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Comcast TV may pull plug on Lodi City Council meetings
People who like watching Lodi City Council meetings from home could soon be out of luck.
Comcast told the city on Friday that it no longer plans to staff the meetings, which means they will not be on cable TV or online unless the city finds a solution.
The cable company will continue to operate the equipment that records the meetings at least through May, said Comcast spokesman Bryan Byrd. He said the company will meet with city staff soon to discuss what the city will do.
The change is due to cable companies now striking contracts with the state instead of cities.
Once cities switch to state-negotiated contracts, Comcast will stop providing staff to for meeting coverage, Byrd said. Lodi's state contract started March 14, 2008, and city spokesman Jeff Hood said this is the first the city has heard that the cable provider would no longer provide this service.
In 2006, the California legislature approved the Digital Infrastructure and Video Competition. Starting in 2007, once cities franchise agreements ended, the state would then negotiate the new contracts.
With the bill, cities have always feared that cable companies would stop presenting meetings and providing other public access options because the city could no longer require the services in the franchise agreements.
"It wasn't a surprise when we heard, because this is what cities feared and cable companies reassured wouldn't happen," city spokesman Jeff Hood said.
Comcast provides a staff person to operate the equipment at no cost to the city. The equipment belongs to the city, Byrd said, even though the cable company installed it.
Options for the city include paying for the cable company or having an outside contractor to run the equipment, said Jonathon Kramer, the principal attorney at Kramer.Firm. His Los Angeles-based company does telecommunications consulting for governments and private institutions.
Comcast is doing what makes sense from a business standpoint, Kramer said, because employing someone to run the camera does not make the company any money. But he said that in a cash-strapped economic time, it is unfortunate, because some city governments will not have the money to hire someone to do camera work for the meetings.
"For decades, it has been a way to connect citizens to the government. To come in and say we are going to take that away ... is a hard pill to swallow," Kramer said.
The news came late Friday afternoon, so Hood said the city does not know if it will be able to find another way to continue showing the meetings. The city will brainstorm solutions, Hood said. The video that appears on the city's Web site is also recorded off Comcast's feed.
Hood did not know if Comcast had ever given the city data on how many people watch the meetings.
But in 2007, 336 residents responded to a scientific survey on a variety of Lodi issues. Of the responses, while only 20 percent had been to a council meeting, 32 percent said they had watched a local public meeting on cable TV in the past year.
Contact reporter Maggie Creamer at maggiec@lodinews.com or read her blog at www.lodinews.com/blog/citybuzz.
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Reader Feedback
Cogito wrote on May 10, 2009 4:26 PM:
sam wrote on May 9, 2009 5:22 PM:
sam wrote on May 9, 2009 5:21 PM:
You are so right. Even if they sound like idots they love to go on and on and on. "
Whoa Nellie! wrote on May 9, 2009 5:09 PM:
dogs4you wrote on May 9, 2009 2:39 PM:
Whoa Nellie! wrote on May 9, 2009 1:40 PM:
Watching the mtgs live, listening to the CC's comments, and lack of sometimes, tells a voter a lot about the CC'r. Print newspaper articles can not translate everything that live tv does. "
Whoa Nellie! wrote on May 9, 2009 1:37 PM:
davidd wrote on May 9, 2009 12:47 PM:
Unfortunately, this article doesn't say what will happen to that. I assume that they'll go away, too, unless someone can operate the cameras.
Surely there's a few people who could volunteer to man the cameras? I'd be happy to do it on occasion. "
CAJEWELS wrote on May 9, 2009 11:54 AM:
Maybe they should get up to speed on technology and have a way for citizens to watch online and respond via email on the topics during the meetings instead of having to wait all evening to make a brief comment. Emails could be limited to a certain number of them at one time and be appropriate to the topics being discussed. People in this town might actually watch and know what is going on. "
Observer wrote on May 9, 2009 7:10 AM:
ra wrote on May 9, 2009 6:22 AM:
Comments on this story are now closed.