It's been quiet lately on the public access front. There's been no nudity in Hillsborough recently, and only a bit in Pinellas. Likewise, bigoted speech is all but nonexistent. Dr. Conley is anomalous; besides, his message is so jumbled it can hardly be taken as a serious threat.
Louise Thompson, head of Speak Up Tampa Bay, likes it this way. "It's been about eight months since we've been called the White Chocolate channel and I hope we don't hear it again," she says. Still, she's not about to take any measures to block potentially controversial speech from making it onto the channel. Historically, the bigots and sleazeballs have come in ebbs and flows, and there's reason to expect that at some point they'll be back.
She hopes that a return won't spark another defunding move by the county commission.
Public access operators nationwide share her anxieties. Thompson tells the story of a channel that was expunged from a budget because it ran a show by a guy who painted his privates and presented a talking penis. "People are losing channels every day," Thompson says. "It's political football every day."
Reidel of the Alliance of Community Media doesn't paint as dire a picture. "I wouldn't say public access is under siege," she says. "The economy's been so bad at the state and local level that a lot of stations are taking budget cuts, just like other services. There are stations in jeopardy here and there, but there is also a lot of brand new public access starting up. By and large, what I see is growth in public access."
Mostly, the Louise Thompsons of the world want local governments to get their thinking straight on the public access issue. Is it too much to ask elected officials to embrace freedom of speech? Station personnel want politicos to realize that if they strip station budgets because of objectionable material, they risk killing hour after hour of community service and information.
Besides, advocates maintain, public access is not the radical lefty mechanism it's thought to be. Thompson reckons that if you had to array TBCN's programming across the political spectrum, about a third would be left, a third would be right and a third would be neutral.
Further, public access is actually in the government's interest.
"Public access can actually take a burden off government," Reidel says. "It allows nonprofit entities serving the community to get the word out for free. If they didn't exist, the government would have to somehow fill that role."It's like an outtake from American Gothic. The elderly woman stands bolt upright gently plucking her acoustic bass. Her husband sits on a hay bale strumming a guitar. After several bars, they break into a down-home gospel tune. The Barbers — Weaver, 80, and Mildred, 75 — perform their music for TBCN once a week. They used to take their act to retirement homes; now the retirement homes watch Country Gospel (Live) on TV.
The couple will be married 60 years in February. "We always do everything together," says Mildred. They agree that having a show on public access keeps them active, their minds sharp. They get recognized now and then. Someone even bought them lunch once.
While Speak Up Tampa Bay was going through its showdown with the county commission, Weaver and Mildred turned up at every hearing. "I think you had some commissioners trying to feather their nest by getting rid of public access," Weaver says. "I personally don't agree with all the programming, but we need to keep freedom of speech. I know every program is not designed for me."