Local access stations get the boot
By Steve Enders
AT&T said it was going ahead with the channel change. Sure enough, it did, and San Jose's KICU-TV now fills the Channel 6 airwaves in Saratoga and Los Gatos.
The spot used to belong to community-access stations KSAR and KCAT, in their respective communities.
The latest twist to the case came late on Sept. 24, when station managers announced a new player on their legal battlefield. The Palo Alto-based law firm Heller, Ehrman, White & McCauliffe has agreed to take the cities' case pro bono, and will work with Saratoga and Los Gatos at least through the next round, scheduled in court Oct. 5.
Then AT&T will be required to show proof of why the channel swap needs to be made. The cities will then have an opportunity to respond. For now, the two stations are on Channel 15.
"We do pro bono cases all the time," said Stanley Young, an attorney who will be leading the case with the two cities. "We're doing this as a service to the municipalities involved," he said. "We believe as a firm that it's part of our obligation that people have adequate legal representation." In this case, the small-budget cities are going toe to toe with one of the world's largest corporations.
Orry Korb, Los Gatos' town attorney, said he welcomes the partnership. "We're certainly accepting their offer," he said, adding that the firm may continue to provide counsel past the Oct. 5 hearing.
Two weeks ago, the cities went to bat for their beloved stations, filing a request for a temporary restraining order against AT&T to keep it from moving the two stations. The request was denied, but the judge also told AT&T attorneys to come back to court on Oct. 5 to show why it thinks it has the right to move the channels.
At issue are "must carry" laws, which state that a station has rights to a certain spot on the dial based on three criteria: current channel position, an agreement between the cable company and the station, or the local station's channel spot in 1992 or 1985.
According to Los Gatos and Saratoga, none of those applies to KCAT or KSAR.
Linda Lubeck, president of the KCAT board of directors, said that the stations will continue to fight.
"We are going to go to the hearing and will try to present the case that the must-carry rules are being misinterpreted and don't apply in this situation. To meet criteria A, the rules say, KICU has to have been on [Channel 6] for a while. It hasn't been."
Neither station's programming has been affected by the channel swap. AT&T has already sent notices to residents' homes throughout the area notifying them of the change, and had previously promised to show a message on KICU on the day of the switchover, also letting people know where they can find their station.
Still, KSAR's Tessa McGoldrick said letting people know of the change isn't going to be easy.
"Any time you change a channel, there's a number of issues," the program director said. "We've got to change stationery, logos, everything. Viewers have identified with a channel, and right now we've got a Channel 6 logo on Channel 15."
George Sampson, KCAT's station manager, said "The first effect will be that people won't be able to find us. Unlike AT&T, we have no promotional budget to announce we'll be moving to Channel 15. We're losing a very good dial position, and AT&T has made no guarantee that we'll even remain on Channel 15. KCAT doesn't have the resources to fight the world's largest telecommunications company."
Reporter Nathan R. Huff contributed to this story.
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
