Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout2004/05/06 - ADMIN - Minutes - Community Technology Advisory Commission - RegularOFFICIAL MINUTES ST. LOUIS PARK TELECOMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION MEETING OF MAY 6, 2004 AT 7:00 P.M. ST. LOUIS PARK SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL MEMBERS PRESENT: Bruce Browning, Dale Hartman, Ken Huiras, Mary Jean Overend, Rolf Peterson MEMBERS ABSENT: Rick Dworsky, Bob Jacobson, STAFF PRESENT: Reg Dunlap, Civic TV Coordinator; John McHugh, Community TV Coordinator OTHERS PRESENT: Arlen Mattern, Time Warner Cable Public Affairs Administrator; Tom Marble, School District #283 Technology Coordinator; Charlie Fiss, School District #283 AV PC LAN Technician 1. Call to Order Chair Huiras called the meeting to order at 7:05 p.m. 2. Roll Call Present at roll call were Commissioners Browning, Hartman, Huiras, Overend and Peterson. 3. Approval of Minutes for February 12, 2004 It was moved by Commissioner Browning, seconded by Commissioner Peterson, to approve the minutes of February 12, 2004 without changes. The motion passed 5-0. 4. Adoption of Agenda Commissioner Browning requested that the following be added as Item 5D, Old Business: Public Hearing follow up It was moved by Commissioner Browning to approve the agenda as amended. The motion passed 5-0. 5. Old Business A. Franchise Renewal Update John McHugh described some of the activity and business points that staff has been discussing with Time Warner Cable (TWC) pertaining to a new franchise. He said that if TWC needs to close the customer service facility in St. Louis Park, they must have a replacement facility within 4 miles. He said that if TWC discontinues Local Origination cable production (channel 16), the City proposes to operate a van and cover local productions. He said that the City has proposed to allow TWC to continue the studio at its current St. Louis Park facility or allow limited use of TWC’s Eden Prairie studio, which is a better studio and not too far away. Chair Huiras asked how often the studio is used, and Mr. McHugh said monthly or less often than that. Commissioner Browning asked if the St. Louis Park studio is outdated, and Mr. McHugh said that it certainly wouldn’t serve resident’s needs for the next 10-15 years. B. Emergency Alert System update Mr. Dunlap contacted Lance Leupold, Time Warner’s Director of Public Affairs, for an update on the digital override system and has not heard back from him yet. Chair Huiras said to notify Time Warner that the monthly analog test didn’t work yesterday at 1pm, and Mr. Dunlap said he would follow up. C. Victory Sports update Arlen Mattern, TWC’s Public Affairs Administrator, said there was nothing new on this, and distributed a letter from Mike Munley, TWC’s Minnesota President. Mr. Mattern said TWC wants to carry Victory Sports but it’s too expensive. Chair Huiras asked if TWC had met with Victory lately, and Mr. Mattern said there had been a meeting within the last 2 weeks. Chair Huiras said that it irritates him that this is being negotiated on the national level instead of the local level. Mr. Mattern said that he thinks there is more activity going on than is publicized. Chair Huiras asked if TWC had gotten a $ .60 rebate from Fox Sports yet for losing the Twins games and if the customers would ever see a credit on their bills? Mr. Mattern said that the rebates from Fox hadn’t started yet, but eventually there will be a rebate and a small refund will be passed along to customers. Commissioner Overend asked about Governor Tim Pawlenty’s suggestion for mediation between the parties; Mr. Mattern said if there is anything to be mediated, it’s between the Twins and Fox Sports Net, the network that used to carry Twins games on cable. Mr. Mattern also mentioned that the cable companies had anti-trust concerns if they entered mediation as a group. Chair Huiras said that the free trial that Victory Sports proposed last winter included a clause that required a signed contract within 90 days. Commissioner Browning asked if any metro area cable systems carry Victory Sports, and Mr. Mattern said no, but that some out-state systems had signed up for it. D. Public Hearing follow up Commissioner Browning asked if there had been any staff follow up with Bill Watson at Wyndmoor Condominiums, who spoke at the February 12 public hearing. Mr. McHugh said that he met with Mr. Watson about 3 weeks ago and helped him consider options for the condominium association to vote on at an upcoming meeting. The Wyndmoor contract with TWC expires this fall, so one option is to negotiate installing a security camera on a shopping channel with a TWC approved contractor. This solves the problem of not preempting channel 6, a state-required regional channel, and keeps TWC from being in the business of installing security cameras. Mr. McHugh has discussed this proposal with City Attorney Joel Jamnik, who agrees that the narrow interpretation complies with the standstill agreement the City and TWC negotiated. 6. New Business A. School District funding for 2004 Tom Marble, District #283 Technology Coordinator, gave a summary of recent District cable TV efforts. He mentioned a new, more efficient method of doing graphics for the channel which allows teachers and staff to prepare PowerPoint slides instead of cable TV staff. Art Watch has been a tremendous success thanks to parent and student involvement, and the 5 or 6 shows have created many requests for DVD copies. Unfortunately, Art Watch was created by Beth Johnson of the Communications Department, which has been eliminated at the end of this school year. Mr. Marble said they are looking to add DVD equipment compatible with their Tech controller so they can play back DVDs on channel 14. He said that it is now possible to keep programs entirely digital throughout the editing process, which allows higher quality and easy manipulation of the signal. One surprise was that mini-DVC cassettes ($4 each) cannot be successfully erased, meaning they can be used only once. Chair Huiras asked who was doing the School Board meeting coverage, and Mr. Marble said that TWC is providing staff to use District equipment. Chair Huiras asked if that’s what TWC was talking about taking away, and Mr. McHugh said yes, but that the City would assume those tasks. Mr. Marble said that the District has changed the original proposal for the $19,000 equipment grant that they received from franchise fees in the second half of 2002. They have not had studio classes this school year so there’s no reason to try to build a second studio. Instead they purchased a 16 x 16 router, a DVD recorder and a DVD dub tower ($1800) to duplicate 8 DVDs at a time for Art Watch. Mr. Marble said that the District requests an operation grant from the franchise fees of $35,000, the same as last year. Chair Huiras made a motion to recommend an operations grant of $35,000 for 2004, and Commissioner Browning seconded the motion. The motion passed 5-0. Commissioner Peterson said that he’s reviewed the microphone specifications and found that they have an on/off feature. He has discussed this with the School Board, and the Board would like to try that because it will make it easier to manage than the current system where the speaker must continually hold down a button while talking. Mr. Marble said that could be done. Commissioner Overend asked if there was any way to have a fund to replace the studio cameras? Mr. Marble said that the TWC $100,000 equipment grant could be a place to look for that, or perhaps the technology budget. Commissioner Peterson said the one bright spot in the School Board budgeting is the technology levy. B. Review: School District using interns for extra experience & to produce programming Mr. Marble said that this would continue to be a goal of the District. The first student that served as an intern was a Brown College student and a former St. Louis Park High School student who was very familiar with the procedures in the school. Unfortunately that student could only help for 2 weeks, but the School District will continue to work with Brown College on an internship program. They are talking about credit for hours of assistance during the school day, for things like staffing the PC help desk. Mr. Marble said that this was the first year for charging students for all extra curricular activities, and the fee has had a negative effect and discouraged participation in video club activities. C. Background on proper uses of Social Security Numbers & privacy policies Deferred to the next meeting because staff did not complete the research on this item. D. Staff proposal for Time Warner $100,000 equipment grant Mr. Dunlap said that the City was still early in the budget process so there was no direction on how much of this could be spent. He said that Technology and Support Services Director Clint Pires mentioned that some of the City’s wide area network (WAN) equipment may come from this grant, and so one of the proposals on the draft plan for the grant includes video conferencing equipment using the WAN from sites like the Police and Fire Stations. Mr. Marble said that by sharing the paths of the School District fiber optic network with the City could save $150,000. Mr. Dunlap asked how partnering with the City benefits the School District, and Mr. Marble said that locates cost the District $35,000 per year, and that the City could assume that task as part of their right of way management. He also said the City might be able to get some Homeland Security grants to fund their part of the project. Commissioner Browning asked if voice over internet protocol (VOIP) had been considered over the WAN, since this had been big success at Brown College. Mr. Marble said that since the School District was near the end of the useful life of their other telephone equipment, they are looking at implementing VOIP options in January of 2005. Commissioner Peterson asked about the path of the WAN to Susan Lindgren, and Mr. Marble said it runs by the Ford dealer and the Rec Center. E. Discuss cable TV possibilities related to Jewish Community Center & Park Nicollet $100,000 Senior Summit grant Commissioner Peterson and Overend inquired about this grant. It is a Naturally Occurring Retirement Community (NORC) federal grant of $1 million that was announced at last year’s Senior Summit. Mr. McHugh said that one of the NORC activities is a monthly presentation at the Lenox Community Center, to be taped by Community TV. McHugh said he will do further research and email information to the commission before the next meeting. He said that communicating with seniors could be done with universal cable TV service, but confirmed with Mr. Mattern that no such arrangement exists anywhere in Time Warner’s Minnesota area. Commissioner Overend said that NORC might be another way to tell seniors about community TV services. 7. Reports A. School District Quarterly Programming Report B. Complaints Chair Huiras asked if customer complaint #1 got an apology. Mr. Dunlap said that the customer had contacted him after it had been resolved by TWC, and said they didn’t want further action but to simply report the inconvenience that had occurred. Mr. McHugh said that complaint #2, about having to make 4 phone calls to find out how to get a copy of the Breck vs. Benilde-St. Margaret’s hockey game, illustrated the need for one central telephone number for local programming questions, which he has proposed in franchise renewal talks. Mr. Mattern said that he gets calls like this all the time about tape copy requests, and that a central phone number would go a long way to make it easier for customer service to help callers, so he would see what he can do about this. 8. Communications from the Chair Chair Huiras said he had received a lot of favorable comments about the February 12 Telecommunications Commission meeting being on cable TV. Chair Huiras made a motion that all future Telecommunications Commission meetings be in the Council Chambers and televised, if the Chambers is available. The motion passed 5-0. 9. Communications from City Staff Mr. McHugh passed around two pictures (Hennepin Library and Lenox Community Center) as examples of some new community message screens now running on Community TV 15’s new (“Carousel”) message display system. He plans to, yet this year, contact all houses of worship in St. Louis Park and ask them to participate in sharing their events which are open to the public, using similar customized announcements. Mr. Dunlap said he worked with a committee of 15 students to produce a short video publicizing the recent Youth Summit, and he thanked Charlie Fiss for running it numerous times on this channel to help get the word out to students. 10. Adjournment Commissioner Browning made a motion to adjourn at 8:46pm, and the motion passed unanimously. After the meeting, Mr. Marble and Mr. Fiss led Commissioners Overend and Peterson and City staff McHugh and Dunlap on a tour of the studio and meeting room C350 where the School Board meetings are taped. Respectfully submitted by: Reg Dunlap Civic TV Coordinator