Local TV station tunes out
After more than 20 years of serving Hacienda Heights, Industry, Valinda, La Puente, Bassett, Avocado Heights and north and south Whittier, KCAT Channel 3 is signing off.
The television station's board of directors voted about two weeks ago to shut the operation down.
As the local television access station in the area, KCAT covered a variety of events in the San Gabriel Valley including the Hacienda Heights 4th of July Parade, Concerts in the Park and the Industry Pro Rodeo.
We sent out a photographer Saturday night to shoot the last taping of Marty's Corner, one of many community-based programs taped at the station's Hacienda Heights location.
I haven't gotten the full scoop as to why the station is shutting its doors yet, but I suspect a slipping economy and little money for public broadcasting likely has something to do with it.
Look for a full story in next weekend's paper. In the meantime, here's some video from the show. One of the Tribune's reporters, Michelle Mills in the clip too:
****I haven't gotten the full scoop as to why the station is shutting its doors yet, but I suspect a slipping economy and little money for public broadcasting likely has something to do with it.****
Funding for Community Media Centers has nothing to do with the economy or with donor funding. Federal law has long permitted cable companies to do business in a municipality, provided that up to 5% of the monies be returned to the community. This is known as a "right of way" provision which repays the town for the damages caused to buildings, sidewalks, streets, etc. for laying their cable. Most towns have then forwarded a significant portion of these monies to a non-profit organization formed to run the cable access stations on behalf of the town, providing a valuable voice of local affairs via media training and access to the channel time.
California recently passed a State Law known as DIVCA and heavily sponsored by Verizon and AT&T to eliminate such funding as a requirement for competitors to enter the market. As a result, California and other states will soon see their highly prized community media go away such as the case here.
I'm wondering if anyone has the names of the people on the KCAT board. I can't find them all listed anywhere. It seems fairly cheap and cowardly that they voted to close the station at a secret meeting, and now we can't even find out who these people are.
With no accountability, we're going to keep losing things like community access TV.
Long Beach is having good luck so far...Read our blog and - stay tuned!