FOR RELEASE: Immediate, Thursday, June 23, 2005

Senate & Assembly Sessions to Be Shown on Cable TV Statewide

Gavel to Gavel Coverage of Sessions To Begin in January 2006

Senate Majority Leader Joseph L. Bruno and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver today announced that live gavel-to-gavel telecasts of Senate and Assembly sessions will be expanded beyond the Capital District region to other cable television viewers throughout the state beginning in January of 2006.

"For several years, legislative sessions have been shown on cable in the Capital Region. The expansion of telecasting legislative sessions is another step forward for government reform, for increasing openness and accountability," Senator Bruno said. "It will give people throughout the state greater access and understanding of their state government and enable them to watch their representatives at work," Senator Bruno said. "This agreement fulfills a commitment we made to televise legislative sessions statewide, and I want to thank the Speaker and the Cable Telecommunications Association for their cooperation in making it happen."

"Bringing our legislative deliberations to as many New Yorkers as possible through statewide television coverage has always been a priority for my Assembly colleagues and me. By expanding the gavel-to-gavel coverage of our proceedings across the state, we are bringing state government into the homes of more New Yorkers. This announcement moves us closer to achieving our goal of establishing broadcast coverage of our government through a statewide C-SPAN-like channel. I am very grateful to Senator Bruno and the Cable Telecommunications Association of New York (CTANY) for their willingness to work out the many technical and institutional challenges that had to be overcome to make today's announcement possible," said Silver.

The Speaker also expressed his gratitude to Assemblyman Ron Canestrari, chair of the Assembly Working Group on Television, Assembly Minority Leader Charles Nesbitt and Senate Minority Leader David Paterson for their commitment to work in a bipartisan way to agree on this important matter.

Senate Democratic Leader David A. Paterson said: "I am a long-time supporter of making our work in Albany more accessible to the people we serve. As I have often said, there is no better and more effective way to do this than by televising our proceedings. This measure will lead to a better-informed electorate and will help us to forge a strong, more democratic State government."

"This is the right thing to do to ensure that the people of this state, who send us to Albany to represent their many interests and concerns, have an opportunity to view the televised coverage of the Legislative process. The Assembly Minority Conference and I are proud to have played a key role in this bipartisan agreement to bring a better understanding of our work in The People's House of the Legislature to the people we are elected to serve," said Assemblyman Nesbitt.

"When we first studied the idea of televising sessions on cable there were too many obstacles, primarily costs and technology, to show them throughout the state," said Senator Owen H. Johnson (R-C, Babylon), who co-chaired a joint Legislative Task Force on Televising Sessions. "The advances in cable technology over the past several years have finally made achieving the goal of putting sessions on television statewide a reality and that is great news for everyone in the state."

"Today's announcement is a significant advancement of our goal to better inform New Yorkers about their state government. Expanding the television coverage of our proceedings to the entire state was a big priority for the Assembly. It was among the many reform measures the Assembly called for at the beginning of session this January. We are very pleased that the legislative deliberations of both the Assembly and Senate will be available to television viewers across the state, and that we can build on this development to achieve our goal of establishing a statewide public affairs channel," said Assemblyman Canestrari.

Richard F. Alteri, President of the Cable Telecommunications Association of New York said, "Cable is proud to expand bringing New York's representative government to our cable systems and customers throughout the great Empire State. This investment in New York exemplifies our commitment to local communities and our customers. We salute Senate Majority Leader Bruno, Speaker Silver and their colleagues for partnering with cable on this important public venture."

The Legislature announced plans to provide unedited, gavel-to-gavel broadcasts of its sessions four years ago. In 2001, based on the recommendations of a bipartisan Legislative Task Force, the Legislature began broadcasting sessions live on the Internet (www.senate.state.ny.us and www.assembly.state.ny.us). In May 2002, Time Warner Cable became the first cable system to cablecast the Senate and Assembly sessions, live and on tape delay, in the 12-county Capital Region. Unfortunately, the prohibitive costs of satellite time and other equipment costs required to provide these broadcasts to other cable operators, particularly after the economic downturn resulting from the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, delayed the planned expansion to other markets across the state.

Since that time, discussions have continued with officials from the Cable Telecommunications Association of New York and the state's cable television providers, including Cablevision and Time Warner Cable, who have committed to expanding the service on a statewide basis. Technological advances and industry infrastructure investment have now made statewide broadcasts of the Legislature's sessions feasible in January. The cable industry has agreed to deliver these broadcasts to a statewide audience and to make them available through a dedicated channel and or a local public access channel in order to reach the largest audience possible.