Montreal: In decisions that give the new owners of Television Quatre Saisons and cfcf-tv room to maneuver, and quell the immediate fears of independent producers, the crtc has set the ‘minimum’ level of annual spending on independent Canadian programming by tqs at $8.6 million. In cfcf’s case, majority owner WIC Television has been asked to set up a development office in Montreal and invest $4 million in independent Quebec-produced programs in underfunded categories.

Exactly how the new Communications Quebecor-led management at tqs will spend the $8.6 million is not as clear, and is one of the reasons the commission has imposed a four-year licence term instead of seven as requested by Franklin Delaney, president and ceo. Quebecor and partner Cancom (30%) took over the network Sept. 1.

The $8.6 million excludes spending on programs produced by affiliates, the acquisition of professional sports programming, and technical services and direct labor provided by tqs.

In addition, tqs has a new $2.3-million benefit obligation including $1.6 million in independent programming, $250,000 in funding for Centre d’etudes sur les medias to study violence on tv, and $50,000 for the Alliance for Children and Television. The $4 million from wic is new money and is incremental to existing cfcf program obligations including an existing development or seed fund.

The crtc rejected a $3-million wic ‘benefit’ proposal in the form of a new digital mobile, tagging it as ‘the normal cost of doing business.’

And while the crtc did not formally absolve cfcf of its children’s programming commitments as requested by wic president Jim Macdonald and strongly opposed by cftpa president Elizabeth McDonald, cfcf is being held only to a weekly youth news program and an earlier cfcf commitment to produce an annual youth talent music special.

cfcf is required to maintain a minimum weekly average of 14 hours 50 minutes of original local news and to continue to produce in-house Montreal AM Live, a one-hour phone-in program broadcast weekdays.