Source: Globe and Mail

Here's a question: Is conventional TV worth saving?

The question arises out of the CRTC and Heritage Committee hearings in Ottawa. We have learned that some local TV stations have been put up for sale, at an asking price of $1, and nobody is tempted to buy. We have learned that local TV is doomed. It has been suggested that conventional TV, as we know it, is fighting for survival, and needs help, pronto.

Oh yeah. Doom. Fight for survival. As for the hearings of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission and the Heritage Committee, the term "soul-destroying" certainly, and instantly, comes to mind.

Now, there are many ways to have your soul destroyed. One of the more mundane is to wander the aisles of Shoppers Drug Market, flyer in hand, searching in vain for the specials plainly advertised in said flyer. Another is trying to figure out the point of CBC's The Hour. On Tuesday, CBC's online TV listings gave the content as this: "George interviews former promome (sic) minister Joe Clark, celebrity tattoo artist/reality TV star Kat Von D and actor Eugene Levy." Go figure.

The most painful way to destroy your soul, surely, is poring over the CRTC licence-renewal hearings in search of deep meaning or good news. Yesterday, I was informed by a person who studies such matters, that I'd missed the point of the CRTC hearings. Apparently, our man at the helm, CRTC Chair Konrad von Finckenstein, often plays devil's advocate when asking questions or making comments. Sometimes he doesn't mean what he's saying. Thus, I am informed, he knew what he was doing when he asked a gnomic question about singing sensation Susan Boyle being a creature of the Internet only.

I am led to believe, then, that a lot of what happens at CRTC hearings is a cunning ruse to provoke debate and probe deeply into the minutiae of regulations and possible interpretations of the Broadcast Act. Behind the scenes, one imagines, everybody is chuckling at the repartee and clever banter. Indeed, for all I know, Konrad von Finckenstein is known as "Chuckles" in the TV racket.

Whatever. Look, I don't give the proverbial rodent's posterior. The real point, I put it to you, is that everybody wants out of the local TV business. And that's the area that is worth saving.

Far as I can tell, both CanWest and CTV say they can't commit to local TV service without another source of revenue - the fee-for-carriage proposal (by which conventional broadcasters could charge cable companies to carry their signals.) This is not something the cable carriers support at all. This makes the CRTC wary. Instead, the CRTC has been pushing a special fund to be funnelled to the broadcasters and spent on local programming. At the moment, the broadcasters see the fund as paltry. The CRTC suggested that it could be increased. Even at that, mind, you, both CTV and CanWest balked at a commitment to doing more local programming.

The time for musing, chuckling and debating is over. I've said it before and I'll say it again - evening local and national TV news broadcasts in Canada and the United States are seeing viewer ratings rise as more people become anxious about the local economy, employers, local hospitals and schools, and the local sensibility. Also, unfortunately, with increasing unemployment, there are more people at home to watch.

Enough already with the musings about a special fund. Enough already with the snarling of giant cable companies. Just introduce the fee-for-carriage and direct the funds to local TV service. If a broadcaster still declines to operate local TV news in small markets, then they don't get the money.

So, is conventional TV worth saving? Well, yes, and especially in the case of local, small market-specific TV. Whose side are you on - the cable company or your local TV station?

Conventional TV is still what connects us. And local TV news ensures that key social needs are met - the news is about your community, not some distant city; the weather forecast is for your area, not an entire province; the local sports team gets the recognition it needs to survive and thrive. Local heroes are celebrated. Local villains are exposed.

What's really soul destroying is the feeling that your town, your community doesn't matter.

© Globe and Mail