Low-Cost Community TV Alternative Taps What Networks Can’t

In the competitive, high-pressure world of TV, Channel 53 is an oasis.

No ratings, no restrictions, no rush. Free training for aspiring producers, free use of equipment, guaranteed air time and a $1,000 stipend per show.

Welcome to the world of community-access cable, one of the last places where low-cost or no-cost shows can be produced by people who do not ordinarily have access to television.

United Cable Television’s Channel 53, serving 10,000 customers in unincorporated South Whittier, is Southeast Los Angeles County’s newest community-access outlet.

From 5 to 10 p.m. on Wednesdays and Saturdays, Channel 53 provides coverage of such local events as student art displays, a church carnival, a beauty pageant fashion show and high school sports.

‘What the Networks Can’t’

“This might seem boring to network TV,” Channel 53 Executive Director George Angelo Jr. said, “but we do what the networks can’t, which is to put together shows that our own community cares about.”

Under a county ordinance, United Cable was required to establish and pay for South Whittier’s first community-access channel when the company was granted area franchise rights. The ordinance requires the company to pay for a station director, build a studio, buy equipment and train and award grants to any certified person producing a show. Producers do not have to accept the grant.

Angelo, a Whittier native and independent film maker, was hired to run the nonprofit corporation in charge of the station, South Whittier Community Programming Corp. Channel 53, which went on the air in January, has produced 15 programs, Angelo said.

Almost all of Channel 53’s programs have been features, with lots of upbeat messages from school administrators and others in charge of the televised events.

Education 53 Series

But this week, the station plans to move into the realm of public affairs with a weekly series produced by Angelo called Education 53. The first installment covers 40 area high school students on an annual chamber of commerce-sponsored trip to Sacramento last month.

The second show will discuss Propositions 71 and 72, measures on the June 7 ballot that could change the spending power of cities and school districts. The guests will be Whittier Mayor Victor A. Lopez, City Manager Thomas G. Mauk and Lee Eastwood, superintendent of Whittier Union High School District.

Angelo is doing much of the camera and production work for all the shows himself but hopes that production duties will soon be shared by people he has trained, leaving him free to pursue other projects. He is interested in more issues programming, such as a documentary about the homeless in Whittier, and Spanish-language shows, such as weekly area soccer highlights.

There is a market for bilingual and bicultural programming in the area, he said, where about 45% of the 35,000 residents are Latino. About 30% of United Cable’s subscribers in the area are Latino.

Looking for Latino Draws

Angelo, who speaks Spanish and is part American Indian, said televising events such as soccer games would be a big draw in the Latino community because “the bleachers are packed out there every Sunday.”

The beauty of Channel 53, he said, is having the freedom to program anything from soccer to student art. A film maker specializing in ethnic documentaries for 10 years, Angelo said he has never been comfortable in a corporate structure.

“I’ve never really wanted to work for anyone,” he said, seated at his desk overlooking Channel 53’s newly soundproofed studio. “For me, this is the perfect job.”

He takes a visitor into the control room, which has Indian rugs on the walls breaking up the high-tech clusters of TV monitors and VCR decks, to screen a recently completed documentary he produced about an Indian healing and baptismal mass in Northridge, which also aired on Channel 53.

‘My Personal Project’

“This is my personal project,” said Angelo, who has produced similar ethnic films in Jamaica and Central and South America. “I do this because this is my love.”

But being a self-described “Whittier guy,” Angelo also loves the community, especially children. Many of Channel 53’s shows feature the accomplishments of children.

“See what the camera does to these kids? They love it,” he said while reviewing a tape of waving and screaming youngsters during a physical education day at one school. “Kids around here don’t get many chances to be on TV.”

The idea of community access is to get local people producing shows about the community, he said, so training prospective producers is a crucial part of the station’s operations.

Six-hour training classes are held monthly, Angelo said, and more than 30 people have become certified to produce programs. Those certified, who must be Whittier residents, can then apply for grants of up to $1,000, funded with $25,000 that United Cable has set aside this year for Channel 53, Angelo said. Just two grant-funded programs have been produced, with the rest produced by Angelo.

‘My Job to Nurture Them’

Sometimes his students complete the classes and lose interest, Angelo said. “I stay in touch with these people because it’s my job to nurture them,” he said. “There are creative people, idealistic people out there who want to do this, I know.”

Similar community-access channels operate in Norwalk, La Habra and Pico Rivera, Angelo said. They often exchange programs with Channel 53.

Angelo’s shows reach only the 35,000 people in the unincorporated area because another cable company has the franchise rights for incorporated Whittier. The contract with that company, Sammons Cable, does not mandate a community-access channel.