Forum continues debate on potential AT&T television
Posted on Wednesday, January 31, 2007
City leaders, public access representatives and AT & T representatives sounded off Tuesday in the latest debate on how to bring a new competitor into Fayetteville's television programing market.
The forum took place at Fayetteville City Hall and focused on the proposed AT & T agreement with the city about a local launch of the company's Internetbased television service, Uverse. Among the questions raised were how the city is going to regulate the new technology and how AT & T is going to go about providing that service to the city.
Cathy Foraker, director of external affairs for the AT & T Fayetteville office, said the company's looking for a chance to open up its services to people before it can get all the financial details in order.
"We're fortunate the company has decided to come here," Foraker said. "Let's let the consumers decide."
The problem is that because AT & T's service is not a cable service - but a new technology through its Internet service - there is no clear guidelines for the city to follow in terms of regulating it. There's also no guarantee the service will be available to the whole area at the start, something that Fayetteville resident Larry Long said was a concern.
"It would be frustrating if this moved at a slow speed," Long said. "This is our shot to make sure we have the best available."
Currently AT & T has agreed to pay a 5-percent fee to the city to be allowed access, but the company has not disclosed when or where in the city the service will be available.
Alan Ivester, AT & T area manager for U-verse execution, said the company is trying to keep such information from reaching its competitors.
"We're not able to release areas or rollout times because we don't want competitors to plan competing specials. "Ivester said. "We are currently on track to cover 50 percent of area consumers by 2008. "
Foraker said the areas most likely to receive service right away would be ones that were densely populated. The company would not discriminate economically, she said, meaning it would not go directly to the wealthier areas of town.
"We're just asking to be able to provide the product and see if we have any takers," Foraker said.
The forum also addressed the need for a competitor in a market dominated by cable incumbent Cox Communications.
Ivester said that about 98 percent of the nation's cable markets only have one provider.
"According to a (Federal Communications Commission ) survey, markets that have two providers have rates that are 15 percent lower," Ivester said. "Competition is clearly benefiting consumers in that sense."
Another big question the forum addressed was whether the new technology will support the public, education and government channels (PEG ), and whether AT & T would be willing to financially contribute to making sure those services stayed available to all its customers.
Colleen Pancake, community access television (CAT ) board president, said there could be an increased cost to CAT with the arrival of AT & T's new service. AT & T needs to be responsible for covering that cost, she said.
"There needs to be an additional percent upfront for connecting (PEG ) to the new system," Pancake said.
The newest contract proposed by City Attorney Kit Williams states that AT & T needs to provide PEG access on its lowest tier package.
Foraker said there was always a chance the company would cover those costs.
"The contract is left open ended," she said. "We don't know the upfront costs for delivering (PEG ) content, but we'd like to start working with the city to figure that out. "
Foraker said the contract does call for an upfront grant to pay for the costs to get CAT up to the new technology's level, but company officials cannot be specific about how much that would be at the time.
"We recognize (PEG ) as a community asset," Foraker said.
The proposal goes to the Fayetteville City Council at its meeting on Tuesday.
Casey Milford, a CAT board member, was concerned whether there had been enough time for public comment on the proposal.
"It was introduced on Jan. 7, and it's going to the council on Feb. 6," Milford said.
Richard Drake, a Fayetteville telecommunications board member, agreed with Milford.
"It makes me uncomfortable for things to be moving this fast," Drake said. "Washington County has a bad history of pushing things through too quickly and paying the consequences later."
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