Oxford Community Television (OCTV) is much like the child of a divorce – both parents want it to move in with them.

Last week, the Oxford Area Cable Communications Commission voted 5-0 to have a committee consisting of commissioners Char Sutherby and Lori Fisher, along with OCTV Station Manager Bill Service, gather all the information regarding two potential new homes for the station.

Oxford Village pitched the idea of the station moving into its 50-year-old municipal complex on W. Burdick St.

Ron Davis, director of the Oxford Township Parks and Recreation Department, previously proposed constructing a new station in Seymour Lake Township Park, just east of Baldwin Rd.

Cable Commission Chair Sue Bossardet, who also serves as Oxford Village president, wants the committee to collect all the facts regarding the two options, so the pros and cons of each can be weighed.

“I don’t think that we as a board and the (station) employees understand what it is that we want,” she said. “We do a lot of talking, but I don’t ever see anything in writing.”

Bossardet said the cable commission and station employees “need to sit down and decide what it is that we want.”

The cable commission oversees OCTV and consists of five officials representing Oxford and Addison townships as well as the villages of Oxford and Leonard.

Since 2004, OCTV has been housed at 1775 N. Lapeer Rd. The station leases commercial space for $2,000 per month ($24,000 annually). The lease is set to expire in February 2019.

The station relocation issue once again reared its head at the July 24 cable commission meeting because Oxford’s interim village manager, Jaymes Vettraino, made a short presentation pitching the municipal complex as a potential option.

“We have space available,” he said.

The village is offering two choices.

OCTV could move into the eastern wing of the complex that served as the township hall until 2006. This vacant area is in a state of “disrepair,” as Vettraino put it, and would require an investment on the cable commission’s part in order to bring it up to code.

Or OCTV could move into the portion of the complex that’s been leased by the township parks and recreation department since 2002. The department since 2002. The department is planning to move out this week and set up shop in its new offices at Seymour Lake Park.

“That space is ready to be occupied immediately,” Vettraino said. “It’s been fully functional.”

The village council is anxious to fill the vacant and soon-to-be-vacant spaces in the complex for financial and security reasons as well as preventing the building from falling into further disrepair.

Village officials have discussed the possibility of engaging the services of real estate professionals to assist in marketing and potentially leasing the property. But council wanted to give the cable commission first crack at it.

“We really would like to gauge the temperature of this body before we take our next steps with the open market,” Vettraino said.

Vettraino’s presentation is the second pitch the cable commission has heard this year.

Back in March, Davis offered the commission free land in Seymour Lake Park on which to build a brand new station. The commission would be responsible for funding the construction. Davis envisions the station being constructed as an addition to the new parks/rec. offices and multi-purpose community room that was just built and the senior activities room which the department is planning to build once funding is secured.

OCTV has been saving money for a new station and has a little more than $450,000 in its fund balance.

OCTV is not supported by local tax dollars. The station is primarily funded via the franchise fees paid by people who subscribe to cable TV services provided by Charter Communications and AT&T U-verse.

At the time, Davis told commissioners being located in the busy park would increase the public’s exposure to OCTV. He said there are 2,000 to 2,500 people “in that park every night” from May through September.

Davis believes it would give OCTV and the parks and recreation department the opportunity to run programs together and get more young people interested and involved in community access television.

Commissioners asked Service and OCTV Production Manager Teri Stiles if they have a preference – municipal complex or park?

With the park option, Service said “the land is free” and that’s a “big benefit.”

The big concern with the municipal complex, according to Service, is what happens to the station if, at some point in the future, the village decides to sell the building.

In the November 2012 election, village voters gave council the authority to sell the entire municipal complex and the land it occupies, if it so chooses.

Stiles believes having the station in the park would give OCTV “more exposure” in the community, especially considering the thousands of people who go there for everything from athletic events to the annual Seymour Celebration.

“They’re going to see us,” she said. “That’s free advertising for us.”

Service noted OCTV personnel are already at the park about four times a week covering events from June through September.

Bossardet wasn’t convinced the park offers a greater degree of visibility.

“I feel that there’s just as much exposure on Burdick St.,” she said.

Fisher, who serves as the Addison Township treasurer, expressed her doubt as to whether having a “little sign” on a TV station in the park would “catch anybody’s attention” because it’s so busy there.

Commissioner Bill Dunn, who’s also the Oxford Township Supervisor, indicated his “big concern” is the municipal complex parking lot, which he said “is in pretty bad shape.”

Dunn went so far as to say it “almost should be condemned.”

“It’s that bad,” he said.

Service expressed his concern about potentially upsetting Oxford Township during the station search process because it provides approximately 80 percent of OCTV’s funding.

“We lose our money, we’re dead,” he said.

But Dunn assured both him and the commission that the township “will never blackmail anyone.”

“We would never use our donation of money to coerce something to go our way,” he said.

Commissioner Ed Hunwick, who represents Oxford Township, asked if OCTV were to move into the municipal complex, would the village be leasing or selling the space to the commission.

“I think (it’s) for lease-only at this point in time,” Bossardet replied.

Dunn remarked that selling part of the building would be a terrible idea.

“That would be the worst thing you could do is to break up this building and limit any chance of selling it (as a whole),” he said.

“I don’t think the village council has any intention of selling this property,” Bossardet noted. “But that’s the current council. Ten years down the road, I have no idea (what could happen).”