July 16, 2007

MEMBERS PRESENT

Peter Blum , Chairman
Lara Beck, Member

MEMBERS ABSENT

Richard Curry Jr., Member
Loren Heger, Member

OTHERS PRESENT

 Chairman Blum calls the July meeting of the Marion County Cable Franchise Board to order.  He announces that Ken Burrow has resigned from the Cable Franchise Board.

 The first items on the agenda are the Approval of the April Minutes and the June Minutes.  There is no quorum so these items will be tabled until the next meeting.

 Moving on to the next order of business is the Agency report submitted by Mr. Maultra, Director of the Cable Communications Agency.

 Mr. Maultra thanks the Board for the opportunity to highlight some of the things that the Cable Communications Agency has been involved with during the past month.

 The Cable Agency sent Bright House a letter on June 25 reflecting the auditor's findings that Bright House still owed an amount of $85,520 for the 2002-2003 audit periods.

 The Cable Agency sent the requested data on a project for Emergency Management called Continuation of Operations (COOP) which will be utilized by the City in the event of an emergency.

 Comcast has affirmed that they have received the necessary approval paths to connect the township fire departments in Washington and Warren to the institutional network (INET) to receive the internal programming utilized by the Indianapolis Fire Department.

 The Agency continues to work on the 2008 Cable Agency budget and have completed their narrative for the Controller's Office that was included along with their proposed budget in your Cable Board packets. 

The Agency’s budget presentation will be July 31, Tuesday at 5:30 pm in room 260.

 The Cable Communications Agency has been serving as a consumer advocate to Indianapolis and Marion County subscribers in assisting them in mediating cable complaints on their behalf.

 For the month of June, the Cable Agency received a total of 14 complaints for Bright House .  The high areas of complaints were primarily in customer service and service interruptions.  For Comcast , the Agency received 22 complaints since the Agency’s contact information has been taken off of Comcast ’s billing statement.  The high areas of complaints for Comcast were derived from customer service.

 That concludes Mr. Maultra’s Agency Report and remarks and he will answer any questions that the Board may have.

 The next item on the agenda is the Government Access TV Programming Report with Mr. Ken Montgomery, Manager of Channel 16.

 Mr. Montgomery will go over the June, 2007 Programming and Production Report that was included in the Board packets.  June was a relatively healthy month for Channel 16 with 61 hours and 30 minutes of live and tape delayed meeting coverage.

 There were 9 hours and 2 minutes of specials and events production for the month of June.  Channel 16 did 17 hours of In-Kind Production for City-County/Government Agencies and 3 hours on Series Programs

 The total for new production in all categories was 90 hours and 32 minutes. 

The In-Kind Services were tracked at $7,330 for materials and services for the month of June if Channel 16 would have charged.

 Mr. Montgomery has included an On-Line Archives Usage Report to track how the amount of requests for particular meetings.

 With that, Mr. Montgomery will answer any questions from the Board.

 The next item on the agenda is the Cable Operators Management Reports by Bright House Networks. 

 Al Aldridge, Director of Public Affairs for Bright House Networks will present their operator’s management report that was distributed to the Board. 

  Bright House began the month with 58,897 customers and ended the month with 57,743, giving a system total of 1,154 customers loss for the month of June.

 On the incoming call report, Bright House handled 58,057 calls out of 58,272 calls received.  55,413 calls were answered in 30 seconds or less, which gave a call answer rate of 95.4% and a busy rate of 0.068%, as represented by them.

 On the Complaint Summaries Report, there were 13 complaints from 11 customers. 

 100% of service interruption calls were addressed within 24 hours. 

There were no planned outages, but there were 52 unplanned outages that affected 5,901 customers.  The system reliability for the month was 99.98%, as reported by Bright House .

 100% of total service calls were addressed within the next business day, unless as otherwise directed by the customer.  There were no appointments kept outside of the 4-hour service window during normal business hours, unless requested by customer.

100% of standard installations were performed within seven business days after the order was placed.

There was no construction during the month of June.

The Division was in attendance at the Bright House Networks "Star Teacher Awards" celebration in Orlando , Florida during June.  For being the Indiana Division's "Star Teacher", Bright House presented, Karl Knerr, an Indianapolis area middle school teacher with a check for $1,000, an all-expense paid trip to Orlando , a two-day educational trip to Chicago and a Crystal Star trophy from Tiffany's. Karl was selected for his innovative use of cable television programming resources to create a living history museum with groups from his 6th grade students.  Karl was the first winner from the Indianapolis area since the programs inception in 2002.

The Division was  a sponsor of the 2007 Course to a Cure.  This is the Hemophilia of Indiana's largest annual fundraiser.  This is the Division's 10th year of sponsoring this community event.

The Division sponsored the National Kidney Foundation of Indiana's (NKFI) Cadillac Invitational Golf Tournament.  This was the first time that the Division has been a major sponsor of this event.  Al Aldridge, Bright House 's Director of Public Affairs is a member of the NKFI Board of Directors.

The Division was a major sponsor of the Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Indiana Big Bash Benefit...Magic Carpet Ride.  This middle Eastern themed fundraising event raises funds to support the mission of providing mentors to area children.  This is the third year that Bright House Networks has been a major sponsor of this event.

The Division sponsored a 5-week Kid's Summer Camp at School 51.  Bright House provided themes and volunteers for each week of the camp.  The weeks were divided into; Cheerleading Camp, International Camp, Cooking Camp, Bright House Tech Camp, and Leadership Camp.  This summer camp was a continuation of Bright House 's After School Program with the IPS school.  Over 30 kids were invited to attend camp.

Members of the Division continue to volunteer with the Indianapolis Public Schools Education Foundation, Gideon's Gate, the Indiana Cable Telecommunications Association, the YMCA, the 100 Black Men, LEAD, Inc., the Indianapolis Chapter, the Coalition of 100 Black Women, and the Indiana Hemophilia Foundation, and IPS School 51.

Mr. Aldridge offers to answer any questions that the Board may have.

The next item in the agenda is the ETC Monthly Report submitted by Mr. Chuck Fearnow.

ETC has been approached by the creators of Chubby and Sluggish about airing a program.  Chubby and Sluggish are two characters that help kids understand the benefits and rewards of exercise, healthy eating, and developing good personal cleanliness and safety habits.  The primary targets are children ages 3-7.  Parents and educators are also a focus of their message.  A future proposal is expected.  An update will be provided.

“School Testing – Behind the Numbers” is a lively, humorous and thoughtful discussion of the meaning and impact of school testing, from the reporters who cover testing, their editors who shape the stories, students who take the tests, parents who want their children to do well, teachers who prepare students for the tests, administrators who must meet accountability requirements, respond to parents and encourage teachers, the policymakers who set the requirements and the experts who question the impact.  This program will be seen starting in August.

Dr. Robert Gobetz from the University of Indianapolis has been named the new ETC President taking over for Earl Harris.

The ETC is requesting its Eighteenth Public Purpose Grant from the City-County Council for the amount of $41,050.

Mr. Fearnow offers to answers any questions that the Board may have.

The next item under New Business is the Approval of Budget.  There is no quorum to vote but Mr. Chairman asks Mr. Maultra to do his presentation.

The narrative that is going out for the overall budget on behalf of the City is going to include just a few updates.  For the Cable Agency side, since Comcast is under a State Certificate now, the City will need to do follow-up with the IURC regarding any benefits that are derived at the local level.

For Channel 16, the Webstreaming and the Video On Demand features will open up a lot of new opportunities enterprise wide not only for Channel 16 and the Cable Agency but also enterprise wide for a number of departments.

For the budget, in character one, the Controller’s Office recommended that Channel 16 put the 2005 Producer position that was lost due to budget cuts, back into the budget.

In character 2, there is a 21.4% increase for batteries that need to be replaced at Channel 16.

In character 3, there has been an increase for the Public Purpose Grants.  The Agency is requesting going from $20,000 to $35,000 for the IRIS Grant and from $41,050 to $50,000 for the ETC Grant for Indiana University .

There was a jump in equipment maintenance and repairs.  Channel 16 is swapping $10,000 from sub-object 420 into 356.

The overall increase is $64,382 which reflects an 8.7% increase to the Agency/Channel 16 budget.

Chairman Blum tables this item until there is a quorum present.

There are no public speakers.

Chairman Blum announces the next Board meeting on Monday, August 20th, 2007 at 5:30 PM in room 107 and adjourns this meeting.