HC Media has a satellite studio in the Harbor Place building at the corner of Merrimack Street and the Basiliere Bridge.
If the comments at Monday’s Cable TV Advisory Committee are any indication, Haverhill residents are much happier with their community-access television stations than with the corporation that provides the city’s cable service.
The committee is beginning its review of Comcast’s contract with the city in advance of an anticipated request for a new 10-year license beginning in 2019.
Resident complaints about Comcast ranged from service outages to slow internet to untrained technicians. But mostly, residents asked for competition from other providers.
“I feel Comcast has become complacent because they’re the only game in town,” said customer Mary F. Drayton of Franklin Street.
James Mamonas said he and Comcast’s technicians are on a first-name basis because of the number of times he has called about trouble with the service at his Washington Street condo. He described his service as “nothing but a nightmare. My cable doesn’t work; my phone doesn’t work; my email doesn’t work.”
But complaints about Comcast were far outnumbered by praise for local-access station HC Media. Members of the general public were joined by representatives of business, charitable, community, educational and religious organizations in unanimous support of the efforts of the local-access service.
In the last year, Comcast distributed about $900,000 to Haverhill Community Television, also known as HC Media, for operation of public access, government and education channels. The city receives about $240,000 annually in fees.
James P. Cleary, president of the HC Media Board of Directors, said this is an especially exciting time for the local access channel, which has built a studio in the new Harbor Place building downtown, where it will partner with Northern Essex Community College to offer TV production courses and open its studio to the public for live performances.
The level of praise led Kathy Drive resident Diane Murad to wonder whether Comcast’s license renewal was a done deal, given that Comcast financially supports HC Media.
Committee members said the company and the local-access channel are mutually exclusive. Any contract, no matter the company, would include a funding agreement for community access to the cable system.
Residents’ wishes for a competing company to seek a license are unlikely to come true, committee members said. Many residents suggested the city try to interest Verizon in bring its Fios service here, but committee members said the company is not expanding its services to any new areas and few cable companies are interested in the expense of installing an entirely new cable system to compete in cities that are already serviced by another provider, they said.
mayor, take over local access. have the $240.00 go to the city treasury. also make this a line item in the budget.
Hidden within the obviously planted HCTV supporters with their “free” public relations videos paid for by Comcast subscribers I thought there were a couple of really serious questions. How does a nonprofit have $1.6M in cash, pay excessive salaries, expand into a $1M downtown location – maybe because of the last point that was raised – an ineffective Board of Directors and no city oversight. Really? WOW! Forget about competition for Comcast, its not going to happen, how about competition for public access TV and that $900K they take in every year of our money?
I asked this question and did not get an answer. Who over sees there budget when we as citizens pay for it??? Seems corrupt if you look at the articles.
Good points all/ Look towards city hall for the person in control. He has the power to appoint the board from what I understand and change the agreement. It is a slush fund and some are making some great money there.with no accountability.
I wish I could make serious $$$$$ like they do over at HCTV. How about the council calling for an audit of their books ? W ho is keeping an eye on these folks ? Lynn had a serious issue with their cable access station and the people running it. The corruption got out of hand while nobody watched and in the end it was not pretty !
Humm, the greater Boston average mean salary for the same Executive Director position based on review of 20 other non profit tax returns is 78k. The HCTV Executive Director base compensation is 111k. Then there is the 10% 401 match (yikes) plus benefits and perks which all combine for 139k comp package!! Then there is the 1.67 million slush fund at Haverhill Bank?Why does HCTV need premium space Harbor Place? What’s wrong with leasing a spot at NECCO or Ward Hill? Where is the governance over the books of record and policy oversight ?
As they say, nothing to see here folks, move along….