Last evening, January 15, 2004, a group of public access producers met with Mark Jaffee and Richard Wilkens. Both of them tried to make what happended sound fair and reasonable, even though it was both illegal to do and illegal in the way it was handled. Below are some of the complaints. I will provide more information as I become aware of it

  1. The Dec. 8, 2003 contract was negotiated under the terms of the April 10, 1980 franchise agreement. According to the original ordinance 1523 paragraph 7(B)1 pages 13 & 14 these terms can only be negotiated during the negotiation window, every 5 years. The next opportunity to do this will be in 2005. Any terms or agreement negotiated in 2003 are null and void, and unenforceable. Therefore the 12/08/03 resolution is null, void and unenforceable.

    Mr. Jaffee responded to this by saying the deputy attorney decided to do it ten years early.

    Why is this a rush job?

  2. Only the Rules and Regulations that were approved in the 1983 Resolutions are enforceable. Any current TW claims must be reviewed via a joint open session with the City of San Diego, the cummunity, and all public access producers and associated persons. This is to be noted in the permanent record of Time Warner as a complaint to be reviewed during the next contract negotiatins.

    When queried about public hearing, Mr. Jaffee said there wasn't time.

  3. The original Franchise agreement that ALL interested individuals throughout San Diego County will continue to have the right to be CPC producers at Time Warner, the right that has been enjoyed since 1980, until recently.

    Mr. Jaffee says that each city must negotiate their own contract.

  4. Any and all negotiations are to be publicly noticed, for 30 days consecutive days in the community calendar during normal viewing hours, and via a minimum of two emails to the producers who have email and via US mail to those who do not.

    Mr. Jaffee freely admits that in the haste to proceed with this, none of the above was done, ie...

    • no publice notice for 30 consecutive days
    • Where is the community calendar???
    • No emails, not one, not two
    • No US mail

  5. During a minimum of three open meeting, the producers and community will have input into said negotiations, and be fully privy, via written documentation, to all of the terms and points of negotiation that directly affect them as they are proposed.

    Mr. Jaffee agrees there were zero open meetings and zero written documentation was made available to the producers.

  6. Beginners training for AVID to be offered to all producers.

    Yes, it is offered once every six months to only 10 people at a time when most of us can't come anyway. If you miss even an hour of the training, you must wait six months and do the entire class over, including pay for it.

  7. Upgrade or refresher training for AVID offered for all producers every month

    see above

  8. Increased memory capacity for current AVID system.

    How much space is acturally there on the computer for editing?

  9. Any significant changes in equipment by Time Warner must result in Time Warner offering free training classes to all current producers to bring them up to the level where the producers can return to creating programming as they were prior to the changes.

    Time Warner is currently charging for the free training.

  10. Betacam and digital cameras available for location shoots.

    Mr. Jaffee expressed surprise that no field equiptment is available.

  11. Re-instate the busiest times that are most used: Friday nights, and all day Saturdays, both morning and afternoons. Make the studio available all day Sunday, as well.

    Mr. Jaffee expressed surprise that no field equiptment is available.

  12. Re-instate the busiest times that are most used: Friday nights, and all day Saturdays, both morning and afternoons. Make the studio available all day Sunday, as well.

    TW has arbitrarily taken over all the prime producer times, forcing producers to to schedule times that are not easily met and take off work to work on their shows. We all agree that some compromises must be made, but we feel a producer should not have to sacrifice thier livlihood to meet TW's whimisical scheduling.

  13. The studio should return to being fully available 40 hours per week as has been the case for the last decade.

    TW has let us know for the last few years that they are trying to phase out the Public Access TV and its producers. Why are we so surprised when they keep reducing the hours that we can produce.

  14. Time Warner staff must stop taking over the studio during public access times.

    Mr. Jaffee did not understand that such pre-empting is at best inconvenient, at worst the producer has lost a show. Sometimes the producer might get a weeks notice, which is still bad in terms of rescheduling, which must be next month, if ever, or the producer may come in with his/her guests to find that TW has taken over the studio. He did not seem to know that the guests also must take off work to come it, and they won't do it twice.

  15. Time Warner must make studio additionally available (beyond the 40 hours of recording time) for editing time for those persons who lost editing ability.

    See #s 6,7,8,9. In addition, since most of the producers know how to do linear editing, they are useing studio time to do editing. Few know how to do the AVID editing due to TW's training schedule.

  16. Time Warner must make studio additionally available (beyond the 40 hours of recording time) for editing time for those persons who lost editing ability.

    See #s 6,7,8,9. In addition, since most of the producers know how to do linear editing, they are useing studio time to do editing. Few know how to do the AVID editing due to TW's training schedule. Apparently Mr. Jaffee did not realize that we have only one editing bay and that is the AVID bay which few know how to use. Mr. Jaffee suggested that since AVID cost only $1,000.00, the produces should buy it and do their editing at home. Mr. Jaffee also suggested that it is the trend for the public access producers to edit at home. When asked why if it is only $1,000.00, the studio couldn't buy another one. It would make things easier because there would be two, then more people could train. Mr. Jaffee then backed up and said, "But the computer to run it on costs $4,000.

  17. Once yearly open and recorded meetings with Dan Ballister, and Studio Supervisor and all public access producers and community members established on the first Saturday of every March at 2pm. Results of said meeting to be made into minutes and distributed to all interested personnel.

    In the past we have repeatedly requested meetings and even open forums where interested individuals could freely express their opinions and what they would like to see or produce. These requests have been ignored. We feel the requests are only fair.

  18. Simultaneous digital recorder, beta recorder and ¾" recorder in upstairs studio suite.

    At this time, that is not the situation.

  19. Digital roll-in option in upstairs studio suite.

    Don't we wish. Currently that is not an option.

  20. Written response to complaints from both Time Warner and Mark Jaffees office within 10 days.

    Currently we get no response, oral or written.

  21. No retaliatory suspensions. A penalty to Time Warner for any suspensions that are established as retaliatory after a hearing with an independent arbitrator. There must be recourse and resolution.

    Currently, if you complain, you are suspended. There is no recourse. The supervisor is God.

  22. Mark Jaffee's office must enforce regulations when Time Warner violates them.

    Unfortunately, that has not happened yet. Regardless of contract, the Deputy attorney "decided" to renew the contract ten years early, without public hearings, without producer input, and never notified anybody until it was a done deal. A flagrant deregard for the law. Is this how our City represents our interests? Is Mr. Jaffee's job to smooth things over when they are done illegally or does he represent us?

  23. According to FCC regulations, the contact information for all public access producers is public information, yet Time Warner refuses to release this information.

    Mr. Jaffee equivocated on this question. He did say, after being pressed, the the producers probably could not get that from the city either.

  24. Time Warner is to cease broadcasting commercial & for-profit radio programming on community calendar on non-commercial public access channels. This is a direct violation of the original franchise contract. This is the third time this has been noted in recent years, yet Mark Jaffee's office refuses to enforce this provision of the contract. This should be made a permanent part of the record of Time Warner's violations for review during the next contract negotiations.

    Mr. Jaffee agreed that they should not do this, but it was unclear whether he intended to inforce the law or not.

  25. Require a written response from Mark Jaffee's office as to specific reasons for any suspensions, and verification that these are legitimate warnings and violations. If a producer is unfairly suspended, the original suspension time must be reversed, and the number of missed dates to be doubled as a replacement.

    We feel this is fair and reasonable. Mr. Jaffee said he would discuss it with TW.

  26. Co-producers cannot be suspended if a producer is suspended. This is a violation of basic civil rights.

    Mr. Jaffee didn't seem to think this was so unreasonable. Are we in the United States yet? In the United States, one person does not expect to be presecuted for anothers persons sins. When did this change?

    At this point, a Political Science student interupted the proceedings because she had to leave. She said she found such flagrant disregard for the law and for a written contract, by the city attorny's office, Mr. Jaffee's office, and Time Warner to be frightening.

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Please select your issues from below, augment per your own ideas and send in to TW immediately.

Must be done by Sat at 9am

PAPPA 2002 10 07 REVIEW OF PROPOSED CHANGES

We are very concerned that there were many producers who were unable to attend the meeting. These people will be directly affected by these changes. Further, for the individuals who were able to attend: Time Warner did not make a sufficient number of copies proposed rules for the attendees, and apparently there were numerous incomplete sets that were distributed.

SOLUTION: We request that these proposed rules, along with the agenda, are posted, IN THEIR ENTIRETY on the TW website for the next thirty days, and this address is given out on the public access voice mail for the next thirty days, with an email address for accumulating responses.

Finally, we would like it noted on the record: the agenda was prepared by TW without consultation with any producer or community member. No public access individual had input into the agenda or to the rules as proposed by TW prior to the meeting. No public access individual was privy to the rules and the producers have been given merely 7 days to make their full and considered responses and suggestions.

In an effort to respond promptly, a group of us have accumulated the following:

  1. LIVE Shows: TW has had more than 30 days to respond to requests for live broadcast. This is more than sufficient to create additional requirements. This needs to have a time certain to be finished.
  2. III. Please include and make available the complete and unedited Cable Television Franchise Holders agreement as it is incorporated as a part of this document, as Not including this information is unduly burdensome to the community to go to a second source (which is not readily available) to be informed about their rights of redress.
  3. IV D5b: “mailing address should be on file but is not mandatory for labels” is the suggested clarification per the discussion.
  4. IV D7 the word “not” should be included appropriately
  5. IV D7 Please add the commitment that was made during the meeting: ”TW will provide pre-recorded five second count-down tapes at both the recording and editing facilities
  6. IV D8 This should read “If both channels are used, only the audio on channel two will be broadcast.”
  7. IV D 11. We would prefer that this read “Most cablecast shows will not cable-cast more than twice in a six month period as a general rule. Producers will understand that fresh programming is desired as optimal as much as is possible. It is not our intention that the same 13 shows will run four times in a single year.”
  8. IV D 12 We request the following clarification: “As a courtesy, as soon as it is reasonably known, Time Warner will notify any producer whose show has been or will be pre-empted, and the show will be re-scheduled for the next available time slot.”
  9. V.2. We prefer the following clarification “ “Producers should strike at least thirty minutes prior to the scheduled end of their shoot, except when the following shoot is scheduled and pre-arranged to use the identical set.”
  10. V9 The agreement made during the meeting is most closely approximated by the following clarification “A producer or crew member must arrive within thirty minutes of the scheduled time or call to indicate the late arrival or the producer’s time may be forfeited.”
  11. V. 12 Please clarify:. “Any addendum to this manual will be posted on the bulletin board, the website and the outgoing voicemail for thirty days before going into effect to allow for input from producers and crew, and to allow them time to integrate those changes into future productions:
  12. VI.
    1. There is no verification that the producer has understood that they have received a “verbal” warning. There should be no such thing as a secret “verbal” warning.
    2. If an associate producer is suspended, the producer and the crew will not be suspended as a result of the action, unless they were also involved in the original infraction.
    3. TW does not have the right to suspend a producer for active complaints against TW.
    4. Any TW producer who seeks redress in accordance with the provisions of Section 73.0105 ( c ) cannot be considered suspended for pursuing his or her lawful rights.
    5. Please include the actual full and unedited wording of the above referenced section in the Manual. Not including this information is unduly burdensome to the community to go to a second source (which is not readily available) to be informed about their rights of redress. A contact phone/address should be included, along with procedure.
  13. VII C. We request the following clarification is added ” Materials used in accordance with the Fair Use law are exempt from this paragraph.”
  14. XI. Carol Paddyfoot stated during the meeting that she has more shows scheduled than she has time to cable cast these shows. Per this paragraph, TW is required to expand the hours of public access channel operation when this happens. Please submit a time table as to when this will happen.
  15. XIV. Please include the exact date of the next designated review of the cable franchise agreement, and the address of the FCC that keeps the permanent file for this review purpose.
  16. 1
      The following equipment is requested to upgrade the shows produced at TW:
    1. Wireless lavalieres
    2. Degausser for tapes.
    3. teleprompter
    4. an adapter for control room to roll-in tapes from a standard RCA hook up as in the downstairs editing suite
    5. two more table top microphone stands
    6. one more floor microphone stand
    7. White cove
    8. Chromakey green cove
    9. black tile on floor
    10. 3 floor lights
    11. Digital or mini-dv player for both studio and edit suites.
    12. A boom mike permanently set into the lighting grid.
    13. Standard plants of various sizes to be used in shows.
    14. We have been promised two digital field cameras to replace the 6 year old field VHS cameras for nearly two years. Please give us an idea when this will happen.
    15. The beta tapes from upstairs are seldom distributed to public access. Cox is requiring beta tapes soon. We would like to request these be distributed as they become available.
  17. We specifically request that the Vice President of Media Relations send a written request to the Time-Warner Cable TV Guide requesting a procedure to include the detail of the public access shows in the guide.
  18. We specifically request a page on the provided TW web site for those producers who do wish to provide contact information for the general public. Dan Ballister agreed this is a good idea.
  19. We request The Chromakey function to be cabled to the other two cameras.
  20. Move the “GREEN ROOM” sign so that it is actually ON the door instead of behind it so that guests will know which is the actual room
  21. Provide a second “GREEN ROOM” sign, so that guests will be able to find it from both the studio as well as the reception area.
  22. We request a GREEN BORDER stripe across the top of the green room as was agreed four years ago at the prior meeting.
  23. Provide proper make-up lights either in the green room or in the restrooms so guests are able to apply make-up accordingly.