Don’t forget that KOCT will air its numerous Election 2015 programs throughout the weekend on our Community Channel 18. Or you can grab your practice ballot and watch each Election program as Video On Demand and make your final decision about who you are going to vote for. And don’t forget you can watch these programs on your Smart Phone, Tablet or Computer.  

The only thing scarier than spending a weekend watching political candidates is the annual KOCT Halloween party! KOCT’s Jake Rush and Angela Miranda led our team of ghoulish zombies in decorating the studio for our Potluck Feast. Board member Liz Rhea and her husband George joined the fun (after Cowboy George helped Liz make a successful jail escape). There was a vote for the best costume and Angela Miranda and her Day of the Dead dress and make-up just beat out second place Zombie Jake Rush!

Looking forward to next weeks Election because there is a City Council meeting the next day. Will the incumbents win or the feisty candidate contenders? Watch KOCT channel 18 on election night for City Council and School Board results!! (Go to the City’s Website to see all the local race results) And turn to KOCT-Channel 19 Government channel on Wednesday, November 5^th from 4 pm on for LIVE City Council coverage! Or watch it by watching our Streaming Video service on your smart phone, pc or tablet.

Did you know that September 24^th was proclaimed KOCT DAY by Mayor Jim Wood? KOCT was proud to have received this acknowledgment and proclamation in honor of KOCT’s 30^th Anniversary. Most of KOCT’s volunteer Board of Directors were able to attend the ceremony and KOCT Board Chairman, Liz Rhea, encouraged viewers and those in attendance to attend KOCT’s fundraiser on October 23^rd at the Outback Steakhouse in order for KOCT to be able to document and replay more community events.

KOCT is proud of the long-term relationship between KOCT and the Oceanside City Council and their staff.

In fact, as Executive Director Tom Reeser explained at the proclamation “KOCT began because of the encouragement by then Mayor Larry Bagley to form a non-profit corporation”. This was because at that time volunteers were working with city staff members and the founder of KOCT, Bob Bowditch, who began covering election forums some of which were being conducted by the employee unions. Mayor Bagley and Bob both recognized it would be best for the community for KOCT to be an independent corporation and history has proven that to be a wise decision. As the Mayor’s proclamation stated “WHEREAS, KOCT has produced and continues to produce more election programs then most television stations in all of San Diego County with the goal of providing important information about ballot initiatives and candidates, a critical service for voters considering the loss of local newspapers….”

SPEAKING of election programming….you’ll want to watch this Thursday’s Journalist Roundtable program the large field of candidates running for the Tri-City Medical Center Board of Directors will be featured in a special 90 minute program. The show airs ‘live’ at 6 pm.

Next week we’ll record our final election edition Voice of Oceanside with one-on-one interviews with candidates for the Oceanside City Council as well as the hospital board candidates.

ALL of these programs will run extensively throughout October and all of these programs can be seen as Video On Demand on KOCT.org.  You can even watch them on your Smart Phone or iPad.

Thank you to the Oceanside city council, Mayor Wood and city staff for their support, encouragement over the past 30 Years—and thank you to our many generations of viewers too!

In the beginning KOCT began covering candidate forums and ballot proposition with volunteers because KOCT Founder Bob Bowditch felt it was a service to our community. You might say KOCT’s independent status was born out of election programming because that was the impetus for KOCT to become a 501 3 c non-profit over 30 years ago. 

When the City of Oceanside provided general fund support for KOCT they included in our contract of needed services election programs, but then in 2011 cut all of KOCT’s general fund dollars and the requirement to produce election programs.

However KOCT’s staff and volunteer Board of Directors felt, like Founder Bob Bowditch, that this was an important service to our community and that is why in 2014 KOCT continues to produce more local election programming than any television station in San Diego County !

How can we continue to produce programs about City Council, MiraCosta College, Oceanside School District and Hospital candidates?  Because of community support for KOCT and events like our upcoming 13^th Annual Outback FUNdraiser!

Without this FUNdraiser, grants and production income KOCT would not have the staff or resources to produce informative Election programs. So help us out and attend this years FUNdraiser.

The event will be at the Outback Steakhouse in Oceanside on Thursday, October 23^rd with seating’s at 11:30 am and 1:00 pm. There will also be an opportunity drawing and silent auction.

If you can’t attend you can still support KOCT by sponsoring an active duty military family in our “meals for military” program on Saturday, October 25^th.

Tickets are only $20 for adults and $10 for children 10 and under.

For more information or to purchase tickets contact any member of the KOCT Board of Directors or call KOCT at 722-4433!

Support KOCT election programming, an informed electorate and our local military families by attending this years 13^th annual Outback Steakhouse because KOCT is Your Community Channel!

Hope you caught last weeks engaging Journalist Roundtable featuring the Candidates for the Oceanside City Council, if not you will not want to miss it. You can watch this special Journalist Roundtable and be an informed voter by viewing this episode on Channel 18 Monday thru Friday at 7:00AM and 6:00PM as well as Sundays at 7:00AM and 10:00AM.

One of our two Journalist, Logan Jenkins has written an insightful column about the show:

Thursday night on KOCT, Oceanside’s community TV station, Kent Davy (former editor of the North County Times) and I asked questions to the four principal candidates for two City Council seats. Incumbents Jerry Kern and Gary Felien are challenged by former Councilman Chuck Lowery and community activist Dana Corso. These were my take-aways from the spirited back-and-forth:

Click here to read the rest of the column.

JRT Guests Included:

Candidate Dana Corso, president of Alliance of Citizens To Improve Oceanside Neighborhoods (ACTION), says that she was a leading voice in speaking against Proposition E, which threatened to end rent control in mobile home parks.  She commented that as a councilwoman she will have a greater opportunity to serve the people and neighborhoods of Oceanside as a voice for the people that is currently absent in the City Council majority decision-making. 

Gary Felien, a current council member, is seeking re-election and he says he will continue to keep improving Oceanside. He says that as a result of his election in Nov 2010, a new council majority based on fiscal responsibility was formed and they immediately set to work to turn the city around from the dire straights the past majority had placed the city in. 

Candidate Chuck Lowery, an active Board Member of the Oceanside Charitable Foundation, says he wants to create jobs, and that he has the experience and expertise necessary to cultivate a thriving economic environment. According to comments he has made he will cut spending as he will fight tirelessly for balanced budgets. He said he cares deeply for the City of Oceanside and its residents.

Jerome Kern, an incumbent, is seeking re-election after a 6 year term. He indicates he has worked hard to bring positive change to Oceanside by championing issues that can make our city a better place to live, do business and enjoy our unique recreational opportunities.

Robert Tran was invited but did not attend.

Tune to KOCT - Channel 18, Thursday September 4th at 6 pm for a one-hour “live” Journalist Roundtable program. KOCT’s election season programming begins featuring a special Journalist Roundtable questioning Oceanside City Council Candidates. You’ll want to watch this special Journalist Roundtable and be an informed voter.

Our Guests will include:

Candidate Dana Corso, president of Alliance of Citizens To Improve Oceanside Neighborhoods (ACTION), says that she was a leading voice in speaking against Proposition E, which threatened to end rent control in mobile home parks.  She commented that as a councilwoman she will have a greater opportunity to serve the people and neighborhoods of Oceanside as a voice for the people that is currently absent in the City Council majority decision-making. 

          

                                           Dana Corso                                                 Gary Felien

Gary Felien, a current council member, is seeking re-election and he says he will continue to keep improving Oceanside. He says that as a result of his election in Nov 2010, a new council majority based on fiscal responsibility was formed and they immediately set to work to turn the city around from the dire straights the past majority had placed the city in. 

Candidate Chuck Lowery, an active Board Member of the Oceanside Charitable Foundation, says he wants to create jobs, and that he has the experience and expertise necessary to cultivate a thriving economic environment. According to comments he has made he will cut spending as he will fight tirelessly for balanced budgets. He said he cares deeply for the City of Oceanside and its residents.

          

                                       Chuck Lowery                                             Jerome Kern

Jerome Kern, an incumbent, is seeking re-election after a 6 year term. He indicates he has worked hard to bring positive change to Oceanside by championing issues that can make our city a better place to live, do business and enjoy our unique recreational opportunities.

Robert Tran is a first time candidate and an Oceanside native. He was born, raised and currently resides in Oceanside and said he is running for City Council to ensure that Oceanside continues to grow in all economic ownership sectors and that all taxpayers of Oceanside deserve a city that is fiscally responsible and is not in the hand of special interest groups or of personal interest. (Photo not available)

The host for Journalist Roundtable is veteran journalist Kent Davy and he will be joined on Columnist Logan Jenkins from the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Currently the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is considering Comcast’s acquisition of Time Warner Cable. Public, Education and Government (PEG) advocates have submitted a number of comments they hope the FCC will consider before they allow for further consolidation of big media entities. For example, American Community Television believes this potential merger will put PEG TV stations at risk saying “We request that the FCC protect PEG access television by rejecting the proposed transaction or conditioning the proposed merger on curing the various problems we have outlined”—Example cited included loss of channels, PEG closures in many states, lack of programming guide description and charging governments to provide PEG programming.

Access Humboldt has also filed FCC comments and they suggest that if the transfer were to occur the FCC should prohibit discrimination against PEG channels and ensure that PEG channels have the same features and functionality and signal quality as they do for local broadcasters as well as requiring PEG channels to be distributed on the HD tiers.

KOCT is and has faced many of the issues cited above: Cox Cable & AT&T will not post our program schedule which makes recording KOCT programs via their DVR’s time consuming and complicated. And AT&T’s DVR won’t even record the PEG channels manually!

Over the past 20 years there have been more & more media  mergers and less requirements for public interest programming—this despite the fact that these communications giants use the public right of ways to conduct private business for a profit. It is not to much to ask that out of the thousands of channels they provide that they not only allow a few channels to be dedicated to the communities they do business in but to actually support those entities by treating them with the same level of support they do for the commercial channels. And in fact, according to grandfathered local franchises and the new state franchise they should already be doing so!

I am hopeful the FCC will not agree to the merger of these two communications giants without an agreement of better support for the many small community PEG channels across the country like KOCT-YOUR community channel. 

Continuing the Community Connections Throw Back Edition to celebrate KOCT's 30 years of service to our north county community!

We have another election in November of this year so it’s appropriate & fun to look back to past elections. Here, in 2002, are the candidates for Mayor of Oceanside on the Voice of Oceanside. Left is incumbent Jim Wood, Host Tim Aldrich, an unknown candidate and Rocky Chavez—then a City Councilmember and now a state Assemblyman, 76^th District.

Talk about a lot of candidates for City Council! Too many to name but standing is the former host of the Senior Scene, Dick Johnson,  and it looks like the Flag Man, Alex Kapitanski, provided the set decoration.

Late 90’s?

One of our most popular shows in the late 90’s and early 2000’s was Lawyers on the Line by the North County Bar Association. Viewers could call in with general legal questions and the show featured some of the many talented Lawyers and Judges in North County tackling a variety of legal issues & topics.

HealthCare Matters (Top) was a health program KOCT produced that was hosted by radio personality, Meg Banta who now teaches Radio at Palomar College. KOCT’s Inside Oceanside, below, was a video magazine about Oceanside that was initially hosted by their Public Information Officer, Don Williamson and Camp Pendleton’s Amy Forsythe. Amy later served numerous tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and continues to enjoy a varied communications career in the US Navy. 

The Good News and the Bad News About Public Access TV

On the completely great side, the California Legislature passed AJR 39, a joint resolution from California's State Government asking the federal government to please fix the clause in the 1984 Cable Act that restricts much public funding of cable access channels to capital only without operational support. This clause, which is supported by virtually no one, has contributed to the closure of community media centers across the state of California.

On the less wonderful side, a California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) rulemaking process on cable franchise renewals appears to be taking the path of least resistance under the leadership of Commissioner Peevey, and endorsing a rubberstamp process that ignores service level to the community and complaints received during the cable service renewal process. Media Alliance's latest set of (somewhat futile) reply comments can be found here.

More news in support of PEG channels like KOCT:

And recently, at the 82^nd Annual Meeting of the United States Conference of Mayors, a resolution was made calling for the restructuring of the 1984 Cable Act. The resolution, which was passed unanimously, encourages the U. S. Congress to amend federal legislation pertaining to community access television stations. These stations like KOCT, currently receive Public, Educational and Governmental (PEG) fees. However, PEG funds. must only be used for capital improvements. The resolution calls for allowing those funds to be used for operation costs as well.

With the support of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, KOCT urges the U.S. Congress to make the minor legislative changes that will allow PEG fees to be used for the operations of our community access television station. The resolution supports the power of public access stations. Community television channels provide transparency and access for local governments with their residents and business owners by broadcasting City Council and hospital  meetings, voter information for local elections, topical talk shows on local issues and topics and other events like the recent Independence  parade. 

The Bob Bowditch Scholarship fund was established by Ida Bowditch upon the passing of KOCT’s founder, Bob Bowditch in 1989. Every year annually KOCT awards a small scholarship to Oceanside or El Camino High School graduates whose intent is to have a college major in communications or media studies. Our 2014 Scholarship Recipient is Joshua Montiel from El Camino High School. In his application he wrote “A good film takes you into the story and lets you become a character; you begin to feel the emotions as if you are part of the film itself. It distracts you from everyday stress and worries. For the length of the film nothing else exists but the story you are taking part in”. Watch for Joshua’s appearance on a future Oceanside Spectrum when he will be interviewed by Spectrum Host: Elaine Swann!

Congratulations Joshua!

KOCT’s founder, Bob Bowditch

Speaking of Elaine Swann her latest book “LET CRAZY BE CRAZY” (you can order her book on her website) has just been published and it contains practical examples, tips and advice on the perils of what she calls “Crazy Folk.” Whether in our professional environments or family and personal relationships, they exist. Swann gives sensible guidance on:

How to identify Crazy Folk, How to get rid of toxic Crazy Folk and How to deal with the Crazy Folk in situations where we have no choice, such as work, in volunteer organizations and with family members. Elaine is currently on a coast to coast tour including appearances on television stations all across the county. As you can tell we are Crazy about Elaine who, by the way, will be our host at our June 12^th Open House and Forum.

Host, Elaine Swann

•  Next week, Tuesday June 3rd is Primary Election Day. What will the results mean? Will incumbents lose and be forced to fight for their office in the November election or did they slide to victory over their aspiring challengers? For insightful analysis you’ll want to tune to next Thursday Nights (June 5^th- 6 pm / Channel 18) Journalist Roundtable where our first two guests will help in our Election Dissection. Our first guest will be Francine Busby-the Chair of the San Diego County Democratic Party and our second guest will be  the Treasurer of The Republican Party of San Diego County. Both will discuss the outcome of the June primary at both the local and regional level.

Our other two guests will discuss two important subjects in the news: Health Care and the decommissioning of San Onofre Power Plant.

Chris Van Gorder is the President & CEO of Scripps Health—his path to CEO is an unusual journey and Scripps has many health facilities in North County. He’ll discuss changes in health care since the passage of the Affordable Care Act and Scripps plans for health care in North County.

Our last guest will be Councilmember Jerry Kern who is a member of the newly formed Community Engagement Panel which is looking into issues related to the decommissioning of the San Onofre Power Plant.

Our Journalist for next week JRT will be Host Kent Davy, KPBS’s Alison St. John and the Managing Editor for The Coast News, Tony Cagala. Don’t miss JRT- “It’s Good TV”!

• Finally don’t forget to mark your calendar for Thursday, June 12^th from 4pm to 6:30 pm. KOCT is inviting everyone interested in touring your community channel to our annual Open House and Forum! (more in next week’s Community Connection)

          Save the Date-June 12^th Open House

It is no April's Fool joke that this week begins KOCT’s 2014 Election Season.  For the June 3^rd primary there are two major county offices North County voters will be asked to cast their ballots for:  5^th District Board of Supervisor and the District Attorney seats.  Fortunately KOCT will have special Journalist Roundtable programs featuring candidates for these offices.

This Thursday, April 3^rd from 6pm-7 pm our ‘Live’ Journalist Roundtable will have two of the three candidates running for the District Attorney seat and they are Robert Brewer and Terri Wyatt. Incumbent Bonnie Dumanis was also invited but her campaign manager regretfully declined due to a schedule conflict.

Next month on Thursday, May 1^st our Journalist Roundtable program will feature Mayor Jim Wood and incumbent Bill Horn for a lively program on the race for the 5^th District County Board of Supervisor office.

KOCT will also be airing a forum hosted by the Oceanside Chamber of Commerce & Mira Costa College featuring these two 5^th District Candidates.

KOCT has offered each candidate an opportunity to record a 5-minute Candidates Statement and these segments will also run on KOCT right up to the June 3^rd election. All of our 2014 election programs are available as VOD or Video On Demand via KOCT.ORG so you can review the candidates, their positions and answers prior to going to the polls or filling out your Absentee Ballot.

KOCT is proud of our long tradition of providing local election programming a service more valuable then ever with the loss of the North County Times and limited information about local issues, offices and candidates. We have been providing this service for 30 years and we can continue to do so with your help. Please consider becoming a Friend of KOCT by clicking here: Local Media Matters!