LAKE COUNTY >> The Lake County Board of Supervisors approved the City of Lakeport’s request to participate in the county’s Public, Educational, Governmental (PEG) Cable Television Channel at its regular meeting this week.
Joining Clearlake and the county, Lakeport will now directly contribute to the channel with its own PEG board member and $2,000 towards the channel’s operations budget.
Mayor Martin Scheel will join Clearlake Mayor Denise Loustalot on the five member board along with Chair Ed Robey, who shared his optimism for the channel to the board.
“This is a reboot for the PEG station in a lot of ways,” Robey said. “We want to have a chance to show what a community access TV station can be and do.”
In its effort to reboot the channel — which also includes Lake County schools Superintendent Brock Falkenberg and Eric Hoefler, a teacher at Kelseyville High School — Robey said the board’s goals are to get cameras to record city council meetings in Lakeport and Clearlake, similar to those in the supervisors’ meetings, and to stream the meetings online.
According to the agreement, Lakeport’s financial contribution will also be joined by the county’s $15,000 and Clearlake’s $8,000. However, that money will be only be used for business operations.
Capital expenditures, such as purchasing cameras and other equipment will come from one percent of the revenues the three agencies make from the franchise fees they charge to Mediacom.
The operating expenses have been set aside by the county in its fiscal budget this year, but the others were not confirmed.
Even if one agency does not pay, they will not be penalized because the agreement, expiring in June 2018, comes with a non-appropriation clause.
The board also has another priority: to coordinate with the Office of Emergency Services that recently was transferred to the sheriff’s department.
“We want to work out a protocol,” Robey said. “So when there is an emergency, we can be broadcasting right then.”
That protocol has yet to be determined.
