PORT TOWNSEND — Mayor Catharine Robinson found disbelief in the audience at Monday night’s City Council meeting when she promised that the city isn’t planning to pull the plug on its public access cable television station, PTTV.
“PTTV is not closing,” Robinson said during the lengthy council meeting, the first held at Fort Worden State Park while the historical City Hall is being renovated.
But, most in the audience answered “no” when Robinson followed her statement with a question about whether the onlookers understood what she said.
During a public comment session on the television issue, at least one speaker accused staff members of trying to put a “spin” on the situation after hearing Administrator David Timmons allege that false and misleading information had been disseminated by word of mouth and in a story in Sunday’s Peninsula Daily News.
He termed the newspaper story and its headline, which said “PT council asked to void TV station deal,” as “sensationalism.”
Station manager Gary Lemons, during a break in the meeting, said statements attributed to him in the Sunday PDN report had been accurately reported.
City Clerk Pam Kolacy, a member of the station’s coordinating committee and a show producer, said the proposal she gave to Lemons last week was to change the scope of work included in the contract, not eliminate contractual services to the city.
“My ultimate goal is certainly not to eliminate public access; my goal is to fulfill the initial premise of the PEG station — that the city would provide equipment, air time and training that public members could be as autonomous as possible,” Kolacy said in a Monday memo to the council.
