Pirok on FCC & Local Cable Franchising

Ken Pirok, Champaign City Council member for District 5, has a lengthy post about the recent FCC ruling on cable franchises and local jurisdictions:

On December 20, 2006, the FCC effectively decided to take away many of the rights that cities, counties, and states have to regulate cable franchises in their jurisdictions.  By a three to two vote, the FCC placed various limits on the length of time that a municipality and a video provider may negotiate as well as which types of requirements that a franchising authority (such as a city) may impose.

First, the FCC under President Bush has been a complete embarrassment.

Second, you may remember the that AT&T asked the Champaign City Council for the rights to implement some new fiber-optic video services in select areas of Champaign. 

U-verse would use telephone lines to offer video programming, including video on demand and a program guide. AT&T also would offer high-speed Internet and phone service and would offer bundling of all three services.

"It's all about providing competition and choice to the residents of Champaign, Urbana and Savoy," said Marc Blakeman, AT&T regional vice president, who said such service could be available by as soon as late 2007.

But the new technology offered by Project Lightspeed – AT&T's internal code name for the $4.6 billion national project – has also raised a number of legal and policy issues.

More from Pirok:

The fact is that municipalities are begging for competitors in the cable market.  The problem is that the new video providers don’t want to play by the same rules as the incumbent cable companies.  Municipalities and their citizens own the right-of-way where the fiber is laid.  It is their property, and they are simply acting to protect their rights.  Cities simply want to ensure that all of their citizens will have access to the video services and that their local government and educational channels will be maintained.

The biggest crime is the new FCC exclusion of “unreasonable” buildout requirements in contracts with the video providers.  (A buildout requirement simply states that the video company will eventually provide the service to the entire city.)  There’s that word again, what is “unreasonable?”  As to coverage of the city, a municipality must continue to be able to require that a provider eventually service everyone.  This is a fundamental right; it is fair and just for a municipality to require 100% buildout.  How would you feel if your city contracted for the new fiber optic service that included high speed internet, but your neighborhood was excluded as a business decision?  Would you vote for the mayor who had approved this contract?

I'm all for competition and innovation.  But I agree with Pirok about two things: 

• that the local jurisdictions are best suited to make these decisions, not the Federal government
• that the local jurisdictions absolutely have the right to demand universal coverage in exchange for access to the right-of-ways

Of course, AT&T and other telecom companies will be lobbying Congress, state legislatures and local governments for easier access to these new markets and technologies.  And I think they're already running TV commercials pushing the idea.  Regardless, the issue won't be going away soon, and I'm sure this won't be our last post on it.  Hopefully, it won't be the last we hear from CM Pirok on the issue either.