April 4, 2018 Minutes
CTAC – Monthly Meeting Minutes – April 4, 2018
Members in attendance:
Tad Weinstein (West Haven), Chair
George Alexander (Hamden) Treasurer
Yvonne-Manning Jones (New Haven) Advisor
Ashley Sklar (New Haven Public Library) Advisor
Laurel Coleman (West Haven) Advisor
Peaches Quinn (New Haven) Vice-Chair
Johnes Ruta, (New Haven), Advisor, Acting Secretary
Meeting called to order 6:10 PM.
1. March Teleconference Minutes
Changes requested to item #2 (b) by George Alexander regarding inaccurate quote of Comcast
upload/download Speed Test. Agreed to make correction by Johnes.
Laurel Coleman made Motion to then Approve. Ashley Sklar Seconded the Motion.
Vote – unanimous.
2. February Teleconference Minutes
George requested correction to Spelling error in item #1, and addition to item #5regarding Frontier
annual funding contribution of $2,000 to Statewide CTAC. Corrections agreed to by Johnes.
George made Motion to then Approve. Ashley Sklar Seconded the Motion.
Vote – unanimous.
3. CTAC Video Contest –
a.) Laurel Colemen provides her CTAC Video Scoring Sheet in person.
b.) Johnes now tabulates the final scores. George reviews the Tabulation Sheet.
c.) Discussion of the scoring methodology. OK.
Deadline will be reached tomorrow April 8, 2018, for the CTAC Video Contest Winner Notifications:
CATEGORY A – “Dreamers Beyond DACA” – to producer Antonia Seyfarth – $1,000.
CATEGORY B – “Fun Things To Do in New Haven” – to producer Christian Herron “Ceejay”
– $1,000.
Johnes requested to notify the winners by email (CC: CTACForward) and invite them to accept the
presentation of their Award Prize Checks at Modern Apizza, State Street, New Haven at the next
CTAC Meeting Wednesday, May 9th 6:00PM.
Winners are to be invited to bring three other individuals involved in their videos to this dinner.
Parents and/or co-sponsors are to be invited, up to four individuals for each winner.
A Press Release notification of this meeting will be distributed to local media and press.
Johnes make Motion to accept the winners according to the tabulation scores.
Tad second the Motion. Vote taken is unanimous.
Laurel asks if there will be another Video Contest in the coming year. George replies, “Yes, we do have the budget already.”
4. COMCAST Report: – submitted by Sharon Codeanne via email.
Sling International is a multichannel live TV service that is streamed over the Internet and offers International channel packages that are available on a subscription basis. Starting March 29, X1 customers will start seeing the Sling International app appear in the X1 Apps menu. Once there, they will be able to sign-up for Sling International channels directly within the app, or log-in with an existing Sling International account.
- Customers who subscribe to both Xfinity X1 and Xfinity Internet are now able to subscribe to Pro Guitar Lessons TV On Demand, an Xfinity Internet Subscription Video On Demand service. Pro Guitar Lessons TV offers professional guitar lessons for the whole family with 170+ lessons on chords, scales, songs, changing strings, playing funk bass and more!
- As of March 28, Acorn TV On Demand and Disney Story Central On Demand subscription services are available to Xfinity TV customers across our Xfinity On Demand platforms for $4.99 per month
- Vme Kids HD programming is now available to live stream out-of-home via the Xfinity Stream app or web portal. Vme Kids is the first television channel in Spanish with educational programming for children in preschool 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Please note that in order for customers to view this content, they must subscribe to an Xfinity TV package that includes Vme Kids.
- With the Xfinity Stream app or web portal, customers can live stream certain local ABC, NBC and Telemundo broadcast affiliate networks while out-of-home. Please note that if an Xfinity TV customer is connected to their in-home WiFi network, they can use the Xfinity Stream app to live stream all local broadcast affiliates.
- Here is the link to our Xfinity Stream web portal for Xfinity TV customers: https://tv.xfinity.com/
- The 17th annual Comcast Cares Day will be held at the Clinton Avenue School in New Haven. Comcast employees will be volunteering their time to work on various projects at the school. All are welcome to join in!
George Alexander states that Comcast customer checks erroneously received at CTAC (despite notice on every
Comcast bill) will be kept until Sharon Codeanne attends a meeting. Johnes voices wonder whether this
might endanger the continuous cable connections of these Comcast customers ?
- CTAC Statewide
Tad Weinstein and Peaches Quinn state that they will attend the CTAC Statewide Meeting on Tuesday,
April 24th.
Peaches makes a Motion to adjourn this meeting at 7:00. Johnes seconds this motion.
CTAC Meeting adjourned at 7:00 PM EDT.
April Minutes Submitted 04/23/2018 by Johnes Ruta, CTAC Acting Secretary, New Haven Rep #2
March 7, 2018 Minutes
CTAC – Monthly Meeting Minutes – March Meeting TELECONFERENCE – March 7, 2018
Teleconference meeting arranged by Tad due to snowy weather. CTV Offices were closed at this time.
Members in attendance:
Tad Weinstein (West Haven), Chair
George Alexander (Hamden) Treasurer
Peaches Quinn (New Haven) Vice-Chair (arrival 6:28 pm)
Laurel Coleman (West Haven) Advisor
Johnes Ruta, (New Haven), Advisor, Acting Secretary
Teleconference Meeting called to order 6:04 PM.
1. CTAC Video Contest –
a.) Discussion on inviting Sharon Codeanne, Joe Schofield, and Walter Bradley to view and
scrore the video submissions. George recommends that Comcast should televise the
award winner, as it is they fund the award.
b.) Johnes has printed all the Parental Permission and Actors Release Forms, which he would have
brought to a meeting tonight at CTV.
c.) According to the pre-published schedule, CTAC advisors will score the video emtries and submit
to the CTAC council by Wednesday, March 14.
d.) The criteria for the Judging Rubric is available on the CableAdvisory.org website,
in grading values from 1 to 4 ( 4 = highest).
e.) The Video Contest winners are to be chosen by the next CTAC meeting on Wednesday April 4,
2018, and the winners to be notified by April 13th, 2018.
- COMCAST Report: – None submitted this month.
a.) Johnes requests contact with Sharon Codeanne regarding “Comcast Customer Privacy Notice” which was received in his monthly Comcast billing (dated 02/17/18), as he finds certain terms
to be questionable in which Comcast reserves the right to release privacy data to other agencies.
Are these GMOs and or Non-GMOs ?
b.) George questions the accuracy of an email message from Comcast stating significantly increased
internet download / upload speeds of 150 MB per second. George’s Internet Speed Test several times during the day today indicated actual upload speed as 5 MB/second.
- CTV – Johnes asks about poor sound quality of 8 AM weekday broadcast on Channel 26.
Tad says that we can contact Joe Schofield via his cell phone, and that he can monitor the
sound quality remotely, and correct it.4. CTAC Funding –
George Alexander and Peaches Quinn renew the debate on the issue of Frontier’s contribution
to the Cable Advisory group. – An annual check of $2,000 goes to CTAC-Statewide.
George and Peaches want to know if monies can be rather divided among all the local Cable
Television Advisory groups, and wants explanation of all franchise contributions. (Tad Weinstein
is the Treasurer of the Statewide-CTAC.) Peaches recommends that Tad inquire Statewide
the details of franchise financial contributions and report to our CTAC chapter (Hamden,
New Haven, West Haven.)Statewide Video Advisory Council website: http://www.ctsvac.org/
Peaches makes a Motion to make a formal request to Statewide-CTAC for a Financial Grant
or Scholarship Award for all Advisory Councils in Connecticut.
Laurel Coleman seconds this Motion. Vote take – all vote Yes in concurrence.
- Budget 2018: Discussion delayed until next meeting in person, rather than in teleconference.
6. Correspondence – None submitted.
7. New Business:
The next CTAC Meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, 6 PM, April 4, 2018.
Tad asks if all business is complete for this meeting. – No further business brought forth.
George makes Motion to adjourn. Johnes seconds the Motion. All agreed.
CTAC Teleconference meeting is adjourned at 7:02 PM EDT.
March Minutes Submitted with informational modification to item #2 (b)
04/23/2018 by Johnes Ruta, CTAC Acting Secretary, New Haven Rep #2
February 7, 2018 Minutes
CTAC – Monthly Meeting Minutes – February Meeting TELECONFERENCE – February 7, 2018
Teleconference meeting arranged by Tad due to snowy weather. CTV Offices were closed at this time.
Members in attendance:
Tad Weinstein (West Haven), Chair
George Alexander (Hamden) Treasurer
Peaches Quinn (New Haven) Vice-Chair
Yvonne Manning-Jones (New Haven)
Ashley Sklarr (New Have Library System) Advisor
Johnes Ruta, (New Haven), Advisor, Acting Secretary
Meeting called to order 6:03 PM.
1. January Minutes –
Peaches makes Motion to approve January, 2018 Minutes, George Alexander Seconds this Motion.
Vote – approved.
to void December Motion to extend Video Contest Deadline.
2. CTAC Video Contest –
a.) George asks Johnes about previous request to contestants to indicate how they learned of the
CTAC Video Contest. Johnes indicates that this question was included in his January 4th email
to each approved contestant, but none provided an answer. Johnes will try again. (Johnes did
repeat this question to contestants on February 8th, but still none replied.
b.) The deadline for video entries is Wednesday, February 28, 2018. (Johnes also re-informed
each contestant of this deadline in Feb, 8 emails.)
c.) Contestants must submit Parental Permission and Actors’ Release Forms before Contest
Prizes can be distributed to winners. Email JPG Form or paper Forms OK. (None received as of
February 20th.)
- Frontier – Tad Weinstein says that Frontier is technically not a cable TV company, and therefore not
in our jurisdiction. Licensing has Comsumer Requirements. George Alexander specifies that
Cablevision is a cable company, offering TV via cable. Frontier is rather in the jurisdictio
of the Statewide Cable Television Advisory.
- COMCAST Report:
Tad indicates that Comcast is only required to appear at CTAC meetings twice per year.There is no Comcast Report this month.5. CTAC Funding –
CTAC funding is only available from Comcast as the local franchise television carrier within
our jurisdiction.Johnes asks if Frontier funds the Statewide Cable Television Advisory, then should not this
funding be divided and distributed among all the local CT Councils ? Peaches Quinn: Seconds
this question. George wants to know the specifics about the Frontier funding and docket.
Annual Report – was submitted to PURA at the end of January.. Frontier provides an annual
funding check of $2,000 to STATEWIDE CTAC.
6. CTV – no report this month.
7. CTAC Budget –
Not discussed yet.
George make Motion to arrange 2018 Budget the same as 2017. Peaches Seconds this motion.
Vote taken – all in favor, unanimous.
8. Next CTAC meeting scheduled for Wednesday, March 7, 2018.
- No further business at this time. Peaches makes Motion to adjourn.CTAC Teleconference meeting is adjourned at 6:39 PM EDT.
February 2018 Minutes Resubmitted with corrections and addition to item #5 Annual Report clause
04/23/2018 by Johnes Ruta, CTAC Acting Secretary, New Haven Rep #2