The Lake Minnetonka Communications Commission

2/26/11

Reader "Smart Voter" asked what impact the LMCC has on Shorewood residents and how Council Member Zerby's attendance (or lack thereof) at LMCC meetings affects residents.

The LMCC is a Joint Powers Agreement (yes, another JPA) organization with membership of 17 cities around Lk Mtka. Its mission is to manage the cable TV franchise with Mediacom, to provide Public, Educational and Governmental (PEG) programming to its member cities and their residents and to offer member cities consulting on communications technologies and communications industry issues and trends. See www.lmcc-tv.org for more on this.

The LMCC gets its funding from collecting a franchise fee and a PEG fee from Mediacom. Mediacom collects these, in turn, from residents who subscribe to Mediacom TV service. Fees are basically set by the Federal Communications Commission and apply only to the cable TV part of a Mediacom customer's bill. Monthly, the fees amount to less than $1.00. The total revenue per year is about $600,000. There is no tax dollar funding for the LMCC.

The LMCC operates four cable TV channels on Mediacom cable as well does Internet streaming of some programming. Programs are recordings of council meetings and other public meetings, local sports events, school functions, public interest, locally produced entertainment and more. The LMCC provides free training for residents wanting to learn how to produce TV shows and the equipment to record, edit and air these resident-produced shows. Many regional and national awards attest to the quality of the LMCC's efforts.

Each member city can have two commissioners (not all have two). These commissioners are the equivalent of a city council for the LMCC. They meet as a whole commission four times per year where they consider what the LMCC is and should be doing, how it spends its money and what services it provides to its member cities and their residents. Shorewood has two commissioners: Scott Zerby who is the city council rep and Ken Hendrickson who is a resident rep appointed by the City Council.

So, when Scott Zerby does not show up for a LMCC meeting, he is not representing Shorewood and voting in any decisions. It's basically the same as not showing up for a city council meeting.

Happy Reading!
The Insider