to supplement cable public access including video on
demand options for government and public access programming
f) upgrade and simplify methodologies for receiving and scheduling programming.
3) Re-brand public access. SACC-TV has done an admirable job of establishing a public access television program, but with the opportunity to expand the footprint and the programming, a new "brand" would open doors that have not been open for some time with neighboring communities to create and distribute programming. This rebranding would aim to be Schenectady centric, but capital region in its interest.
4) Work with the current SACC organization to assist in the transition to Proctors, and changing its core mission into a programming support organization. Sell the current SACC building, move the still useable equipment to Proctors, then use SACC resources to support and fund as needed programming for broadcast.
5) Work with the City of Schenectady to identify issues related to the franchise agreement and assist in resolving them.
6) Work with Glenville, Niskayuna and Rotterdam to best fulfill their ambitions for P.E.G. Access.
What might all this look like?
Through 2009, not a lot will be different. Work will happen to sell the building and consider the location and equipment needs for the move.
By 1 January a budget will be established (attached) for the 2010 fiscal year and will include hiring of existing senior SACC staff and increase staffing to support new programming.
By 1 February 2010, Proctors will be prepared, presuming franchise issues are resolved for this move, to begin broadcasting from its facilities. Proctors will be as administration and legal entity providing to Time Warner and the City of Schenectady Public Access and public access support.
By spring of 2010 training programs will be offered to the community that will include training in filming, editing, and story development. These programs will be offered at no charge to participants.
By fall of 2010, Proctors will establish an after school media program to students that is co-ordinated with the ongoing work of the Schenectady Public Schools and will offer training to create program development.
As this timeframe fleshes out and our "next stage" development happens for public access, what will be different and what will this finally all look like?
Putting PLAY back into playback and scheduling system
More reliable program playback - No more blue screen, cut off shows.
Accurate and Timely scheduling - updated in real-time to the web and.
Inclusion in Time Warner's interactive "TV GUIDE"
Uploading programs via the web
Potentially A MILLION (or more) new VIEWERS
LIVE Streaming to the Internet
V.O.D. (Video on Demand) on the web to view specific shows anytime
Enhanced on screen information graphics with live updates of local weather,
traffic and important news and information.
More COMMUNITY in the community Bulletin board
Submit user postings over the web though an easy to use interface
Multi-User, Self-publishing, Secure Accounts for approved users
Post and maintain user's own announcements.
An even MORE open Media Project
By participating in projects that will take community media to a new level By
bringing Local Public Access activities and services to the WEB
Leveraging the power of WEB 2.0 technologies and social media
Producer Web pages / Blogs and Community discussion forums
Keeping the ACCESS in Public Access
Expanded equipment loan inventories and innovative education and training programs
will make the production tools available to anyone
Public accessible video editing delivered on an advanced and secure media network
to provide the community with the capabilities and support needed to create
programming.
Extensive studio and production facility upgrades will combine both Standard
& High Definition Video equipment into production packages tailored to users
needs and capabilities.
The Digital SOAPBOX
A quick, easy, and cheap way to get programming "in the can." This
plan will introduce unique methods and equipment to allow self- production that
will combine ease of use with advanced and fun features like virtual set technology
and special effects.
Equipment Needs
After extensive review, $139,365 of equipment needs will allow Public Access to enter this new age:
New Broadcast Server with adequate storage of 2 terrabytes
Digital Soapbox server for streaming on the internet
New ingest/encoding stations for traditionally delivered media to be digitized
and uploaded
2 HD Editing systems
1 Portable production pack (cameras and software)
Lendable production equipment
One tricaster for live editing
With the elimination of costs associated with owning and maintaining a property,
this new level of public access will be able to run on a budget similar to the
past with support from subscribers, media sales and sponsorships.
This is a very exciting time for Schenectady as it continues to redefine itself around arts, culture, education and technology. Public Access, imagined as part of the cutting edge of culture and technology, will fit it perfectly with this new definition and will allow Schenectady's reputation to spread well beyond its borders as a community committed to expression, creativity, information and access.
Comment 9 (by Gregg Millett, 2/16): I'll be in line in the Spring for the free training and certification.
From the Times Union Sunday -- February 14, 2010
Proctors getting cable-ready
SCHENECTADY -- Proctors Theatre has officially taken over the city's cable access
station.
But the theater's State Street building has no cable infrastructure to support
broadcasting, said City Councilman Gary McCarthy, who is chairman of the station's
board of directors.
It will likely be a few months before Time Warner Cable can install the necessary lines.
Meanwhile, McCarthy said an auction last month of the station's Broadway building attracted no serious offers. The city recently valued the property at $2 million -- many times more than its old assessment. McCarthy said he couldn't comment on how that might impact the sale.
Proctors agreed to take over the city's public access station as a way to train aspiring filmmakers -- while keeping the station's original programming staples such as the weekly interview show "Schenectady Today." The station, which receives $80,000 in franchise fees yearly, could barely pay its bills.
The station is on Channel 16 in Schenectady, Glenville, Rotterdam and Niskayuna. It is required to continue programming produced by residents as well as any provided by producers affiliated with Proctors. Proctors is not allowed to advertise its shows, including its Broadway series, on public access.
The station estimates it reaches 43,000 cable subscribers, 18,000 of those in Schenectady.
-- Lauren Stanforth