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Protest to public access' new face
Future control of Schenectady's cable access channel is fueling a clash of old and new voices

By LAUREN STANFORTH, Staff writer
First published in print: Wednesday, July 7, 2010
SCHENECTADY -- In recent years, Frank Duci would return from Florida every spring, sit down in front of a camera and talk.

Duci, who was mayor for 16 years in the 1970s, 80s and 90s, had a 30-minute show called "Frankly Speaking" that ran on cable access Channel 16 in Schenectady County for at least two decades until Proctors Theater took over the channel this year.
New rules require anyone producing a show in-house must provide a camera person and pass a free course to be certified. The old days of Duci walking into the station's former building on Broadway and having someone there to record his musings appeared to be gone.

While Proctors says it has found a camera person to tape Duci's show, the changes at the station have staged a clash between the old and new -- between people who fear Proctors will shut out fringe voices and co-opt public access for its own artistic interests, and others who feel the sometimes unusual programming that typifies cable access should go the way of the dinosaur.

As a result, the new leaders of Schenectady Cable Access Council (SACC), the nonprofit organization that ran the station for more than 30 years, have decided not to hand over the group's remaining funds to Proctors amid concerns about the future of public access.

"For some of the viewers, the services SACC offered, the help we gave were important," said new SACC board Chairwoman Anneke Bull. "We saw that disappearing. We want to keep the public involved."

The federal government mandates cable systems provide channels for public use, and Time Warner Cable collects franchise fees from customers in order to pay for those channels. Schenectady gets about $100,000 a year to run its cable access, which provides more original programming than most in the Capital Region.

City Council President Gary McCarthy, SACC's former board chairman, orchestrated Channel 16's move to Proctors because he said it would save the channel from debt and would provide better technology and a platform for local filmmakers. After the City Council approved the change, it was believed SACC's board would then transfer its assets to Proctors' new television entity, Open Stage Media, and dissolve itself.

But after McCarthy's term as chairman ended, six new board members were seated and things changed.

Bull said SACC has already transferred over $50,000 worth of equipment and another $46,000 in funds. Bull would not say how much money SACC has left because there are bills still be to be paid nor would she elaborate on what the board will do as SACC no longer has a television station to run. But she said the group might function as a watchdog over Proctors' new efforts.

Proctors CEO Philip Morris said the changes have now allowed station staff to focus on all programming as opposed to just producing a few peoples' shows............>>>>...........>>>>.........Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/AspS.....7/2010#ixzz0szaXnOJT

The transfer of Channel 16 to Proctor's will save it from debt?-lol- Everything Proctor's does involves creating more debt. It's a nonprofit.

     Just a coincidence that Frankly Speaking from Mayor Duci and the Glenville Board meetings get yanked by Mercury Morris? Finally the criticism is sticking to Proctor's. He can't run a banquet hall and he can't run a TV station. Can he run a theater profitably?

With out taxpayer's money......Morris can't run ANYTHING!!

  Mercury Morris said the "changes have now allowed station staff to focus on all programming as opposed to just producing a few peoples shows"? Say What? You mean like the City Council and Glenville Town meetings? How about Franks show? Too pathetic as is the constant cheer leading from the Gazetto.

     BT he can't even run anything with millions in your money. When's the Morris catering company scheduled to open {with your money}. People have has enough of this phony. Sell old Key Bank to a private company.

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Out of Sync; And Out of Control
By Pat Zollinger, July 20, 2010

I was shocked to learn prior to the city council meeting of June 28th that the City Council
had decided to fire John Harnden and his videographer group. They were the Video
Explorer Post 7 which was formed under the Boy Scouts of America banner, more than
twenty two years ago.

My understanding of this group, as extended to me by Mr. Harnden was that a couple of
decades ago the City of Schenectady had to broadcast the City Council public meetings
through a "franchise," and they had a videography business in line to do the work. They'd
even given the videographer upwards of $40,000.00 for equipment but the deal fell
through and the city never pursued reimbursement. The City Clerk at that time called
John Harnden and asked him for his help. How could he say "no" to the city he loved so
much? Of course he couldn't.

Mr. Harnden formed the Video Explorer Post 7 under the Boy Scouts so that he could get
insurance. The "handshake" agreement that he had with the City of Schenectady paid for
that and Mr. Harnden paid for the equipment. Every bit of it including the upgrades that
was required over the years. Every council program was overlaid with "Video Explorer
Post 007" as the producers and a plea for volunteers. I personally recall that they had
several young people over the years, learning how to operate the equipment.

John Harnden had to produce three separate recordings for the City of Schenectady. An
audio recording that went directly to the City Clerk's office for transcription, a video that
went to SACC TV (now known as SACC, Inc) for rebroadcast, and one in a different
format for archiving. What I didn't know prior to talking with John is that citizens have
the right to FOIL the city clerk for a copy of the archived council meeting. Mr. Harnden
would receive a copy of the FOIL (and acronym for Freedom of Information Law)
request and create the copy onto VHS. They used VHS because in the late 80's and early
90's the city council meetings could go well over two hours.

Enter Gary McCarthy, political powerhouse for the Schenectady Democratic Party, past
and present council member, past president of the SACC-TV Board of Directors, current
investigator with the Schenectady County District Attorney's office. Through his position
of "President of the Board for SACC-TV", Gary McCarthy spearheaded, planned and
coordinated the transfer of "broadcasting" the Schenectady City Council meetings to a
new not-for-profit organization created for the benefit of Proctor's Theatre in
Schenectady. I'm not sure exactly how that happened but after the deal was done, SACC,
Inc members were concerned about the politicizing of public access, and voted Gary
McCarthy off the Board.

Gary McCarthy threatened to sue SACC, Inc because SACC decided to retain the funding
that they had received instead of handing it over to Philip Morris and his not-for-profit
group, Open Stage Media. Obviously he was angry that the funds "he" had promised to
OSM were being withheld by SACC, Inc but to threaten a lawsuit against the group took
this action to an extreme. Why would he do that? My gut feeling tells me that it’s because
of his personal dislike for John Harnden, and that was cemented in my mind last evening
on the sidewalk in front of City Hall when Gary McCarthy started to rationalize the
events to Marv Cermak, Vince Riggi, Scott Riggi and me as we were chatting after the
meeting.

For the few minutes that I listened after he arrived, McCarthy stated that John had
fraudulently been using the "Boy Scouts" for insurance purposes. Now I don't believe that
John Harnden ever initiated any "claim" for insurance purposes nor do I believe that
there's a fraudulent bone in his body, but using that word in and of itself tends to be a
political introduction to an excuse so I listened a bit longer. Then McCarthy said that
there were "questions" regarding minimum wage payments and other fraudulent activities
perpetrated by Mr. Harnden with his video taping of the council meetings. And that's
when I started to get angry so I walked away.

I didn't argue with Gary McCarthy, what good would that do? The sidewalk in front of
City Hall is no place to hold any kind of a debate. If fraud on anyone's part was the
impetus for the City of Schenectady to throw John Harnden's group out of city hall, then
we'd be seeing that in the court system now wouldn't we? The only other reason could
very well be because Gary McCarthy was angry that SACC and Harnden (who by the
way is also a member of SACC, Inc) came to their own decisions overriding McCarthy's.

John Harnden is a 1950 graduate of Union College in Schenectady, holds many patents
for and is a retired engineer for General Electric. He is a Schenectadian, a diminutive and
gentle man and seemingly absorbed in the science of life around him such that he
reminds me of a modern day Charles Proteus Steinmetz. His love for science and
technology as well as for Schenectady and our great history brought him to found the
Edison Exploratorium around 2004. His naivety however, caused him to be taken
advantage of when the director he hired and paid for out of his own pocket locked him
out of the building.

And now Gary McCarthy has done the same thing to John Harnden that Thurston Sack
did over the Exploratorium. John Harnden was told to pack up his equipment and vacate
City Hall. For twenty two years John tried to do the best he could to serve the people of
the City of Schenectady. He purchased equipment to use; he upgraded that equipment
twice, all with no funds from City Hall. Then McCarthy uses the excuse that the
transmissions were bad, the sound was bad, the video was bad, for having John thrown
out. But the problems were not John's doing or that of his group. The problems were
caused by the changing technology of video transmission; the conversion from an analog
to a digital signal.

The bars in the video were caused by the analog signal being transmitted over a digital
signal to your cable box. The terminology best fitting this scenario is that the signal was
"out of sync." If you had the cable plugged directly into your television, there were no
bars and the sound was perfect. If you had a digital cable box however, there was a
definite delay in the signal where the analog feed from City Hall to Time Warner hadn't
yet been adjusted. That was the signal problem and it was in no way, shape or form, John
Harnden's fault. In fact, during one of the live broadcast meetings, you could actually see
that some technician somewhere was "tuning" the signal.

And yet, the quality of that signal, or lack of quality as it was, was blamed on John
Harnden by Gary McCarthy.

Now I'm not saying that ignorance didn't exist on both sides. Every battle has its
supporters but when the fighting starts, it’s only the people in this city who lose.
Apparently a "switch" went bad at the new connection point at Proctor’s and as the public
watched the meeting, the signal cut out and a rerun of the previous meeting's broadcast
constantly broke through. Again, not knowing what was happening the videographer in
the back room could see the broadcast as it was being taped, and assumed that members
of OSM were causing it. So they overlaid "OSM is out of control" on the videotape.

That only served to anger Philip Morris and his OSM group, so at the next broadcast they
refused to air the show and instead, set up a screen shot of that council meeting
introduction, and broadcast John Harnden's personal telephone number for people to call
with complaints. And I thought that it was so sad that this issue had fallen to such a
juvenile level. But "ignorance" has the innate ability to breed contempt, and everyone
was affected.

It was too easy for Gary McCarthy to come up with lame excuses for firing John
Harnden, and that should be condemned by the people in this city. There is much
misinformation and outright lies coming out of the mouths of those who benefited, and
those whose political standings were on the line, but how were we to know? With all of
the backroom wheeling and dealing going on, and I cite the City Council's executive
session with Philip Morris last year, how are we to know what is real and what is simply
a political payback?

When politics and technology clash, as they did with the videotaping and live broadcast
of the Schenectady City Council meetings, the only ones who get hurt are the people of
this city. I believe that John Harnden deserves a real apology from this city. He has given
us his best every time he was asked. And all we did was kick him out the door.

We should all be ashamed of our city’s actions taken toward one who is truly our own.

http://www.schenectadyinformer.com/cgi-bin/forum/Blah.pl?m-1279666925/

This man was railroaded by the power hungry democraps, it is clear. But what did he expect to happen when dealing with such creatures? Character assassination is the ages-old tool these people learned from the communist playbook.

I often wondered what the "boy scouts" had to do with it ... they definitely weren't youngsters running the programs any time I'd seen it.

Quoted from GrahamBonnet

This man was railroaded by the power hungry democraps, it is clear. But what did he expect to happen when dealing with such creatures? Character assassination is the ages-old tool these people learned from the communist playbook.

And this is apparently and obviously just one reason why I hope Pat Zollinger gets elected!!! I'm sure she's one that they don't want on the other side of the rail at those city council meetings. She would expose everything!!

I hope she can raise money.

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SCHENECTADY
Public TV switch results in feud
Move goes smoothly for popular local show
BY MICHAEL LAMENDOLA Gazette Reporter

    The basement of Proctors buzzed with activity Tuesday morning. There were lights, cameras and, of course, action as Ann Parillo played the perfect hostess during her 628th “Schenectady Today” show.
    Parillo has produced and hosted “Schenectady Today” for 12 years, most of that time with Schenectady Access Cable Council on Channel 16.
    About two months ago, she moved her show over to Open Stage Media, the new provider of public access television in Schenectady County. She called the move relatively smooth. But not everyone is happy with the change in providers.
    Behind the scenes a bitter feud continues between SACC and Open Stage Media. The feud has escalated with threats of lawsuits, cries of betrayal and allegations of censorship entering the picture, threatening to tarnish the legacy of public access television in Schenectady County, home to one of the more robust programs in the state, said former SACC President Nick Barber.
    “We need a happy ending here,” Barber said. “We are talking about two public access entities.”
    SACC operated public access television on Channel 16 of Time Warner Cable for more than 30 years. Under federal law, cable operators like Time Warner have to provide channel capacity designated for public, educational or governmental use as part of their franchise agreements.
    SACC operated only the one channel, 16, offering locally produced programming from live coverage of City Council meetings to religious programs, from rambling eclectic shows to highly formatted shows like “Schenectady Today.”
    In December the Schenectady City Council replaced SACC with Open Stage Media, a subsidiary of Proctors, and gave it the $100,000 public access fee the city receives annually from Time Warner under a franchise agreement. Time Warner collects the fee through monthly bills of city cable subscribers.
    SACC had received $80,000 annually in public access funds from the city under a prior 10-year franchise agreement. Time Warner bumped the amount to $100,000 when it concluded a new 10-year franchise agreement with the city in January.
    The city selected Proctors because it has a strong fundraising ability and the management capability to expand public access beyond what SACC could offer, said Gary McCarthy, who, as president of SACC and the Schenectady City Council, helped navigate the change in providers.
    McCarthy said SACC was continuously plagued by revenue problems and was never able to move beyond the operation of Channel 16. He faulted SACC for not developing an education channel and not “implementing ideas and raising money to make them happen.” .....................>>>>.................>>>>....................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....r01101&AppName=1

It is clearly just a power grab and a continuation of government take over!

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Blame to go around in SACC-TV saga

    The loss of Channel 16, SACC-TV [Schenectady Access Cable Council] was a true tragedy for Schenectady. Engineered by City Council President [Gary] McCarthy, the once-great public access defender of free speech is now a mere arm of Proctors, under the name of Open Stage Media.
    All one has to do is look at the new creation from McCarthy and Proctors CEO Philip Morris to see how awful the station has become!
    But two wrongs do not make a right and the election of a new SACC board, composed of many from the old board who so mishandled SACC and its transfer to Proctors, and of many who have had their own personal issues that so compromised the station, is another mistake.
    The former board went along blindly with McCarthy’s egoistic and self-serving plans to abolish SACC. Now many of them claim to be defenders of freedom of speech, and want us to forget their complicity in the whole affair.
    As sad as it is, true public access is dead in Schenectady and election of a so-called new board is just making the death of SACC even more painful. The new board has no idea of what to do with money they are withholding, or how to create a body to restore public access to its former glory. They bicker, make grand statements with nothing to back them up, and insult and harass devoted former SACC members who dare to question their motives and tactics.
    Everyone involved in this fi asco is not acting for the benefit of the people, but only for themselves, and all, from McCarthy to new board members, should resign and exile themselves to the land of stupidity, lack of ability and selfish greed and need for power.

    KATHERINE DELAIN
    Schenectady

http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....r01104&AppName=1

Meet the new bored-same as the old bored? McLain is right. Anyone who supported this hostile takeover by horrible Mercury Morris and his stooge OSM should be run out of town on a rail.

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Everyone involved in this fi asco is not acting for the benefit of the people, but only for themselves, and all, from McCarthy to new board members, should resign and exile themselves to the land of stupidity, lack of ability and selfish greed and need for power.

Welcome to Schenectady County government Ms. Delain.

Graham is right. Even the People's Gazetto demanded that DEM hacks be thrown off the SACC Bored. Nothing happened. Debates became censored messes with REP candidates cut off or the sound going dead on concluding remarks. Right-technical difficulties-lol-

     The old SACC elections were orchestrated affairs by DEM hacks. {Kinda like November elections?} No Conservative needed apply. Now its too late with taxpayer sinkhole Mercury Morris at the controls. He is turning a deaf ear to many critics while jumping up and down yelling that he is part of the community. Where's the Proctor's audit by the State Comptroller?