Philadelphia Community Access Coalition
				Home | About | Join | Act | Contact | Search | News | Calendar

MR. MESSIAH: Sure.

-- and Nutter for introducing the legislation to move forward with the establishment of public access in Philadelphia.

My name is Louis Messiah, and I'm here on behalf of Scribe Video, a nonprofit organization that provides instruction on film, video, audio, and interactive media production to individuals, young people, and adults, as well as to members of community groups --

COUNCILMAN COHEN: I'm going to ask you to bring the microphone closer.

MR. MESSIAH: Sure.

-- who wish to use video and other media as creative means of expression.

We are small organization, but over the past ten years, we've had the opportunity to work with some 50 community organizations in Philadelphia, teaching them the craft of video making. Through our work with groups like the Women's Community Revitalization Project, the John Coltrane Cultural Society, Asian-Americans United, COMAR (the Community Mental Health and Retardation Group), Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia, Women Against Abuse, Habitat for Humanity West Philadelphia as well as with a variety of public and independent schools, we've had the chance to witness how communities and groups are empowered when they are able to talk to their constituency and articulate critical issues in their open words.

The participants in our workshops have come to understand that as we leave the 20th century, the ability of a community or group to construct a message through video media is a basic and essential form of literacy. In this society, our knowledge of so much of what we have not seen with our own eyes, even the community on the other side of town, is created by media. So it is important that communities have the ability to define themselves.

If a civil democratic society needs knowledge in order to make informed decisions, the ability of groups to communicate their own realities and perspectives is critical to this process. Public access is certainly an important mechanism to strengthen this civic discourse.

If you were to sit in our office at Scribe on any given day, you would get a sense of the tremendous need and interest from not only community groups creating a message in video, but also from individuals -- the young person looking for tools of personal expression, the social service worker looking to share their perspective a broad public, or an artist who wishes to expand his or her work into another medium.

We are in many ways -- Scribe, that is, is many ways a specialized service, but the need and interest to use video production is broad. Church groups, schools, neighbor organizations citywide would all benefit from a place to learn, having access to equipment, and the means of sharing their message with the public.

One of the hurdles that independent producers face is how, after you're create work, constructed a video documentary, do you share it with the community. The groups that have worked with us have reached audiences creatively. They have monitors and decks and screen tapes at neighborhood centers.

At Scribe, we have conducted free outdoor screenings of community-produced videotapes. Community tapes have been shown at local libraries, beauty shops, barber shops, and bars. All this while the channels allocated for public access in Philadelphia have been left fallow because of the failure of the City to move forward and create the nonprofit management corporation.

Perhaps the one good thing that has come about because of the delay in establishing public access in Philadelphia is just about every other city in the United States has beaten us to it, and so we have many models to choose from. There are clear precedents on how best to establish a public access system that is responsible, effective, and economically efficient.

To those who are afraid of public access because of the fear of irresponsible usage, there are other systems that have wrestled with those issues and have established clear access guidelines and liability policies. Certainly we can create an effective public access system rather than deny the vast majority of responsible citizens the right to communicate and learn.

I strongly encourage the members of City Council and the Mayor to move forward to create the nonprofit corporation that was described in the 1983 legislation and allow Philadelphia citizens to benefit from this important resource.

Thank you.

COUNCILMAN COHEN: Thank you.

(Applause.)

COUNCILMAN COHEN: The next panel will consists of: Keith Brand; Anthony Riddle, of Manhattan Neighborhood Network; James Horwood, Esquire, from Spiegel & McDermott; and Ann Sheehan, Berks Community TV.

(Above-named witnesses come forward.)

UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Councilman Cohen, if I can just interrupt you for one second, David Haas is also going to be joining that panel.

COUNCILMAN COHEN: Okay, very good. Go ahead. Identify yourself for the record.

Previous (LAWRENCE RICHETTE)

Index of All Testifiers

Next (KEITH BRAND)