WHITE PAPER ABSTRACT

by Chuck Sherwood

November 11, 2009

Over the past thirty-eight years PEG Access Centers have been established and developed in many towns and cities in the United States based upon the model established by the 1970 cable franchises issued by New York City to Manhattan Cable and TelePrompTer for cable TV service to the residents of the Borough of Manhattan and launched on July 1, 1971. This PEG movement started as a result of the broad consensus beginning in the late ‘60s among academic researchers, public policy advocates along with local elected and appointed officials of the importance and the value of local community communications resources. These resources managed by a Designated PEG Access provider delivering services for the general public, for the schools and for the municipality or county. These services included training in television production, access to field and studio production equipment along with post production editing equipment as well as cablecasting on cablesystem channels set aside for Public, Educational an d Government (PEG) Access television programming.

Historically, the lack of these local community communication resources was due to scarcity of broadcast spectrum and no Congressional law or FCC regulatory requirement for the local broadcasters to provide free channel time, much less free production services for locally produced community programming. This scarcity problem was solved in the late 70’s and early 80’s by the buildout of cablesystems infrastructure with channel capacity for not only the local Commercial and Public broadcast stations along with the early broadcast super stations and the beginning of satellite TV service to cable channels but also for local or regional PEG channels and their video and community bulletin board programming. This technological fix created the solution for this situation and thus the activists and advocates were then able to influence and work with officials on the local, state and federal levels during the communications policy debate and thus move new legislation, laws and regulations into place. The institutionalization of PEG Access Centers began with the FCC’s approval of rules for cable franchise regulations in 1972 but the capstone event for the establishment of PEG Access was the passage of the Cable Communications Act of 1984 by Congress.

Since then these local PEG Access Centers have made the migration from analog to digital production and distribution technology. Many Centers have made the migration from PEG Access Centers to Community Media Centers with expanded services and some are now envisioning and designing the move to become Broadband Media Centers, delivering content to multiple platforms using both wireline and wireless networks. Over the past thirty-eight years they have played a vital role as Community Spaces, which offer a broad range of services focusing on Media Literacy Education, Community Television, Community Radio, Community Computing, Community Broadband, Media and Visual Arts along with Community Performing Arts. They have also broadened their funding sources in order to provide many of these new services through revenue stream diversification thus supplementing their traditional funding source based on the local municipality, county or state granting of a cable license to an operator and receiving cable franchise fees and PEG Access support for this private corporation’s use of the Public Rights of Way.

These Centers have now joined with the other organizations in the community they serve, such as Government, Libraries, Schools, Museums and Hospitals, as Designated Anchor Institutions. In their role as Community Communications and Content Creation Centers, they serve not just the individuals, community groups, nonprofit organizations and local businesses but they also provide services to and work in collaboration with all of the other Local Anchor Institutions. As local and county government begin the telecom planning process for Advanced Broadband Infrastructure and Service, whether using local, county, state funds or federal grants and loans for them, they need to insure that Phase I of any plan needs to work with and connect all of these Anchor Institutions. This telecom planning process also needs to be comprehensive, coordinated and collaborative.

Eventhough one of the original missions of the Access Centers, Institutional Networks (I-Nets) and PEG channels was and still is to serve as an Electronic Public Forum for Free Speech on the Public Access channel and for local Community Communications between Government and School Districts with the residents they serve, these resources and services have now been understood to have a broader impact on the community and its community, educational and economic development in a 21^st Century Information and Innovation Economy. Many local governments and school districts have used their I-Net to enhance their ability to delivery voice, video and data services and lower costs. Over the past ten years with the introduction of computers and the Internet, Access Centers also function as providers of Media and Content Creation knowledge, skills and experience thus playing a vital role in Workforce Development and as an important Pathway to Learning for Higher Education in many fields of study. These Centers and their Public Spaces are also part of and play an important role in the rapidly expanding Creative Industry and Economy in the United States.