Opinion: Town Manager Should Release Amherst Media Capital Funds

Amherst Town Manager, Paul Bockelman has refused to release Comcast Capital Funds earmarked for Amherst Media’s facility and equipment needs, and has employed the town attorney to defend himself against charges of contractual violation.

Back in December of 2020, Amherst Media  requested that Bockelman release its money from the Comcast Capital Fund to retire the remaining balance of the bank mortgage on its property at Main and Gray streets, the site of the new Amherst Media facility.  We explained how this would address a number of important issues in our financial positioning toward constructing our new facility and support our continued service to  the people of Amherst.

The amount we requested was $139,000: the current balance from the original $221,000 bank mortgage.  We decided that if we paid off the mortgage’s balance, we would apply the land assessment of $350,000 as collateral while seeking our construction loan. By doing so, we would also relieve the burden of more than $14,000 per year we are currently paying toward interest from our very limited annual operating budget.

This makes good, fiscal sense. 

Amherst Media reminded Bockelman that in 2013, then Town Manager John Musante, agreed to use $70,000 of Comcast Capital earmarked for Amherst Media towards the non-mortgaged balance to help Amherst Media purchase the property. This usage had been vetted and fell legally within the contract language between the Town and Amherst Media and met all state procurement requirements and concerns. Therefore, what had previously been allowed should be seen as a precedent, not an anomaly. Bockelman’s reaction in December, 2020 was to originally raise concerns of “legalities and state mandates” for procurement procedure. He offered his need to “get a legal opinion” as his reasoning for not allocating the requested sum. He refused to recognize the 2013 precedent set by Town Manager Musante.

Amherst Media’s newest Capital Funds for equipment and facilities were negotiated between the Town of Amherst and Comcast during the cable franchise ten-year license renewal, signed on October 16, 2016. Of the Capital Fund’s $1,125,000 agreed upon, $675,000 was earmarked for Amherst Media’s equipment and facility needs, while $575,000 was earmarked for the Town of Amherst’s rebuild and ownership of the Institutional Network or I-Net, to begin as of October 15, 2019. 

Amherst Media has experienced the Town Manager’s proclivity for utilizing prolonged delay tactics numerous times, but in this case, those tactics resulted in him violating the Town’s contract with Amherst Media. 

Bockelman’s refusal to acknowledge or accept Amherst Media’s request has left us no choice but to seek legal counsel. While Bockelman has unlimited taxpayer dollars to spend on legal fees to town counsel  KP-Law, Amherst Media does not. Amherst Media has reached out to Attorney Mae Stiles of Fierst Bloomberg Ohm, LLP, the law firm which represented us during our contract negotiations with the Town.

Since April, 2021 Stiles has attempted to set dates for the Town legal counsel Lauren Goldberg of KP-Law, to discuss our legal complaint.  Stiles was granted occasional phone calls but also experienced numerous cancellations. During those phone calls it was revealed that the Town had no state-mandated procurement legality that would prevent the allocation of the requested money.   It wasn’t until June 3, 2021 that Attorney Goldberg responded, for the first time in writing, to a letter in which Amherst Media offered a course of action to mitigate the need for court proceedings.

Amherst Media had addressed one of Bockelman’s requests by offering to compile a five-year Capital Plan for use of the remaining Capital Funds minus the amount requested for retirement of the bank mortgage. We promised that document would be available for review as of June 3, 2021, and we delivered.

Amherst Media had also asked that KP-Law send a document for our review on how the proposed funds would be returned to the Town’s Comcast Capital Funds if we were unable to construct a building and sold the property. This is commonly referred to as a reversion of funds document. Amherst Media also offered the Town of Amherst the first option to buy if we were to sell the property.  

It is now July 14, 2021 and KP-Law has not provided that document nor have they acknowledged our 5-Year Capital Plan, the document which Bockelman requested and was made available.

The question must be asked: since the Town Manager is the only signature on the contract between the Town and Amherst Media, who in Town government can Amherst Media ask to intervene and help mediate when there is a substantial conflict? 

The Town Council should intervene since they, unlike the Town Manager, are elected by the Town residents, of whom 6,500 households have Comcast Subscriptions. It is those households who are paying for the Capital Funds as well as our annual operating revenues. It is those households who have a vested interest in Amherst Media’s future.  

Amherst Media asks all residents to contact their Council Representatives and solicit their commitment to intervene and demand transparency and daylight for a process that has been cloaked in unnecessary delays, extended silences, and contractual violations.

Jim Lescault

Jim Lescault, Executive Director of Amherst Media