Group tries to save KOCE

Jenny Marder

Supporters of KOCE-TV are mobilizing in a grass-roots effort to take

Orange County’s only public news station off the market.

Led by an eighth-grade science teacher and a KOCE engineer, a

handful of protesters have been circulating petitions and handing out

fliers and red T-shirts to encourage people to rally behind KOCE-TV.

Two Web sites, SaveKOCE.org and KOCEforsale.com, have also been

created to garner support.

“This is something far too valuable and has too much of a future

and a past to get rid of,” said Janet English, a science teacher at

Serrano Intermediate School in Lake Forest and a staunch supporter of

the station.

Public information about the sale is lacking, she added, and the

community deserves to know what’s going on.

English intends to provide this information through her Web site,

a flashy site, complete with facts and figures about KOCE, the

district and the list of potential buyers as well as an online

petition to halt the sale.

English and others began to organize after a list of 10 interested

buyers was announced July 25 by the Coast Community College

District’s board of directors. The district holds the license to the

station, which broadcasts 24-hours a day, seven days a week and

specializes in educational programming and local news and shoulders

about 25% of the station’s $7.9-million budget. Faced with severe

budget cuts, district officials began seeking buyers for the station

in May 2002.

“The fact is that it’s costing us a couple million dollars every

year to keep operating it,” district board member George Brown said.

“We have to cut classes back and we’re trying to find a way to stop

the bleeding.”

Classes should come before broadcasting, Brown insisted.

“We’re very happy with KOCE,” Brown said. “It’s a great station,

and we’d like to stay on the air forever, but we can’t afford to

finance it.”

Brown said he hopes to sell the station to the highest bidder.

But KOCE’s operating fund is only a splinter, 1.1%, of the

district’s total budget, English argues.

She suggests on her Web site that funds from the Measure C ballot

initiative, a $370-million school bond passed in November 2002 that

set aside money for upgrading district facilities and technology, be

used.

Such use would be inappropriate, Brown said, and not what voters

intended the money for.

“We went into a lot of detail with a lot of committees on what we

were going to spend bond money for. KOCE was not included,” Brown

said. “We can probably repair the roof if it leaks, but we can’t put

money into operating for them to spend on their programs.”

Gordon Smith, a systems engineer at the station and creator of

KOCEforsale.com, says that KOCE, which provides Orange County with an

alternative to commercial television, is vital to any county.

“It’s a wonderful place to work, and I’d hate to have it go away,”

Smith said. “What the TV industry needs is a different voice for

commercial stations. It needs a different attitude and a different

choice for viewers. ... [KOCE] has more in depth news and more

intellectual programming.”

Interested buyers include four religious entities and a private

developer. PBS affiliate KCET and the KOCE Foundation, the station’s

fund-raising arm, have submitted a joint bid.

“It definitely should not be sold to a religious entity,” Smith

said. “It would have a whole new mission, and the public and the

community would lose in the long run.”

Most who oppose the station’s sale consider the KCET-KOCE bid to

be the best on a list of bad options. Smith hopes that if the joint

bid wins, the district will establish safeguards so that its

educational programming and Orange County focus remain priorities.

The decision on the sale will be made by the district’s five member

board of trustees.

“The thing is open wide for any type of reasonable suggestion,”

Brown said. “I don’t think we’ve made up our mind on anything except,

help, we’re losing money.”