 Good evening. I'd like to call to order the Board of Directors of Community Television of Santa Cruz County regular meeting of September 23rd 2019 with the secretary kindly call the roll. Yes Chair Maes here. Here. Director Hall. Here. Director Rand. Here. Director Mannheim. Here. Director Lorent. Here. Director O'Driscoll. Here. Director Owen. Director DeLondian. Here. All right. Thank you very much. I note that we do have a quorum So we can move on to item number two, which is oral communications. Is there anybody who'd like to address the board? All right. Seeing none. We can move on to item number three consideration of late additions to the agenda any additions or deletions anything Last minute that we need to add to the agenda or poll All right. Seeing none. We can move on to our consent agenda, which is only one item this month It's to approve the minutes of our last meeting from July 22nd Do we have any motions on the consent agenda? Yes And since it's the only item on the consent agenda, I don't know if we have to pull it, but I do have a correction to make. Okay It noted That this is the meeting of June 24th the purchase from elemental technologies we had amended the amount that we were approving to be 30,000 not to exceed 30,000 and the not to exceed got left off So if we can just add that to the minutes, then I'd move approval Okay, did I get the date wrong? Did I get the date wrong on that? Did we not have a meeting in July? We did not have a meeting in August. In August, that's right. Yes. I will change the date on the minutes as well. That means for the mid-date of the minutes. Yeah, okay. So the date on the minutes, so we have a motion and a second by motion by Director Manheim second by Vice Chair Rand To approve the consent agenda with the stated Corrections. Any further comment? I'll call the vote. All those in paper say aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right, that carries unanimously All right, now we get to move on to the regular agenda and item number five Is the election of a new board member to the seat expiring November 2022 and this seat is reserved for K through 12 education and our candidate before us is This Elizabeth Svensson Who works for the County Office of Education? I have a brief introduction. I will read Elizabeth Svensson is a Californian native who enjoys living in the majestic redwoods of the Santa Cruz mountain She holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Redlands a master's degree and Teaching from Fresno State University and a multiple subject teaching credential from California State University Monterey Bay She has taught all grades K through 12 in public schools in Watsonville and Santa Cruz She currently teaches at-risk high school youth in alternative education with the Santa Cruz County Office of Education Elizabeth has a passionate heart for social justice and conservation and structures her classes and curriculum with a lens encompassing science literature multicultural history and perspectives and sustainability so She comes highly recommended by our former board member Izan Gonzalez and I've spoken with her and find her to be as described Do we have any of you have a motion to elect Miss Svensson to the I like to make a motion. I'd like another fellow educator Among some of our educators on here. So, yeah, I would like to make a motion to elect to approve Elizabeth Svensson to the board Second best. All right. We have a motion and a second any further discussions questions comments from the board All right, see none all those in favor, please say aye. Any opposed. All right. That carries unanimously Please come join us I'm excited All right, I don't know if we have anything else to vote on today, but you can Welcome welcome to the table. You can officially hear the director Officially as a board as a board member and ask any questions So we can move on to item number six now, which is the oral report of our executive director Back down. Please take it away. I'm just typing down the correct spelling of the rules of this class Do you pronounce it Svensson or Svensson? Svensson Cool, all right. Well, this is a this is the report for August and I always start up start off with administration and financial is always at the top of the list and so we the co-working center was in profit for August and on a pace to be in profit for September but We had a bit of a mix-up not we didn't our software vendor made some adjustments during the working day during the first week of the month when we charge everyone and That caused a huge problem there was a week of August when no transactions that we had entered and looked as though they were processed or actually processed So we discovered this on our own and then tracked back and now we're involved with the Programmers who are in another country in another time zone So we think we have figured it out between Mel and Ian and the the programmers We found all the money We've gotten two thousand dollars of it processed and we're working on the tail end of it so I Say we were in profit I believe so based on the amount of the unprocessed charges In September if those of you who can look at the dashboard. We'll see that we have lots of extra money It's because we process the act the missing money this month So there'll be a weirdness so don't get excited. Don't do it. Yeah, no confetti It is it's all kind of come out in the wash and it'll be pretty even and but we we have Rented an office and stuff in September. So we will be up But not that much and so just so you know in the interest of clarity. I just want to let you know that I know it's not a problem in the end. It's just a weird thing that we're dealing with but you should know We did about 15 meetings in June which No, that's wrong. I'm sorry We did 15 meetings in July and That's kind of average for us. So that's right on the money We hired a new government technician and we are interviewing for one more We like to have just and just enough we have a fine balance between Having enough to cover everything in any eventuality and not having so many that some people don't get work So they forget what they're doing. So we want to get them enough meetings But we want to be covered in case someone gets sick. We can't have just enough So it's a balance that Victor walks and he handles it really well. He's looking at one more person right now under equipment and facilities we No would to knock on But we should get the internet by the end of the month of the fight We've seen an actual human came in the building and looked at things and asked us questions And that's been going on and we started a year ago started last September and they told us three months pretty excited now so hopefully that happens and We were concerned you may have seen some emails Back and forth about whether or not that would disrupt our being able to see our own channel in the building And it's actually two separate things not to worry We can still see our channels and this is where we monitor them So because all of our equipment is based in the county building so we can't really without cable We can't see if we're on the air. So we have that feed for that purpose and that will continue and We have Received the new elemental the big $20,000 piece of equipment or $30,000 piece of equipment you guys approved and It's gonna be improved Victor's gonna install it this month. There was not a need to install it right away We just need to buy it because we got that huge 50% discount. So it's been sitting in our office. It's as big as this table So we're very anxious to get it installed Under communication we we're still doing Ian Barry our community coordinator is doing a great job with first Fridays He always gets an artist and we have real interesting art out there today when you come in or go out take a peek at it and he's been doing that every Friday and In in conjunction with that we launched an oral history project for the Earth Lake It's the 30th anniversary of Loma Prieta And so we joined with the Santa Cruz County library system and KSQD in recording oral histories of that event So we're letting people come in tell us what they experienced and we will put some of them on television in October birthday preparedness month well also Give them to the library for storage forever for a part of the Just as oral histories of that event and we've gotten some great stories People are making appointments and you can make an appointment now We do it every day you can call up and make an appointment with Ian to come in and do it we've been doing it in the RSVP studio so that's been pretty cool and We've had a lot of people come in we did a whole bunch of them on first Friday and then we've I think we've done 8 cents then so quite a few. How are you reaching out to people or how are they learning about it? there's an advertisement on the review and We've emailed everybody on our list. The library is sharing it with They have a very extensive marketing program. Yeah, they're good actually on the library website So if you put down 30th anniversary in Google Earthquake interviews it pops right up and tells you who to call They've been connecting different organizations like veterans organizations and other groups There might be people with stories. I shared it on Facebook. So all three of my friends saw it. Oh, yeah Good and we should all do it if you were here during your earthquake, please come in Record your memories of it. I was in New York worrying about my family here Oh, yeah, having trouble getting through to them. You know that is the being displaced and away from the people who are in a tragedy It's almost as traumatic as being in the tragedy. It really is uncertainty. Yeah, the uncertainty anyway We're gonna do that throughout September and then they'll start airing in October in and I are gonna head at those I'm on outreach There was a big well, it's not a big thing. It's kind of a medium-sized thing ACM which is the Alliance for community Was anagram so the Alliance for Community Media is sort of our trade organization they lobby for us and and they keep us up on things and Of course, they the cable companies You know, we're not they don't really support us. They do it because they have to so they're always trying to undo it and they're busy trying to undo it right now and so the All the northern California community television stations were invited to a meet-up a regional meet-up not even a meet-up It was like a meet-up. It was in one room like 50 people and we went to The the community television station in San Francisco, which is the old Bay back if you remember Bay back They back kind of consumed the community television station So we went there and there were others from northern California apparently northern California has the most penetration of community television stations Which is kind of fun. So There were a few things I just want to give you a quick rundown of what happened in that meeting So you can be a prize and then I'm going to ask director ran to help me because she she we had two different breakout sessions And we went so that's how big it was there were two breakouts that means and we each went to one of them so They did a lot. They suggested some best practice strategies It's like to you know to stay important and relevant in your community and all of those strategies are already Currently encompassed in our strategic plan So we were very excited to look up at their PowerPoint and there were all the things we had outlined that we wanted to do So we're on the right track They also there was a big suggestion a big push to let your local government know about this this thing That's happening now is what they call the third order, which is an FCC regulation that they are changing to our disadvantage and Right now they have changed it There's a lawsuit to stop them and they're requesting though. There's not a lawsuit There's an appeal to stop the order to to appeal the decision and then there's a request for a stay So that they don't enact it until we appeal if so That's very confusing. That's where we are at the moment And there are some things and then most things in the new order would not be good Most of them we already lost through Divca. So there was a big overhaul 2014 that took a lot of stuff away from us and this would so we already lost most of these things But the two big things that issue would be the cable companies would like to be able to deduct as in kind contributions from the peg fees and not from the peg fees, but from the franchise fees transporting the cable signal to the head end and Which would yeah, and they in its market value and they're the market So they would be trying to decide on the room what that's worth and then The other thing which won't happen yet But it's in the offing is that charge us in kind contribution money for the actual channels. So This is bad and So that's why they're they're trying to stop They're trying to stop this because it would be bad for our community. It would be bad for We don't actually get franchise fees community television doesn't but the county does Provide county services and that's how we get again So that's because they're using the people's easements And you know that some people are supposed to get something and now they wanted to duck the cost of it Anyway, there's a big pushback on this. So that's What's happening? They've asked us to let our government know our local government Sometimes local governments don't know our local government is all over it. So we already have This both the city and the county have people who are Really keeping track of this and they have helped to inform us. So we're good in that respect. We also though there are a Number of levels of government and you know the FCC is at the federal level So it's not only our local level, but it's also our state level and our federal level So we need to write to our senators and our representatives and we have done that and the board of soups has and I believe the city council has written letters also and Anna eschew wrote a letter for us. And so we Want to keep talking to those people about the value of Community television and make sure that they are aware In Santa Cruz, they are very aware Also run the station in Delroy where they had So it just depends on what community you're working with if they're on it if they They value community television and and don't know tell a lot of them value it, but don't know how it occurs So this they don't realize where the money comes for it. They think it's just a nonprofit There raises its own funds and so there is some confusion, but not here. We're good here, but we do want to make sure that we keep Bugging all the levels so in order to help to do that at this meetup We formed a coalition kind of a loose coalition So that we could approach these Bodies in a group so instead of it's just back a read coming to try to talk to the senator It's like the it's the Northern California Association of community media coming to approach and so that's how we're trying to be more powerful as a group And so that is they're building a website So we have a place and the idea is they asked an interesting question like what do you want? So if we were gonna lobby these guys, what would it be for and so that's kind of what we're working on next is the talking points what kinds of things do we want to impress on them and like what do we do and and you know all the kind of job skill training things that we do and the reporting the documentation of community events and and not just events, but you know Activities and news basically Current events more not news Tom. Yeah Tell my question Are they asking what we as community television would want changed if that yeah, if the order gets altered? No matter what they figure that we should not be on the defensive. We should be on the offensive What do we want rather than how do we stop what they're doing? How do we we want our fat peg fees to be? Restricted that was what I said we want that money to be unrestricted. That's what we want and so that's a high on the list There are other things that other people want, but that's the main thing. That's the restrictive thing That's the thing that they do so we have we used to have we used to get our funding in a chunk And we just funded the station with it it ran the station But then they were able to go in the in 22 states The cable companies were able to make a change in the regulation so that the money that they give us can only be used for facilities and equipment not people or pencils or water and gas or Internet service or any of those things so the goal clearly was to put us out of business, but We weren't ready to go so we've developed all these alternative revenues and done all kinds of things to hang in and If we just had that we get all that money that we used to get we still get but we can't use it for people anymore So it's only can be used for equipment in the building and we've leveraged that to some extent which we can talk later about I can give you the history, but What we really want is to just have the money and to run the station. It's hard to do without people So let's see what else did we? Nobody really so on these in-kind contributions. Nobody knows how that will be implemented. There's no talk of what it would be It's just a big thing and They don't think that's legal and they don't think it's consistent with the law because the law says franchise changes must be Negotiated so there's a little mirror and so hopefully I'm sure that's the leverage. They're using to appeal but so so keep that in mind and That's that's it. That was my outreach for this month and and that's my report for for August I did have one other just comment. Yeah. Yeah, I really like to express thanks to both Ian and Mel for tracking down. Oh, yeah That was a big mess and it happened. It was huge as I understand it the week or the five days Whenever when they were doing this the four hours happened to be the time when we put all of our We charge everybody all of our stuff normally goes through so it was a huge impact on our revenues It was a giant we have what we do is every month on the 28th day of the month We charge everyone's credit cards because that's how we do the the co-working And so we charge everybody is so on the first it goes through so from the first to the seventh no transactions were processed So that's like, you know, 50% of our money Kudos and nobody can figure out why it looked like it was there like we look in it said processed Big big kudos to both. Yeah, they were great They were geniuses and they tracked it back and it took a couple of days It took a lot of our time actually to find this money and so I'll be working on that and we have policies and procedures in place now to Well, not really try to avoid this happening again. Well, we we have complaints in place. We don't um We subscribe pretty much to the software so we don't have any power over it And so we complain well the finance committee didn't you say something about that? We're gonna check the bank account. Oh, we have that We'll check the bank. Yeah to make sure I'm telling you that's how they found out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah We usually check the we mail reconciles the bank account once on she goes through make sure and we have this one report That's accurate that we always know is right and we can control We can contrast that with the bank account and see everything matches up and usually everything matches up But this time what you did it didn't match up. There's always missing money So Mel's gonna look once a week now, okay, because Well, if it happens again, we'll catch it more quickly. Yeah, perhaps. Yes Yeah, because now it's been a month and we have to tell people, you know, we didn't charge you last month We're not gonna charge you twice a little embarrassing. Yeah, and it's uncomfortable for them as they don't They're not watching it real closely. They might think they have tons of money Really, they don't so it's a bad thing. It's really makes us look Right once once a week sounds much better. I have one other question. So the new lobbying Organization was there and the sides forming it? Is there a next step in terms of when is that group going to meet again soon? Is there a calendar? Not yet. They're they're organizing the group So they're put it they're finding a place online where people can meet and they haven't decided whether it should be a forum Or a call or what still they're organizing still organizing And if I could clarify ACM is not really a lobbying organization. Well, no, but there was a new there was a new Committee of the new committee. Yeah. Yeah, it's a trade organization Yeah, yeah, do some lobbying. Yes, they watch out for it. Yes, but there was a new body that was formed of Consisting of members of ACM. Yeah, that will lobby people. Yeah, definitely I mean, you know not in the traditional sense But we'll go talk to them. Great. Well, thanks Becca I believe we wanted to hear a little bit from vice-chair ran from her Separate breakout session. Thank you for the great summary. I went to a different breakout session Which basically dealt with peg operational challenges And it was interesting that the first person that spoke up he you want us to talk about diversity and Of course, that's a huge topic But it all through that our hour and a half that we talked it came in and out And it was actually a great theme for for our conversation. And so some people said, you know We are working on the the basis of first come first serve and that doesn't work We need to we need to reach out to specific organizations. And that's why you know, I think oh youth grant youth grant Yeah, that's our strategic plan and other kinds about reject. Well, yeah, and so I was it was very good for me to see that we enforced With questions from from all the other stations. So another thing was the The statement from someone said throw away your perception of a people want Tell them we have tools. What do you want to do with it? So and I know in our strategic plan, we are, you know, reaching out to community training people Yeah, so it was very strong and I really Took out some of those things They all said we need new producers and higher quality of content and we have talked about that as well and The which we talked about, you know, using engaging the best practices And so there were a couple of items that people talked about and power staff and I know, you know You work very hard on that You know get local college media departments to showcase their their media on our stations, you know All kinds of things that we talked about You know, we need to build capacity, you know more classes and they talked about increased the rate Get advanced classes and we've been talking about that. We've never talked about increasing the rate The frequency of classes or how what you charged Our classes are less than $10 Still an amazing value And then reach out to specific groups that came up several times now They were mentioning that the equipment rental is going down People have their own equipment Well, you know the difference may I'm sorry. I asked you to speak and I'm interrupting you The difference between here Santa Cruz and other places is we have a lot of producers in town Who make their living doing that and want the good equipment but can't don't have enough business to buy it In Gilroy, we could never make any money or equipment But here we do we have the good stuff and we have and we've been very careful to buy things that people won't be able to buy Themselves like a crane or a dolly or that sort of thing or store even or yeah Well, not only money has that there's not like business for producers in every town So they were thinking, you know, and we can do that at the same time, but they were thinking of Doing, you know online learning. Yeah, and they're even thinking about you With a system where people then pay and so it was interesting people were thinking money for for operations as well and digital marketing and They also said that there's money available for people who need to digitally market themselves So that we could train people to then help people to just to be mark themselves And I thought well, that's something we hadn't thought about yet. So there were there were things of And then there were questions like this one woman this poor woman. She's the ed for TV station She has no access to the budget It's unbelievable. So we're all just commiserating with her because how can you as ed lead? You know the the station and not know what You know if you can buy any equipment. I was fascinating. So we're all there was a very supportive group it was a small room and they were like 3035 people sitting in that room and so, you know, these are come some of the the things that you know I think pertain to us, but we were commiserating with this poor woman It's amazing. So I think I came away and I you know We had the the privilege of being in the same car going back and forth So we we had a lot to talk about and then we came away with you know Our strategic plan is doing that not not that so we felt really good about having done the strategic plan And of course we're going to talk about the implementation of this to you plan and then some of the things that be thinking about You know what to do next, but there were a couple of ideas. I think that we need to explore great great day Great company Well, thank you both very much for that Luminating report and sounds like it's been an eventful couple of months while the board has been off Questions comments Well, you know since we're live in terms of educating the public We always at the very end talk about how this is broadcast and thank the volunteers We should probably mention that people who are watching it now are watching a production by volunteers Just as a thought rather than at the end talk about it at the middle for one time Yeah, just a thought. Yes. Thank you. Thank you very much All right. Well, you just finished talking and the next item I agenda is item 7 the oral report from the volunteer advisory committee well, there's a great segue because The there we have a subgroup from the producers and directors who have looked Previously they knew that we're working on a strategic plan and so they came up with a strategic vision for specifically the public access and After we finished the strategic plan They studied it and then adjusted some of their Suggestions for public access. So we met this Saturday in preparation of our retreat on the implementation so they have quite a number of Ways of implementing certain certain aspects and we all know that Keith wrote is very specific thing in our strategic plan already And so kind of masses very nicely together other things are specifically for public access So we will bring it up and see how much is actually going to be in in our report But there's there's plenty to to work with so We were very pleased and we'll hear about that at all. Yeah, what I what I should do is Probably sends you the vision I have to ask if that's okay Division and we already put, you know, yes, no or this you know situation or Disney staff and first So we made all kinds of comments on I'll talk it over with Linda who is the one of the members of that group to see if I can share their vision With our comments. Okay. Oh, if it's approved I look forward to seeing that. Yeah, great so we can move on to item number eight, which is the oral report of the board chair would be me and Let's see aside from setting up a meeting with our Finance committee and executive director and vice chair with the county Which was a nice productive meeting and first time we'd had one of those in a while Whereas I understand they used to be monthly or court quarterly. Well crisis And we were in a crisis for quite a long Good to get together me acquaint with the leadership over our counterparts up at the county but aside from that I was trying to recharge my batteries and Up in the wilderness of Oregon for one week and so but it's great to be back and I'm looking forward to our next year of trying to keep the place going and With our upcoming retreat Take our vision and find practical ways to Implement it and bring the organization forward. So that's about it for me Okay, this would be a good time. Yes, so the board will be meeting on Saturday October 5th 12 to 2 thank you That's why we have a vice chair So, yeah, and and we'll be working on implementing our strategic plan which was devised by our hard-working committee and Coming up with some concrete ways to make it reality. I just wanted to check on the time. Is it 11? I had 11 to know it's 12 to 2. I'll check my camera Two hours Did you say 11 to 2? Yeah, that's exactly what it is That's 33% more 11 to 2. 11 to 2. 3 hours to Figure it all out. So everybody drink lots of coffee that morning and come prepared to brainstorm Yes, okay, so we can if there's no further comments questions We can move on to item number nine board member staff requests for specific items to appear on next meeting agenda Are there any specific items that anybody would like to bring? Seeing none, we can move right along to announcements. We've mentioned the board retreat, which is Saturday October 5th 11 to 2 And I would like to take this opportunity to thank our volunteer crew Which today consists of Philharmonic? Congratulations on another anniversary of your marriage and many more Nick Kirkendall Sherry Ross Linda Janakis Keith Gudger and Karen Scott. Thank you very much to our our Fearless crew We can move on now to item 11, which is adjournment. We have a motion make a motion with our newest member like to second All right, we have a motion and a second for adjourn all those in favor. Please say aye. Aye. Are you opposed? All right, we are adjourned until our next meeting. Thank you very much