Atlanta Public TV Fights for Money and Relevance

December 2nd, 2011

Atlanta’s public access channel, People TV, will likely live to see another day. After months in dire financial straits, the station has apparently secured funding for at least the first half of 2012.

For more than 25 years, People TV has broadcast just about every kind of programming imaginable. Among them, public affairs shows like Democracy Now, explicit music videos, and youth talk shows.

Despite its quirkiness, or perhaps because of it, the channel has come to mean a lot to those who watch and produce its shows.

Richard Bowden, a host for a weekly talk program called The City, says the station’s commitment to nurturing local media producers is invaluable.

“This is the only game in town whereby a doctor, lawyer, and an Indian chief, a student, a sanitation worker can come and take a workshop and air their content, either live or taped, and have a show,” said Bowden.

But since 2009, People TV has been running out of money. After cutting more than half her employees, CEO Charlotte Engel prepared staff and volunteers for a shut down at the end of December.

“I’ve literally done everything but sign the dissolution papers to go to the state,” said Engel.

Engel blames the station’s dire financial situation on the city’s most recent franchise agreement with Comcast. Signed in 2009, it effectively cut People TV’s funding from about $700,000 per year to about half that in 2010 and to $100,000 this year.

In a recent public forum covering local media at Georgia Tech, Heather Gray the President of the Radio Free Georgia Broadcasting Foundation, complained about the larger national trend in which cable companies are giving less to their local communities.

“The cable stations – they should pay, it’s crazy that they’re not paying. They’re using spectrums, they’re using what belongs to us, the people,” said Gray.

With dwindled funds, Charlotte Engel has spent much of the last year scrambling for help. Her efforts fell mostly on deaf ears, until this past week, when Atlanta’s city council said it would vote on a one-time allocation of $180,000 to help keep the station open through June.

But critics say the city shouldn’t be subsidizing content that can easily be broadcast on the internet. To that, Engel says we still don’t live in a world with universal internet access.

“People that are poor or at home or are elderly and they don’t have computers, how do they get their information?” said Engel.

In addition, Engel says People TV serves a vital role in creating a sense of community and training future filmmakers.

City officials are reportedly working with Engel to secure additional funding and develop fundraising alternatives, like organizing telethons and member drives.