(A) The Council/franchising authority recognizes that under Section 611 of the CCPA, codified at 47 USC 531, the Council/franchising authority has certain power with respect to certain aspects for public, educational, or governmental (PEG) use which is provided by MCS providers classified as cable operators.
(B) To the extent permitted by law, and in order to fulfill the Council/franchising authority's desired goal of a public, educational, and governmental (PEG) access policy that will facilitate the long-range needs of the city, the Council/franchising authority adopts the following:
(1) At the time of an initial application for an MCS franchise for a cable system, and contained within any renewal franchise agreement, an MCS provider classified as a cable operator shall pledge to include the following guarantees:
(a) An MCS provider classified as a cable operator shall provider, at its own expense, one 12 hour educational channel; and
(b) An MCS provider classified as a cable operator shall provide, at its own expense, one 12 hour governmental channel that is available for providing coverage of Council meetings and other related programming offered or designed by the City Manager, or designated official, including department heads; and
(c) An MCS provider classified as a cable operator shall provide, at its own expense, one 12 hour public access channel that is available for use by various community groups and organizations.
(d) Such requirements may not require three separate channels; rather, that sufficient channel capacity exists at any time to accommodate the needs of the users of the PEG channels.
(2) Both the Council/franchising authority and the affected cable operator shall review use after every six months, including the percentage of use of every PEG channel. At the end of each six month period, the Council/franchising authority shall evaluate the response and actual use of such channels. If, after any six month period, the percentage of use for any required PEG channel drops below 25% of the total time allocated, then the required number of hours shall be reduced to a number that most closely approximates the average hours of use per day. If the Council/franchising authority determines the average hours of use per day for any required PEG channel is less than four hours, then the requirement for that channel's availability may be affirmatively waived by resolution, and an affected cable operator may use such channel for any lawful purpose during the period of waiver, which may be ended at any time by repeal of the resolution granting the waiver, and upon a finding that demand for the PEG channel has increased beyond the time allocated.
(3) If, at any time, 90% of the total time allocated for any required PEG channel is consistently used five days a week for a period of six months, then the cable operator shall provide an additional PEG channel.
(4) A cable operator is required to provide both mobile, portable, and stationary equipment to be used for PEG access, together with the aid of technical and production assistance provided by the cable operator. A cable operator is required to provide equipment that can store programs for delayed cablecasting and to provide delayed cablecasting. There will be no cost for technical production assistance for PEG access use to any one user provided that a single use does not exceed 50 actual production man-hours. Moreover, the cost of maintenance of a PEG access studio and equipment required to run the studio shall be borne by the cable operator.
(C) Costs of franchise requirements.
(1) The costs of satisfying franchise requirements to support public, educational, and governmental channel shall consist of the sum of:
(a) All per channel costs for the number of channels used to meet franchise requirements for public, educational, and governmental channels;
(b) Any direct costs of meeting such franchise requirements; and
(c) A reasonable allocation of general and administrative overhead.
(2) The costs of satisfying any other requirement under the franchise shall consist of the direct and indirect costs, including a reasonable allocation of general and administrative costs.
(Ord. 4-1994-20, passed 4-12-94)