November 24, 1999

To:      National Television and Video Access Coalition
            Audio Describers
            Listeners, Callers & others interested
From: Margaret & Cody Pfanstiehl

                                The FCC Improves the Next Millennium

After a unanimous yes vote, the Federal Communications Commission on Thursday, November 18, 1999, "proposed that commercial, television broadcasters in the top 25 television markets, and the largest national video programming distributors, introduce video descriptions in their transmissions to allow Americans with visual disabilities to better follow the visual action in television programs."

The Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) calls for "a minimum of 50 hours per calendar quarter (roughly four hours per week) of described prime time and/or children's programming no later than 18 months from the effective date of its video description rules ..." It requires comments by interested parties before January 24, 2000, followed by replies to those comments by February 23, 2000.

                                                            Gratitude

We offer heartfelt thanks to the many good folks who helped to bring this about -and who will, we hope, continue to write supportive comments to the Federal Communications Commission (445 12th St, SE, Washington DC 20554).

                                                         A Bit Of History

On a suggestion by Wayne White of Washington's Arena stage, Margaret Pfanstiehl, founder and president of the Metropolitan Washington Ear radio reading and dial-in newspaper and magazines service, and her now husband Cody, begin audio description service for live theaters in Washington D.C. area. 1982: We test video description for Public Television's American Playhouse Series. 1987-88 Washington Ear produces for WGBH the first PBS network test of video description. 1988 Narrative Television Network begins open channel descriptions of classic films on cable. 1989; We train the first describers at WGBH in Boston as WGBH launches their Descriptive Video Service. 1994: We form the National Television Access Coalition. 1999: United States Government begins implementation process. 2001: Millions of people with little or no vision can begin to benefit from expanded descriptive access to television as people with little or no hearing benefit from closed captioning access. A golden winged lady holding aloft the world globe stands atop our television set. She is the Emmy awarded to Margaret by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences for "persistence in the development and implementation of television for the visually impaired". That was nine years ago.

Persistence. It does indeed help the government to do the right thing.

Today her Emmy is smiling.

The FCC web site http://www.fcc.gov has the press release and the 23-page NPRM.

Click SEARCH, then FCC DIGITAL INDEX, then enter DOCKET 99-339.

For visually impaired and blind telephone dial-in callers throughout Maryland, Virginia and the D.C. these documents are in the Time/Announcements section in Category 36 selection 15.

An audio cassette version of everything is available from the Metropolitan Washington Ear at 301- 681-6636 and our web site at http://www.washear.org.