Cable providers vie for local customers
Forced competition in the cable television
industry has started in Manatee County, and it immediately
triggered potential price cuts for some customers.
Newcomer Strategic Technologies Inc. is having
cables installed in the Greenfield Plantation subdivision to
begin competing against established Bright House Networks and to
comply with requirements in its franchise issued in 2001 by
county commissioners.
Strategic Technologies hopes to start
transmitting cable television broadcasts into Greenfield
Plantation homes within 90 to 120 days, said Rick Bowen, a
Strategic Technologies vice president in Tampa.
Greenfield Plantation has about 600 homes and is
about eight miles east of Bradenton, north of State Road 64.
County commissioners and their staff are
demanding competition in franchise negotiations with all
companies, saying it will result in improved services and
possibly cheaper prices for cable customers.
Bright House Networks responded to the Strategic
Technologies challenge by offering steep discounts to Greenfield
Plantation residents through a bulk-rate contract proposal
submitted to the subdivision's homeowners association.
"It would be better than a 50 percent cut in
normal cable pricing, but it would require every homeowner to
purchase a package, and it's wrapped into the (homeowner
association) annual dues," said Ken Stone, president of
Greenfield Plantation Homeowners Association.
Residents to be consulted
Stone said the association's directors likely
will wait to receive any competing proposal from Strategic
Technologies and accept advice from Greenfield Plantation
residents before making any decision. He is a Bright House
customer, paying about $50 per month for cable television.
"What we would probably do is entertain all
possibilities," Stone said. "I think competition is always
healthy for the consumer."
Rose Carlson, Bright House's vice president and
general manager in Manatee County, declined to talk about
specific prices or competitive strategies. But she said this is
not the first time her company talked with Greenfield Plantation
officials about a bulk-rate deal.
"Offering bulk, reduced-price contracts is not
unusual and is done when it makes sense for both parties,"
Carlson said. "Our advantage is that it streamlines the
relationship with our customers because it reduces our
marketing, operational and billing costs. We have many of them
in Manatee County."
Carlson said there are no plans for Bright House
Networks to reduce programming prices to individual customers in
Greenfield Plantation or other neighborhoods without a bulk
contract where competition exists.
"Our products are priced at a good value, and we
have no plans to lower them at this time," she said.
Bowen and David Drykerman, business development
manager for Strategic Technologies, would not detail what prices
their company will offer to Greenfield Plantation's association
or individual customers there or to other homeowners
associations where the company will compete against Bright
House.
"We will not share prices (with The Herald),"
Drykerman said. "We believe that our pricing is competitive or
better than the competition."
Strategic Technologies must file its rates plan
with Manatee County before activating cables in Greenfield
Plantation.
"I don't have that yet," Frizzette McCarthy, the
county's communications coordinator in the Community Services
Department. "I have requested one."
Competition is spreading
Cables will be installed and competition will
come to other neighborhoods as Strategic Technologies stretches
out from its base in Heritage Harbour subdivision.
"This is the first subdivision for the
overbuild," Bowen said of Greenfield Plantation. "Others are
following very quickly."
County officials are requiring forced competition
in franchise agreements because cable companies voluntarily
compete for customers only in isolated pockets of unincorporated
Manatee County.
They said the Bright House bulk-rate offer to
Greenfield Plantation shows that competition breeds consumer
savings, but they warn any homeowner association to be careful
about getting locked into any deal that discourages competition
for individual homeowners.
"If you ask me, nobody should do a bulk agreement
(for a whole subdivision)," McCarthy said. "Allow your citizens
to make the choice.
"Folks like the idea of a (price) discount, but
in a bulk agreement you've locked yourself out of the ability to
make changes later," she said.
Assistant County Attorney Rob Eschenfelder said
associations signing long-term deals that appear sweet now may
be soured later if the company then feels no obligation to
provide updated technology not required under the contract.
"Once a company gets you locked in, they ignore
your needs," Eschenfelder said.
Cable: No mandates please
Cable companies are unhappy about being mandated
by government to invest millions of dollars in forced
competition.
"No company will say they like competition forced
on them," Carlson said. "I don't believe the county would like
to be told another water company was being mandated to serve the
same homes the county serves."
Greenfield Plantation resident Robert Sitzler,
67, was angry when a crew dug up the right-of-way in front of
his house to bury cable for Strategic Technologies about three
weeks ago. He made a series of calls to county and state
officials, including one to Gov. Jeb Bush's office.
Cable companies are required to restore the
ground and landscaping to at least as good a condition as they
found it prior to digging trenches for cables, according to
Eschenfelder.
"I didn't want any Tom, Dick or Harry digging in
my yard without my knowing what it was about," Sitzler said. "As
long as the Strategic people come back and straighten out the
yard and all the yards in the community, then I think the county
is probably doing the right thing for the community."
Sitzler said the main benefit from competition
for him would be a price cut. He is happy with Bright House
programming.
"I think cable in itself is a little too high,
and it's going up higher and higher every year," he said. "So
for me, personally, it would just be the price."
