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Boston Globe

A lioness, a godfather, and a new elementary school: Why is Stoughton fighting with its cable access channel?

While voters eventually approved the new school in April, Lyons's shows leading up to the decision are part of a local controversy that continues to simmer. The local access station has sued the town and its leaders in federal court, alleging that they violated its civil rights and the shared access agreement by trying to interfere with its operations because it dislikes critical programming. Stoughton officials have denied the allegations, arguing that it's SMAC that violated the access agreement — a document that allows SMAC to record and air government meetings. Advertisement The town says the station exhibited an undue political bias against funding for the new school — including by airing programs such as 'A Lioness & You on the Watch' and 'The Stoughton Godfather,' a local talk show that begins with 90-year-old host Peter Ventresco photoshopped into iconic images from 'The Godfather.' Local officials also said the station has failed to provide the select board with updates as required in the agreement. Advertisement The lawsuit raises thorny First Amendment questions about the relationship between a public access channel and its local government at a time when such organizations are at greater risk of shutting down, thanks in large part to lost revenue as Founded in 2009, SMAC is funded all but entirely by cable fees received by the town, thanks to laws that require cable companies such as Comcast and Verizon to pay for public access programming in exchange for operating in local communities. It is an independent nonprofit and is required by federal law to be apolitical and open to all viewpoints. SMAC had a budget of $467,000 last year. The current feud traces back to an earlier, failed vote for the school proposal in June 2024. The new school is estimated to cost a total of $113 million — roughly $47 million of which will come from state grants — which required residents to vote on a debt exclusion. Opponents said the project will put an even greater strain on residents who are already struggling to keep up, while supporters argued that the proposal is the best and cheapest option for its aging schools. The real breaking point came after residents voted down the initial proposal, which prompted Town Manager Tom Calter to form a working group of residents. They produced a detailed report about the project ahead of the revote this year. Advertisement 'I find it easy to get information out,' Calter said. 'The problem is that factual information has to compete with misinformation.' Calter and other supporters of the school proposal said that opponents didn't characterize the project accurately, claiming, for instance, that the project did not include the costs of tearing down one of the existing elementary schools and building a new road and bridge. Lyons, treasurer of the Stoughton No More Tax Hikes political committee that opposed the proposal, said that her critics were misunderstanding the group's arguments. 'Saying that I'm full of misinformation? It's preposterous,' Lyons said. When SMAC tried to cover the second meeting of the Calter-appointed working group, a member told SMAC to leave, despite the meeting being open to the public. Calter said the meeting didn't have to be recorded because it wasn't subject to open meeting law. 'Video recording or live streaming the meetings would be contrary to the mission of the working group,' Calter wrote in a public letter at the time, adding that he was worried that clips without context would be released before the final report. The move alarmed SMAC, which sued the town just days after residents approved the school proposal in April, alleging that Calter and Select Board members Steve Cavey, and Joseph Mokrisky were not just trying to hide opposition to the school project but also actively trying to steer SMAC's programming. The station also alleged that Select Board members intimidated SMAC staff and had previously tried to gain influence over the station's operations. Advertisement 'SMAC is under a duty to be independent, and it is independent,' said Joseph Zoppo, an attorney representing the media organization. Town officials denied that they tried to steer programming but argued that SMAC needs to remain unbiased. 'We want them to be able to broadcast ideas, even ones that we don't agree with,' Cavey said. 'But what we do need from them is to be able to take that role seriously.' Turning SMAC away from the meeting also troubled some residents, other officials, and station hosts, including Lyons. She filed an open meeting law complaint with the state attorney general's office, but the office did not find that Stoughton violated the law. 'How dare the town manager not allow SMAC to videotape those working groups so that the working public, or anyone for that matter, could then go to SMAC and watch it at their own convenience,' Lyons said in an interview. 'They're the ones spreading misinformation and outright lies.' Crossover between local politics and SMAC helped fuel the town's concerns that the station has a political bent. Lyons and David Lurie, who up until last month was a SMAC board member, advocated against the school proposal and serve on the town's finance committee. SMAC board chair Bob Mullen is the town moderator. 'I'll never argue what SMAC puts up there,' Calter said. 'But it's pretty easy to argue that they had their thumb on the public policy scale with respect to this project.' Calter singled out the programs from Lyons and Ventresco, the latter of whom he called a 'cynic' who 'does no homework.' Mullen and Lurie declined to comment and referred the Globe to SMAC's attorneys, who said SMAC board members don't make editorial decisions, that the station aired plenty of pro-school programming, and that a lot of people in town hold positions at multiple institutions. Advertisement Ventresco said, 'I never lie, I put the truth out,' and said a lot of misinformation comes from the town. He added that he is supportive of the outgoing and incoming superintendents in town and supports a new school, just not the one voters passed. The outsized attention on SMAC comes as there are few other sources of information in town. The local newspaper, the Stoughton Journal, was combined with neighboring weekly papers in 2019, and the paper stopped printing in 2021, when its coverage went fully online at Gannett's Wicked Local website, a spokesperson said. As the fight between SMAC and Stoughton charges on, some residents want permanent change to what they see as too much overlap and dysfunction in town government and at SMAC. Others point to the difficulty in getting independent and reliable information. 'It's not like it used to be back in the day. People could get information,' said Mark Hausseman, 77, a retired Stoughton resident who the SMAC board tapped in 2020 to evaluate a former station manager. 'I think that's one of the problems.' Aidan Ryan can be reached at