Gretjen Clausing News Today

Responses to the Verizon Cable Franchise Survey will be used to gather feedback as the City of Philadelphia moves through the renewal process of its 15-year cable television franchise deal with Verizon Fios.

Philadelphia used to be the biggest city in the country without a public-access TV channel until activists won a 27-year battle to launch PhillyCAM. Now, under the proposed Comcast franchise deal, PhillyCAM is looking at budget cuts. Is it a sign of the times?

PhillyCAM is following up on its ‘Philadelphia Stories’ retrospective on Feb. 17 with Louis Massiah’s film ‘A is for Anarchist, B is for Brown.’

Shannon Thomas, program manager for Doc Society, told PhillyVoice that the pitches go both ways. Content creators in Philadelphia can pitch their story idea to community activists and organizations for financial support, resources and more, while organizations themselves can present their cause for local producers to help tell their own story. "The cheesy kind of Good Pitch tagline is Helping the film go further" Thomas said. "Basically, some films arent even finished, but they are coming here ...