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# City Hall launches 24/7 election coverage
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/city-hall-launches-24-7-election-coverage/
- Published: 2004-10-11T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T05:16:34.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Government & Politics, Santa Monica, #archive-import, Homelessness

*Station makes SM first with 24-hour election TV*

*By PAM WIGHT Special to the Daily Press*

Santa Monica voters can learn about any local candidate, issue or ballot measure any time of day with a new TV station dedicated to 24-hour local election coverage. Because many local political candidates lack enough funds to run expensive television ads, the new CityTV2, channel 20, and the existing channel 16 aim to educate voters and level the field for all candidates by providing them equal air time. Scheduled pro-gramming of election coverage is furnished on City TV, channel 16, but the new station will make Santa Monica the first city in the country to dedicate a channel to educating voters about the specifics of the local election on a 24-hour basis, officials said. The station, which runs the channel 16 election programs on a continuous loop, was a collaboration between Santa Monica City Hall, the League of Women Voters and the West LA-based Center for Governmental Studies. Launched on Oct. 1, CityTV2 is a companion to Santa Monica’s main government access cable station, City TV.

“We wanted to give voice to each candidate,” said Barbara Inatsugu, president of the local chapter of the League of Women Voters. “By using technology and making it easier and more convenient to get information about the elections, voters can make better decisions.”

Last year focus groups showed that people didn’t like the exclusive use of the one-minute candidate statements, or listening to candidates answer the same questions over and over, said Robin Gee, City TV station manager. She, Inatsugu and Betsy Rosenfeld of the Center for Governmental Studies began working on alternative formats.

Fourteen shows using a variety of formats cover a range of relevant voter education. If someone is interested in parking or traffic issues, for example, they can tune into just the programs that address those topics. If they want to find out a candidate’s stance on an issue, they can tune into a segment called “City Council Candidates Address the Issues,” followed by the issue name. Parking/traffic, growth and development, and homelessness are the only three issues discussed in the context of CityTV2’s programs. The local school board and the Santa Monica Community College district board have their own candidate programs when education issues are covered.

“Local elections affect voters’ lives much more than presidential elections do,” Gee said. “But local politicians often don’t have much access to television coverage.”

Questions of impartiality are carefully scrutinized by all parties involved in CityTV2’s creation, according to Inatsugu.

“The league’s reputation is built on the ability to be impartial,” she said. “All candidates are participating, and all have the same exact questions to answer, the same set-up and the same moderators in debates.”

The League of Women Voters has a long-standing partnership with City Hall on covering local government. To attain impartiality, the organization has two distinct functions: One takes positions on issues and is geared toward action, membership and general operational tasks; the other function is strictly voter education and access issues. Whether the league takes a position on an issue is separate from purely impartial involvement in public education of election issues, Inatsugu said.

“It’s a skill,” she said. “Not everyone can do it. If we find there’s someone working for us who can’t (be impartial), we put them on the action side. If we take a position on a very controversial issue, we will often not participate in the TV program which deals with that issue.”

Funding for CityTV2 comes from the same tax base that covers the existing cable access station, Gee said. The city budget for both stations is $881,165\. Underwriting for the programs on judicial candidates was provided by the Women Lawyers Association of Los Angeles, the Pasadena Law Auxiliary, the Culver- Marina Bar Association, the Los Angeles County League of Women Voters, creative learning channel LA36, and ACT, a Pasadena-based nonpartisan political organization. The contributions of both the League of Women Voters and the Center for Governmental Studies to the election programming is educational as they are both nonpartisan, nonprofit organizations.

As for the programs themselves, an effort to be more condensed than previous election programming led to the creation of “Koffee Klatsch.” Described by Gee as “The View meets the school board,” a teacher, a student and a parent ask questions of the school board candidates. To avoid bias, all questions are submitted in advance, and each candidate answers the same ones.

“On The Record With Your Santa Monica Ballot Measures” illustrates the pros and cons of the measures from a variety of angles to ensure there is no bias, Inatsugu said. A similar-named program, “On The Record”, uses the one-minute format for candidate statements, but City Council candidates present either a one-minute statement with a sponsor’s endorsement, or a two-minute statement with no endorsement. Other “On The Record” shows feature contenders for seats on the school board, the SMC Trustees Board, the Rent Control Board and judicial positions. Each candidate has the opportunity to give a one-minute statement.

Another program is “Meet Your City Council Candidates”, where each nominee is interviewed for five minutes in order to give voters a chance to get more of a personal feel for each one. A companion show interviews judicial candidates.

The only live program is a round-table discussion involving all candidates that is being held in the City Council chambers on Oct. 19, from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. Labeled “Council Candidates Live!”, nominees will consider pre-written questions and debate them in small groups. Because the public is invited, the idea is for voters to see all of the candidates in one place so they can make distinctions between their views more evident.

Capping the election season will be continuous coverage of election night from Tuesday at 8 p.m. until Wednesday at noon.

After Nov. 2, Santa Monica residents will be able to catch important government meetings they might have missed by tuning into replays of meetings that are shown live on City TV channel 16\. Between the repeats of those programs, CityTV2 will maintain an on-air community bulletin board. Also, regular channel 16 programming will resume, which includes coverage of local news, sports and arts.

“Santa Monica residents care about the issues.” Gee said. “We’re trying to use technology to give the voters all of the information they need.”

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 11, 2004.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/101104.pdf?ref=smdp.com)