08/26 Columbia MO: Documenting a rebirth - New funds bring new life to CAT.

Documenting a rebirth - New funds bring new life to CAT
by Sara Semelka, Columbia Daily Tribune; August 26, 2009

The halls of the Helis Communication Center at Stephens College were vacant July 23. Empty of students for the summer, the building’s lights were shut off and classrooms and offices were quiet.  A couple of flights of stairs below the main floor, though, a flurry of activity had begun in the basement. Volunteers and staff of Columbia Access Television, or CAT, housed in the lower level of the building, were preparing for a shoot in front of a live studio audience.

Board member Gary Hildebrandt adjusted the gels for the studio lighting. Station co-manager Ryan Walker organized volunteers and configured chairs for the audience. He hustled to find a podium for the lecturer, Melinda Hemmelgarn, and to prepare her microphone. Walker’s co-manager, Andy Neitzert, finished up the slides for the credits in his office and darted into the studio to set up Hemmelgarn’s presentation.

Just before the show went live, Walker, Neitzert and CAT staff member Ted Carstensen huddled in the control room, which buzzed with nervous energy. The three made a plan to incorporate Hemmelgarn’s slide show, listener calls and audience questions in real time for the live broadcast. This would be the first time a CAT broadcast included capability for live call-ins, graphics and studio audio.

As Hemmelgarn, a dietitian, spoke about the role mass media has played in Americans’ food choices, the CAT staffers directed volunteers operating the cameras, monitored the sound and coordinated visuals.  The shoot went off without a hitch. As the staff broke down the set, their glee was palpable.  “We were like NASA in there!” Neitzert said as he stacked chairs. “I think it went swimmingly. There was lots of positive energy in the booth.”

A short time ago, such a shoot would have been unimaginable for the public access station. An infusion of grant money, city funds, new members and full-time staff has resulted in better equipment, more local programming and higher-quality productions for a station that was in danger of disappearing. ”There were some very bleak times,” Neitzert said. “Everybody thought this place was going to go away.”

Jo Sapp has been a CAT board member for more than five years and in 2003 was a member of the cable TV task force that lobbied the city to help secure franchise fees from cable companies and establish a local access channel. For years, there was not enough money to pay any staff, and all programming was produced by volunteers and board members who also had full-time jobs.

“The board ran the station,” Sapp said. “We were able to pay some people for conducting classes. If seven people signed up, their fees would be used to pay the volunteers to teach.”  It was clear that not having a staff was not sustainable.  “This place was running on volunteers and fumes,” Neitzert said.

For years, the station’s board of directors worked with the city to get funding and secure cable franchise fees from Mediacom. “The problem was that it was delayed just long enough so that the state legislation changed, and instead of dealing with local governments, the cable companies could deal with the state,” Sapp said. “It’s a whole different ball game.”

Last year, CAT contracted with the city for $200,000 a year for four and a half years to provide public-access television for the community. The city also was able to negotiate and raise the cable franchise fee 2 percent. That funding has provided a shot in the arm.  “CAT today is almost unrecognizable from CAT two years ago,” Walker said.  [ more ]