Rogers agrees to expand distribution of tiny community station
GATINEAU – CRTC hearings feature a lot of what we call “woulda, shoulda, coulda” talk.
Loads of words about what companies would be doing, if only this or that were changed, what they should (or shouldn’t) be doing under existing rules and what they could be doing, regardless. It isn’t often where these issues are solved without the CRTC forcing the matter.
Well, during October’s phase II BDU license renewal hearing, commissioners heard from one small community TV outfit on what Rogers Cable could and should be doing for them in southern New Brunswick.
CHCO TV is a licensed, not-for-profit, low power station in Charlotte County, N.B. with carriage on Bell across the province, but on Rogers Cable in only one local system. “We produce four to five hours of original TV programming a week on a shoestring budget of less than six figures. We believe CHCO is the last line of defence for organized local expression in television which today of course is often shared on social media. We are struggling and we want you to be aware of the effect of CRTC decisions on community television,” said Jay Remer, CHCO’s board chair.
CHCO told commissioners that it only has to be carried by Rogers in St. Andrews, a community of about 2,000 people – but that it also hoped to be carried by Rogers in nearby St. Stephen (pop. 4,400) and St. George (pop. 1,500). The station has asked Rogers to expand its distribution and has been told no, so it turned to the Commission for help.
Remer and station general manager Patrick Watt told commissioners how, due to changes in cable company ownership and new CRTC regs surrounding community television, that it is the last independently owned and run community TV station left in the province. Rogers runs community TV channels in several zones in the province (Bell runs one as well), but rarely do those channels show anything relevant to Charlotte county, said the CHCO representatives.
“Rogers maintains a headend in Saint Andrews that serves all of Charlotte County, but subscribers in the St. George and St. Stephen areas do not receive CHCO-TV on cable 9 as subscribers do in Saint Andrews,” Watt explained, adding later that in order to earn more local ad revenue, it needs the extra distribution. “We do try to seek out some advertising, and if we do go outside into the bigger towns of St. George or St. Stephen, one of the first things that a prospective advertiser says is, ‘Well, you're not on Rogers. You're only on Bell’.”
Within hours, however, CHCO got what it asked from Rogers. When company executives appeared in front of commissioners the following day to reply to intervenors, the company’s VP regulatory Pam Dinsmore told the panel it would grant the station’s request. “We listened to the intervention of CHCO yesterday and heard the exchange with Commissioner MacDonald. We investigated internally whether it was possible to provide the CHCO low-power television station beyond St. Andrews to the neighbouring communities of St. Stephen and St. George,” she said.
“On an exceptional and voluntary basis, we will provide them with distribution in these two exempt systems by the end of the year. We talked to them last night and have come to an understanding.”
Would. Should. Could. And, did.
