Washington, DC - Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) and Congressman Steve LaTourette (R-OH) today introduced the Community Access Preservation (CAP) Act of 2011(H.R. 1746) to address severe challenges faced by public, educational, and government access (PEG) TV channels and save thousands of jobs across the country.

 

There are an estimated 5,000 PEG channels in America that serve their communities in a variety of important ways.  They connect residents with their local government, televising city council and county board meetings and hearings.  Local school districts operate PEG channels to broadcast school board meetings and forums, homework helpers, lectures, and sporting events not otherwise aired on television.  And according to a survey conducted by the National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisors (NATOA), religious shows represent 20-40 percent of local access programming. 

 

“Local access channels bring unique voices, perspectives, and programming to television,” said Congresswoman Baldwin. “The nature of television programming is changing, as are the methods in which that programming is delivered. These changes should not come at the expense of the diversity and vibrancy of local voices,” Baldwin said.

 

"These stations don't receive federal funding. All this bill does is allow and empower local communities to keep their public access channels if they choose to do so. Many communities within the state televise council meetings or local sporting events at area high schools," LaTourette said.

 

Historically, the number of channels and funding dedicated to PEG TV was negotiated as part of local cable franchise agreements between the cable company and the local community and each community determined its own investment in programming. 

 

However, recent state-level franchise laws in twenty states have jeopardized this balance and communities and consumers in six states, including Wisconsin and Ohio, will lose all funding for PEG channels by 2012.  A recent nationwide study conducted for the Benton Foundation by the Alliance for Communications Democracy shows that PEG access centers in at least 100 communities across the U.S. have closed since 2005 and, without passage of the CAP Act, as many as another 400 public access channels will shut down.

 

By allowing communities more flexibility to use PEG funding for more than “capital costs,” the CAP Act could create or save between 7,000 and 10,000 jobs across the country. The bill specifically:

 

 

“Decisions at the state and federal level have combined to create a crisis for PEG. With the CAP Act, Reps. Baldwin and LaTourette effectively address the most immediate problems and open the door to the future by preserving support for PEG while the FCC conducts its study. This bill is critical to us. Wisconsin’s rich community access heritage is on the line,” said Mary Cardona, Executive Director of the Wisconsin Association of PEG Channels.

 

“I'm very excited that Congressman LaTourette is co-sponsoring this bill,” said Kathie Pohl, Director of Marketing & Community Relations, City of Mentor, OH. “This benefits the entire community because it will mean that the city, schools and public access centers can continue to be used to inform the general public the way they were intended. But it also relieves a great financial burden on those cities that must pay to have their ‘public’ channels carried on the cable system. This deserves the full support of Congress,” Pohl said.