GATINEAU – We could have a story here about the CBC’s plea for a skinny basic.
We could have re-analyzed its re-demands for new revenue in the form of a wholesale fee and how forcefully its executives argued it needs one, despite how detractors point out it already gets a billion dollars from taxpayers and as a public broadcaster an increase from that stream seems more appropriate.
We could have expended more words on Bell’s SD Freesat proposal and how the company re-iterated it will resist new fees to local broadcasters no matter what right to negotiate might be enshrined in policy. When referring to local broadcasters, Bell’s SVP regulatory and government affairs, Mirko Bibic said: “We believe their value is zero.” That comment’s a little bit out of context of course, but it’s pretty inflammatory, noted some of the broadcasters in the room.
We could even dive deeper into the battle over vernacular. During a break yesterday, Commission chair Konrad von Finckenstein had a quick one-on-one with yours truly to drive home the point that this hearing is not about “fee for carriage” because the Commission has no intention of setting a fee.
It is about finding a framework for a negotiation for value, “which is much different,” the chair said (although to be fair, I didn’t know we were going to chat right then so my recorder wasn’t with me).
I could have spun a few hundred more words on each of all of those things but instead, I want to talk about Pam Astbury’s presentation. She is the head of the grassroots group Save Our CBC Kamloops and gave an eloquent, researched presentation yesterday on why local TV in her town is so important to the folks there and what can be done to help.
She took vacation time (she’s a civil engineer) and paid her own way to Ottawa because she and others like her in Kamloops are so passionate about their community and their TV (or lack thereof).
Let me go a little Lewis Black here when I holler: THIS IS WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT! Here is someone (at right) so community-minded and thoughtful about local television, someone who flew across the country on her own dime that she should have gotten to go first, received top billing from every news outlet covering this hearing and given a standing ovation at the end.
This is a young woman whom Ivan Fecan, Leonard Asper, Nadir Mohamed, Hubert Lacroix, Jim Shaw, et al should be seeking an audience with. Not the other way around.
Astbury’s intentions by her appearance at the hearing are, in her words, to “see the CBC restored as an over-the-air service to those communities that have already lost it; to communicate my concern of losing our local broadcaster following the digital transition in 2011…; and remind the CRTC that the nation’s public broadcaster is a critical public service which should not be left in the care of private sector distributors, regardless of market size.”
Since 2006, the CBC has not been available over-the-air to the 87,000 people of Kamloops, B.C. Back then, the local station, Pattison Broadcasting-owned CFJC-TV disaffiliated from the CBC and re-branded under the E! brand name – along side the then-Canwest-owned E! stations.
“The reduction in programming quality has been horrific,” she said. “Instead of enjoying such programs as The National or The Nature of Things, Kamloops was left with various American entertainment magazines and renovation dramas such as Extreme Makeover.”
The group got local government behind it and went to the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage in 2007 when the CBC’s mandate was being reviewed. Nothing happened (CBC Vancouver is, of course, available on cable and DTH, as is CFJC, to Kamloops households).
“We lobbied both the CBC and CRTC to establish Kamloops as the Pilot City for demonstrating the cost-effectiveness of multiplexing for smaller market areas,” she added. “We believe that the future of television will be constructed upon a digital foundation and that digital technology is the answer to both large and small markets across Canada.”
Seriously, this is a regular Canadian who has educated herself about multiplexing, believes in TV, is convinced our future is in digital television and frets that her town is not one of the places broadcasters have to make the OTA transition to digital.
And of course the hearing room was nearly empty when she spoke yesterday.
As August 31, 2011 nears and analog transmitters are turned off, Astbury wondered not if CFJC would go digital, but if it would continue broadcasting at all, especially given the recent closures of CKX Brandon and CHCA Red Deer. “In addition to losing the CBC over-the-air, Kamloops may no longer have a local broadcaster, period,” she said.
“If this doesn’t seem like a big concern to the CRTC, let me illustrate the role of local programming in a city like ours. This summer was incredibly dry. The forest in our area was either on fire or at risk of being ignited… (C)oncern for lives and property was very real,” she added.
“Accurate information regarding evacuation orders, travel routes and area closures was best available via local radio and television. Without this level of coverage, we’d be without vital information as well as lose sight of the human picture… These are stories that can not be truly understood when covered from the big cities of Vancouver or Toronto.”
The Kamloops group undertook an engineering study (!) with the Canadian Media Guild that showed taking the current CFJC-owned TV transmitter there from analog to digital and multiplexing the signal into six channels would cost $90,000, or $15,000 per channel, “quite simply a highly cost-effective option for small markets,” Astbury explained.
In order for consumers to receive such a multiplexed signal, set tops are necessary, she believes. And they’re about $50 now. “Contrary, the free satellite model requires the purchase of a $500 set top box.
(But one wonders how CFJC could be forced to digitally multiplex its signal and give up a channel to the CBC.)
“My peer group is largely young professionals with decent disposable income,” she concluded. “Most of these people can afford, but are not interested in, large cable packages. As savvy consumers, they are seeking something proportional to the limited amount of time they have for viewing. This group is hugely supporting of a six-channel multiplexing.
“I think it’s imperative that we find a way forward that protects local channels and over-the-air broadcasting, even in smaller cities like mine,” she continued. “As a professional engineer, I am trained to resolve problems objectively and cost-effectively with input from stakeholders large and small.
“The most rewarding solutions are never easily obtained. This is why I am compelled to be here today as a citizen presenter.”
Now, I know we’ll be hearing from some less eloquent citizen presenters over the next month or so, but there will be others like Ms Astbury, I predict.
Canwest, CTV, Shaw, Bell, Rogers et al, you need more friends like her among the Canadian populace. She not only desperately wants her local TV, she actually has ideas on how to go about keeping it and moving it into the future.
Anyone this committed to lead her community and thoughtfully dig into the industry, its issues and technology, simply MUST be paid attention to.
