The U.S. Army Garrison Stuttgart Command Information Channel will go off the air permanently Oct. 15.
The service, which is available solely to Telepost Kabelservice, or TKS, subscribers on military installations, is being discontinued due to continuing budget cuts across the military services. The channel is just one of several mediums that Stuttgart organizations use to inform community members about upcoming events.
“The new fiscal reality is leading to some tough decisions,” said Kathleen Cole, Deputy to the USAG Stuttgart commander. “We’re not only looking at the cost of programs, but their effectiveness as well.” The Command Information Channel costs more than $10,000 annually to maintain, and is available to less than 30 percent of the community.
Stuttgart isn’t the only community seeing the loss of this program, according to Dan Thompson, Installation Management Command-Europe Public Affairs Officer.
“Technology is changing, and we are changing with it,” Thompson said. “Just as the telegraph and now even fax machines become less efficient and costlier to maintain, we have to ask if there is a more fiscally responsible way to reach the community in the format of their choice.”
Though the TV signal will be gone, Stuttgart organizations wishing to promote their events can continue to submit their slides to be posted on the USAG Stuttgart website. Slides can be emailed to stuttgartmedia@eur.army.mil.
