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<br />jurisdiction the ability to develop statistics about citizen complaints. Mr. Boyarsky said <br />that it would very important to track statistics so that the community would know if a <br />problem was emerging from a group of random events over time. Mr. Barker asked if <br />statistics for complaints about cable TV from residents in unincorporated Orange County <br />could be generated for the past year. Ms. Barber said that Action Audits would be the <br />source of any such data and analysis. <br />Mr. Patrick said that ongoing, oversight work on cable TV services "has dwindled" for <br />several reasons. The regulatory environment in the past generated annual oversight <br />events that led to greater scrutiny by the local authorities of the cable operators. Under <br />FCC regulations the County has authority to conduct certain oversight activities such as <br />rate regulation and the review of other things such as change of ownership of the cable <br />operator changes has not come up in recent years. Nevertheless, he said, the oversight <br />functions that CAC is serving still need to be served. Although in his opinion the current <br />operator has gotten better, he said, the operator can change in the future or performance <br />could decline for any number of reasons while the franchise is still in effect. Oversight <br />ought to be preserved. <br />Mr. Patrick continued. "There are other matters that have come up in the context of the <br />new franchise agreement that still should be worked on." Density issues, for one. <br />Second, we now have a County government channel and I think citizens should have <br />opportunities to provide input to the Board on that. We have the equipment, and citizens <br />should be thinking and talking to the Board of County Commissioners about whether it is <br />being used even close to its potential, to broadcast Planning Board meetings, for example, <br />or public information announcements. Maybe also someone ought to be looking at how <br />to promote better access to high speed internet of some sort, whether by wireless or wire <br />line, in areas of the county that are not being served. At least one of the Board of <br />Commissioners has an interest in this, but no group appears to be looking at it. It is this <br />kind of recasting of our charge from a focus on cable TV to telecommunications more <br />broadly, or public use of telecommunications in the County, could create a scope that <br />would not abandon cable oversight but instead could create a more interesting and more <br />invigorating role for a citizen committee than we have now with CAC. I say this because <br />I believe this is useful way to go, but note also that I am not interested in chairing that <br />new committee. <br />Mr. Boyarksy asked what role the County's Technology Advisory Committee might play <br />with respect to the unfinished business of CAC or other issues being identified tonight. <br />Ms. Harvey said that TAC's focus is the County government's internal use of technology <br />and noted that CAC member Mr. Brown serves on TAC. She added that the <br />Infrastructure Work Group of the County's Economic Development Commission is <br />looking at high speed internet in underserved areas of the County. <br />Mr. Brown said that when he asked TAC during its last meeting whether it might play a <br />role in some of the issues being discussed tonight "I got slapped on the hand." TAC <br />talked about the different facilities through which high speed internet maybe delivered, <br />he said, such as wireless, cable, personaUportable devices such as wristwatches. Mr. <br />5 <br />