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CABLE ADVISORY COUNCIL
P. O. Box 87
Newtown, Connecticut
~ Amended Minutes ~
Minutes of Public Regular Meeting –
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Newtown, CT
There was a regular meeting of the Cable Advisory Council called to order at 7:03 p.m., Tuesday, November 9, 2010 by Vice Chair Carmella Amodeo at the Charter Communications facility, Newtown, Connecticut.
ATTENDEES: John Bell (Kent), Stephanie O’Rourke (Kent), Joe Hurley (New Milford), George Fletcher (New Milford), Michael Paes (Newtown), Carmella Amodeo (Newtown), Gregory Davis (Roxbury), George Linkletter (Sherman), Paul Katzmark (Southbury), Carl Braun (Woodbury).
From Charter: Tom Cohan (Gov’t relations), Greg Van Antwerp (Community Access), Tim Noonan (Ops), Greg Garabedian (VP/GM).
PUBLIC INPUT: None
APPROVAL OF MINUTES:
Katzmark made a motion to approve minutes from the September 14 meeting with one correction. Seconded by Bell, all in favor.
TREASURER’S REPORT:
Carl Braun gave his report: Total of $21,544.13 between checking, money market, and CD. Fletcher made a motion to accept, seconded by Katzmark, all in favor.
CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS REPORT.
Tom:
- There are 4 new HD channels for Newtown/Winsted, including MTV HD, Comedy Central HD, Nickelodean HD, and ABC Family HD.
- A new multi-cast channel called CoolTV was added. This offers music videos 24/7.
- Connecticut Public Television is adding a multi-cast channel called CPTV4U on November 30, 2010. This will offer different programming themes for each day of the week; Sunday- Mysteries and Music, Monday- Nature and Travel, Tuesday- Drama, Wednesday- History, Thursday-Independent Films, Friday- Science, Saturday-Comedy/Performance.
- SNY began carrying UConn gmaes (5 football games, 13 men’s basketball games, and 1 women’s basketball game.)
- There is a link to the Broadband Mapping website for the state of Connecticut, http://ct.gov/broadband/site/default.asp. There are some mistakes in the Charter areas, which are being worked out. The maximum advertised speed is 60 Mbps, which is the same or faster than most cable companies.
- At the request of the DPUC Commissioner, Tony Palermino, Charter and other cable operators are working with CL&P and UI to establish better communications and coordination procedures to respond to emergencies and major storm damage.
Greg
- Election time was busy for Community Access. CTV-21 hosted the 112th District debate, which was co-sponsored by the League of Women Voters and The Monroe Courier.
- Community Access has been reaching out to WestConn, and was able to have a Professor volunteer to do live election returns for next year.
- 7 people from the community visited the studio for a personal tour.
- The fall internship began October 7th with 12 members.
- There was 1 truck shoot during October, which was a talent show “We’ve Got Talent”, which will be an annual event. There will be a tapping of Cinderella in November at Masuk High School.
CORRESPONDENCE:
- Fletcher is confused about the new e-mail setup, and he is getting errors and is slower than the previous e-mail service. Noonan asked Fletcher to call him to set up a time to get a technician out to his home.
- Bell wanted to thank Greg Van Antwerp and Tim Noonan, as well as all Charter employees who helped a family in Kent when they were having an issue with a transformer outside their home. The homeowner wanted Charter to move the transformer due to noise and fumes, however, Charter said it would cost about $2,200 to move it. The homeowner called Charter, and was able to connect with Tim and Greg, who were able to direct their call to someone who could help. The transformer was moved, with no cost to the homeowner.
- Bell was upset that his basic cable increased by $5.00 per month, and now 3 channels are snowy. Noonan will call John to speak to him about this.
OLD BUSINESS:
- Davis explained that the new registrar name for the Cable Advisory website is godaddy.com. The websites are now cableadvisoryboard.com, cableadvisoryboard.org, and cableadvisoryboard.net. Five years of pre-paid DNS service was purchased for $100, including transfer fees. The council continued to discuss the relevance of the Advisory council. Davis said they are a state mandated council. There is a statewide video council, who are made up of members of the advisory boards for each town. Cohan mentioned that the advisory council was created to oversee disputes and promote access. The members of the board represent charter customers and have a relationship with elected officials. They are here to resolve issues, promote charter, and advocate for the people. The council agrees there should be more promoting about what they do, and what charter does. Cohan suggested that when the public has a question or comment for charter, members can forward it to a private e-mail for
charter.
- The members were discussing putting the membership on community access tv. Hurley made a motion for Paes to work with Van Antwerp to get information for members to put on community access, and report back at the next meeting. Second for Fletcher, all in favor.
- The discussion for writing a newspaper article about what the council does was put on hold until next meeting.
NEW BUSINESS:
- The council decided that 6 meeting for each year is favorable to 4. The next meeting dates for 2011 are as follows; January 11, March 8, May 10, July 12, September 13, and November 8.
ADJOURNMENT:
The meeting was unanimously adjourned at: 8:55 PM. Respectfully submitted by: Tiffany
Wolfe, Recording Secretary
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