TORONTO – Rogers Broadcasting is committed to the Saskatchewan production community, and believes that its yet-to-be-approved purchase of provincial broadcaster Saskatchewan Communications Network (SCN) will help to keep that community “robust”.
Responding to criticism last week that its proposal to buy SCN seeks to spend less on local shows than the station’s previous owners, Rogers Media’s broadcasting president Scott Moore told Cartt.ca that the deal could actually prove to be a boon to local producers by opening up access to national audiences via its stable of stations and networks.
“We’ve asked the CRTC to allow us to do our Canadian programming expenditures in Saskatchewan in the same way that we do with our other Citytv stations, and that’s a percentage of gross revenues”, he said in an interview. “I think that has been perceived, in some quarters, as stepping away from a commitment, but in fact it’s quite the opposite. In fact, as we grow revenues there, our commitment to the local production community will probably grow substantially over what the previous owners did.”
That previous owner, Bluepoint Investments, pledged to spend $1.75 million per year on independent Saskatchewan production, and $1 million per year on digital production in the province over the following seven years when it purchased the station from the provincial government less than two years ago. At last summer’s group-based licence renewals, the CRTC imposed a minimum CPE requirement of 23% on Rogers Media’s conventional television stations which include its Citytv affiliates in Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg.
In fact, Moore continued, Rogers has recently green-lit some Saskatchewan-based productions that fall outside of this commitment, such as a documentary project about the up and coming provincial economy, which he expects will air nationally across the Citytv network and on Rogers-owned Biography Channel. Rogers is also planning local productions around Sportsnet’s coverage of the 2013 CHL’s Memorial Cup which will be held in Saskatoon next May.
Moore said that in addition to providing Rogers with “a beachhead” in the province, the acquisition of SCN and its subsequent re-launch as Citytv Saskatchewan will offer national advertisers an expanded footprint, plus allow it to amortize some of its overall Canadian production spend across more stations. “We’re excited about being in Saskatchewan”, he added. “It starts to fill in some of the holes in our distribution for Citytv, it adds an important economy, and, it adds an important group of viewers.” SCN is a must-carry station that is currently available to 95% of Saskatchewan.
If Rogers’ $3 million bid to buy SCN receives CRTC approval, the station will continue to air commercial-free children’s and educational programming between 6 am and 3 pm, unlike the other Citytv affiliates. Its prime time schedule will include Rogers’ produced hits such as Canada’s Got Talent and The Bachelor Canada as well as popular U.S. shows, in keeping with the affiliation agreement between the broadcaster and the station that started in January.
Moore’s reassurances should be welcome news to local producers, many of whom are still reeling from last week’s announcement that the Saskatchewan government is eliminating the provincial Film Employment Tax Credit as part of its new budget. The subsidy provides a tax credit of up to 45% of eligible labour costs in local film and video productions, and is scheduled to be wound down by the end of 2014.
When asked if this change in provincial tax credits impacts Rogers’ interest in SCN, Moore responded with “a resounding no”.
“We are committed to Saskatchewan and will continue to be”, he said. “It will make our local production dollar with independents go a little less far, but we’re committed for a number of reasons, one, quite frankly, was access to a very robust local production community, and we hope that production community will remain robust.”
