Public Access, Spotty Success

It’s not as slick as commercial television, nor does it have the mass appeal, that’s for sure. But then again, public access television, sometimes also called community TV, was never meant to.

Unlike government or educational access channels, which air official meetings and programming sponsored by city halls or schools, public access television is decidedly grass-roots. Its boundaries run as wide as copyright laws and the 1st Amendment permit.

The programming is kaleidoscopically diverse--as colorful and prosaic, as high-minded and downright wacky--as society itself. Whether you are in Los Angeles or Orange County, Ventura, Riverside or elsewhere in Southern California, tuning in to public access might bring you the following:

* A somber concert of Iranian chamber music.

* A bearded nutritionist in a bolo tie, earnestly diagraming the biochemical causes of hemorrhoids.

* African American men discussing community issues.

* A psychic or a yoga instructor.

* Pets available for adoption.

* Museum buffs chatting about current exhibitions.

* Porn starlets exhibiting themselves in the buff.

Since improving technology 30 years ago first allowed cable channel space to be set aside for community use, public access has established its niche on hundreds of cable systems across Southern California and the nation.

Under the 1984 Cable Communications Policy Act, local government can require cable companies, through franchise agreements, to provide opportunities for community members to produce and air their own shows.

“Public access television was a device to make sure all profit-making cable companies were giving back something free to the community,” said Joe Saltzman, professor of journalism and associate dean of USC’s Annenberg School for Communication.

But serving the public does not necessarily mean reflecting majority opinion, other media experts note. While commercial cable aims for a broad audience, public access TV is founded on the ideal of allowing ordinary people to express a diversity of views, no matter how unpopular or extreme.

“It’s a critical part of democracy,” said Red Burns of New York University, who was a part of the community TV movement when it began.

With government as the gatekeeper of public access through the funding and channel space it provides, community TV is thriving in some areas of the country, weak or nonexistent in others. Several experts interviewed believe that public access around Southern California, for the most part, is lackluster, particularly in Los Angeles. Still, gems of individual effort can be found.

Time and Chutzpah Required

The people behind public access TV usually have day jobs that subsidize their broadcast hobby. With enough time, chutzpah and sometimes money, any community member with public access cable can produce a show.

In Los Angeles, Art Fein’s long-running show is regarded as one of the most professional productions. For 15 years, his “Poker Club” has featured guests ranging from Beach Boy Brian Wilson to little-known local commentators who share a passion for music.

One recent evening at the TCI public access studio in Van Nuys, Fein--whose profession is writing--hosted a show featuring Paul Body and Louie Lista, onetime mates in the 1970s and early ‘80s blues band Sheiks of Shake. Between Lista’s performances on harmonica, the men discussed blues.

Like all public access programs, Fein’s is noncommercial and produced or sponsored by a member of the local community. To shoot a show, producers can receive training, borrow equipment or book studio time at public access centers, in some places still for free.

Much of Southern California’s public access programming lags behind that of other areas, experts say. Chicago, for example, has five public access channels, and Manhattan has four. In Los Angeles and other Southland cities, many cable systems offer only one public access channel. Among smaller communities in Orange and Ventura counties, public access must share channel space with other uses.

The Southland’s cable areas are also fragmented, causing challenges for producers and viewers.

For example, in Los Angeles, a viewer who wants to see a public access show might tune in to Channel 6, 19, 25, 27, 33, 38, 41, 43 or 77, depending on where the viewer lives. Producers who want citywide exposure must send a tape of each show to different cable operators, which might air it at different times. That makes it tough to find or publicize shows, experts say.

Though many access studios remain free to the public, some charge fees. For instance, MediaOne charges $35 in Los Angeles and $25 in Orange County. Cable operators say the fees help cover high production costs. But others say the burden could prohibit low-income people from participating.

“It’s a community resource,” said Bunnie Riedel, executive director of the Washington-based Alliance for Community Media. The public “should be able to go in and use the equipment, like books in the library, for free.”

Much of the technology provided by access centers around the Southland is antiquated, producers say. A common feature is the three-quarter-inch tape. “That was the industry standard 20 years ago,” one producer said. Public access, sighed another producer, “is the stepchild of cable television.”

A Show on Male Role Models

For the last four years, former Crenshaw resident Harry Evans III has been mailing three-quarter-inch tapes to cable areas in Los Angeles. Evans, now a Maryland state employee, produces and hosts “That Show With Those Black Guys” in his spare time.

He said he decided to do a show on African American male role models to counteract the dearth of positive images of black men on mainstream TV.

A recent show featured Evans, 42, interviewing former Laker Lucius Allen. They discussed the need for more athletes to use African American agents and debated the pros and cons of attending a black college.

Evans has produced about 150 shows in five years. Guests have included Rep. J.C. Watts (R-Okla.), NAACP President Kweisi Mfume and Danny Bakewell, president and chief executive of the Brotherhood Crusade. In addition to the Washington-Baltimore area, the show is aired in New York City, Atlanta and Houston. Supporters in each city asked the public access channel to air the show.

Amid the current controversy over the lack of major African American, Latino and Asian American roles in the networks’ prime-time programming for the fall, public access shows such as Evans’ break through “this cacophony of white media,” Riedel said.

Public access also provides a venue for others often ignored by commercial TV. Across the nation, senior citizens, nonprofit organizations, gay and lesbian groups and minor political parties have all used public access as their electronic soapbox.

Some public access shows have sparked controversy because of their sexual or racist content. In the Los Angeles area, “Colin’s Sleazy Friends,” a talk show featuring porn stars who sometimes show off their professional skills on air, has a following in certain circles but has been denounced by others.

Such programs are a small part of a diverse array of programming, but unfortunately they are also the ones that make headlines and give public access a bad rap, public access advocates said.

Dearth of Resources Bemoaned

The biggest problem with public access in some parts of the Southland, experts say, is the dearth of resources.

“One of the shortcomings of the 1984 law is the lack of a stable funding mechanism,” said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, president of the Media Access Project, a public-interest telecommunications law firm. Because funding and channel space depend largely on how well local governments negotiate with cable companies, there has been a “huge variation” in public access resources nationally, he said.

A sampling of California communities demonstrates the variances. MediaOne, one of Southern California’s largest cable operators, spends about $6.67 per subscriber annually on public access in Costa Mesa, a little more than $4 per subscriber in Los Angeles and about $2.50 per subscriber in Palm Desert. The company provides no public access in Tulare and Visalia because those cities do not require it, company officials said.

Though there are exceptions, the best public access systems nationwide are run by nonprofit groups, while the worst are usually managed by cable companies, said Sue Buske, a community television consultant. Many of the Southland’s public access production resources are controlled by cable companies--”a prescription for disaster,” she said.

Bill Rosenthal, an official of Century Communications of Southern California, who also hosts a local public affairs show, disagrees with that assessment. Public access can be part of a cable company’s community outreach efforts, he says.

But cable operators also have incentives to kill off public access, Riedel and others say. The less money and channel space devoted to public access, the more the cable company gets to keep.

“We don’t always want to carry public access,” acknowledged Gisselle Acevedo-Franco, spokeswoman for MediaOne. “It is imposed on us by the franchising authorities. It’s costly.”

Control Can Be Crucial

Having local governments control public access is no better because they are prone to grabbing resources for themselves, said Roger Martin, president of the Public Access Awareness Assn.

The city of Los Angeles, for example, earns $15 million per year in franchise fees. Out of this money, the city spends about $1.8 million on its own Channel 35, which airs government meetings, showcases officials and promotes issues and events important to City Hall.

In contrast, the city allocates $375,000 to the nonprofit group that manages Channel 36, which used to offer citywide public access programming but became an all-educational channel Jan. 1, after the group that runs it responded to political pressure from city officials over some adult-themed programming.

The city requires cable companies to provide studios, equipment and channel space for public access and currently spends an estimated $100,000 monitoring compliance, said Jesse Juarros, an official of the city agency that oversees cable franchises.

A few months ago, the Los Angeles Cable Television Access Corp., the nonprofit group that manages Channel 36, asked the city for another citywide channel for public access, which is provided for in franchise agreements. But Juarros said the city has no plans to create another channel.

Because of the city’s policies, Los Angeles is a public access “wasteland,” Riedel said.

By not having such a channel, Los Angeles is letting a tremendous opportunity slip by, critics say.

Before Channel 36 began operating in 1997, a special committee in the early 1990s studied how public access and educational TV might be used to bring together the fragmented city, especially in the wake of the 1992 riots. A citywide channel would allow cable customers “an unprecedented vehicle” to learn more about each other and build “a strong sense of community in our diverse urban environment,” said a 1992 memo from the committee to then-Mayor Tom Bradley and the City Council.

Though a citywide channel for educational institutions is now in place, community groups and ordinary residents do not have such a forum. Public access in Los Angeles remains as fragmented and anemic as ever, said Paul Vandeventer, who worked with the committee and is now president of Community Partners, a nonprofit organization in Los Angeles.

Experts seem divided over the state of public access nationwide.

“Our research shows that more and more city governments, especially where cities are responsible for funding channels, are getting rid of it,” said Dusty Garza, manager of community affairs and local programming for Charter Cable, which serves Riverside. “It’s a non-revenue-generating factor.”

But others, such as Riedel, say community television is thriving in many areas, especially when nonprofit groups are involved.

Public access might be regaining momentum in some Southland communities. In Ventura, city officials are negotiating for more money, more channel space and better technology for public access, said Pam Drake, director of marketing for Avenue Cable.

In Riverside, where Charter Cable forced public access to combine with the Weather Channel last year because of a channel space shortage, public access will have its own channel back as soon as the company finishes some technology upgrades.

Less than a year ago, Time Warner opened a new access studio in Orange County.

More nonprofit organizations are being formed. In the city of Ventura, a nonprofit group is scheduled to take over public access later this year. A similar arrangement, by which cable operators are to provide funding to a new nonprofit corporation, gained approval in September in Oxnard.

Tackling More Serious Topics

Over the last decade, the quality of public access programming has improved markedly, those in the industry say.

“People are trying to tackle more serious topics,” said John Borack, manager of community/media relations and production for Time Warner Communications, one of the largest cable providers in Southern California. “Around the time of ‘Wayne’s World,’ you had a lot of people just goofing off. That has kind of died down.”

In particular, there seems to be an increase in community-oriented programming, some say.

Examples might be “Charlas de la Comunidad,” a Spanish-language community talk show, and “Teen TV,” both created by Debbie Boyer at the MediaOne-run public access center in Costa Mesa. “Teen TV” addressed youth issues, including homosexuality, date rape and violence. The show, which aired for two years, was run by teenagers, from filming and editing to choosing guests and hosting.

Those familiar with public access TV in Orange County say the area doesn’t have the shows that have caused uproars elsewhere.

“There are some areas where people purposely do shows to be outrageous, like in New York or Los Angeles. There was a guy for years in Arizona that did a show jumping rope naked,” said Robin Fort-Lincke, public access, education and government coordinator for Seal Beach Community Television. “We don’t have that here.”

Seal Beach airs a wide range of programming, including shows created by residents of Leisure World.

A popular program is “Out of the Dark With the Mystery Maven,” which features mystery authors and mysterious happenings. Beth Caswell, the host, created the show four months ago and has interviewed novelist Kelly Lange, the former KNBC-TV anchorwoman, and former mob wife Georgia Durante.

Caswell got involved with public access radio in her teens and later owned a mystery book store. “Public access really provides the best opportunity for someone who doesn’t have the Hollywood package--the agent, financing, etc.--but who is dedicated” and still wants to get involved in the medium, she said.