O88-34ORDINANCE NO. 88-34
AN ORDINANCE OF THE CITY COMMISSION OF
THE CITY OF BOYNTON BEACH, FLORIDA,
GRANTING A RENEWAL OF A NON-EXCLUSIVE
LICENSE TO COMCAST CABLEVISION OF WEST
PALM BEACH, INC., A DELAWARE
CORPORATION, TO OPERATE A COMMUNITY
ANTENNAE TELEVISION SYSTEM WITHIN THE
MUNICIPAL LIMITS OF THE CITY OF BOYNTON
BEACH; PROVIDING FOR THE TERMS OF SAID
LICENSE; PROVIDING FOR A REPEALING
CLAUSE; PROVIDING A CONFLICTS CLAUSE;
PROVIDING A SEVERABILITY CLAUSE;
PROVIDING AN EFFECTIVE DATE; AND FOR
OTHER PURPOSES.
WHEREAS, COMCAST CABLEVISION OF WEST PALM BEACH, INC.,
a Delaware Corporation, has requested a renewal of a
non-exclusive license to furnish cable television to certain
areas of the City of Boynton Beach, Florida; and
WHEREAS, the City Commission has determined that it is
in the best interests of the municipality to authorize
installation and operation of a community antennae
television system for the use of residents and inhabitants
of said City; and
WHEREAS, all provisions set forth in Ordinance No.
68-17 and Resolution Nos. 82-Q and 87-K which do not
conflict with provisions contained in this Ordinance or are
not addressed in the franchise renewal provisions shall
remain in full force and effect where allowed by Federal and
State laws and regulations; and
WHEREAS, the proposal attached to this Ordinance as
Exhibit "A" has been reviewed by the City Commission; and
WHEREAS, a review of the application is found to be in
conformity with the provisions of Chapter 7 of the Code of
Ordinances, City of Boynton Beach, Florida,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT ORDAINED BY THE CITY COMMISSION
OF THE CITY OF BOYNTON BEACH, FLORIDA, AS FOLLOWS:
Section 1. Comcast Cablevision 'of West Palm Beach,
Inc., has submitted an application to renew the privilege of
conducting community antennae television systems within the
City of Boynton Beach (said application is attached hereto
as Exhibit "A" of said Ordinance and made a part hereof by
reference). Said Comcast Cablevision of West Palm Beach, is
hereby granted and awarded a non-exclusive license to
construct, license, operate and maintain a community
antennae television system within the City of Boynton Beach
for a period of twenty (20) years from the effective date of
this Ordinance in strict compliance with the terms and
provisions of the aforesaid application and in strict
accordance with the provisions of Chapter 7 of the City Code
of Ordinances, City of Boynton Beach, Florida, which
provisions are hereby adopted by reference and made a part
of this Ordinance and license hereby awarded.
Section 2. City Commission's Continuing Right to
Adopt Ordinances and Regulations.
A. The City Commission may adopt by Resolution or
Ordinance standards governing the operation of cable
television systems and facilities and equipment in this
City. Such standards shall apply to and shall govern the
operations of the grantee of any franchise granted pursuant
to Chapter 7 of the City Code of Ordinances and are
expressly declared a part of any such franchise.
B. Notwithstanding any provision~of Ch'apter 7 to the
contrary the City Commission may increase the technical
standards required of the grantee's operation at any time
during the life of the franchise reasonably related to the
state of the art then prevailing so long as such technical
standards do not conflict with the then effect of Federal
Communications Commission regulations or guidelines.
Section 3. Franchise Fees.
The grantee shall pay the grantor a franchise fee equal
to the highest percentage allowed by federal law of the
grantees gross annual revenues received from the residents
of the City of Boynton Beach.
Section 4. Other petitions and applications.
Copies of all petitions, applications, communications
and reports submitted by a licensee to the Federal
Communications Commission, Securities and Exchange
Commission or any other federal or state regulatory
commission or agency having jurisdiction in respect to any
matters effective cable television operations authorized
pursuant to a license shall be provided simultaneously to
the office of the City Manager.
Section 5. Annual Report
No later than ninety (90) days after the end of the
fiscal year of the licensee the licensee shall submit a
written report to the City which shall include:
1. A summary of the previous year's activities and
development of this system, including but not limited to
services began or dropped and subscribers gained or lost.
A statement of income covering the last fiscal
year.
3.
A projected estimate of construction for the next
two years in terms of plant miles to be built.
4. A reconciliation between previously projected
estimates of plant miles and actual results.
5. A list of officers and members of the board of the
licensee and the parent corporation.
Section 6. Responsibilities of the licensee.
The licensee or any of his agents or employees shall
not sell or otherwise make available to any party without
consent of the residents:
1. Lists of the names and addresses of subscribers.
2. Any list which identifies the viewing habits of
individual subscribers identified by name, address or other
techniques which would alloW identification of an individual
or household. This section does not prohibit the franchisee
Commission.
Manager in
programming.
from providing composite ratings of subscriber viewing to
any part.
Section 7. Construction and technical standards.
Franchisee shall designate by map its current service
area and provide a proposed schedule of construction as
appropriate. The timetable for any construction shall be
specified thirty (30) days prior to commencement of said
construction. In general the franchisee shall place all
cable distribution plants below ground. In those sections of
the City where the electric and telephone utilities maintain
overhead distribution facilities the poles supporting such
facilities may be utilized by the franchisee to the extent
authorized by the utilities.
Section 8. Public Educational and Government
Channels. (PEG)
A. Within six (6) months after the effective date of
this Ordinance, one Channel shall be activated and available
for government and public educational programming. The use
of the Channel may be made through the office of the City
Manager, unless or until said authority is designated to
another city office or board by resolution of the City
Cable operators shall cooperate with the City
showing educational and public government
B. The Cable Operator shall have available for use as
set forth herein, and except as allowed pursuant to rules
and regulations later adopted, one (1) public, educational,
and government programming and access Channels. The City
Manager shall develop criteria for the use of such Channels
and the Cable Operator's use of such Channels when not
needed for public, educational, or government programming
and access. In no case shall the Channel implementation
schedule be more stringent than the following formula:
A Public, Educational, and Government
Access Channel shall be available within
the time set forth in Subsection A.
above. At such time as eighty percent
(80%) of the available time between 8
A.M. and 10 P.M. is utilized for locally
produced Public, Educational, and
Government Access programming on the
then-used Channel for a period of six
(6) consecutive months, an additional
Channel will be made available for
public, educational, and government
access use upon written notice to the
City requesting same.
C. The activated PEG channels shall be interconnected
with other activated PEG channels provided by other Grantees
operating in the City upon six (6) months notice from the
City to the Cable Operator, provided such interconnection is
technically and economically feasible.
Section 9. Compliance with State and Federal Laws.
A. Notwithstanding any other provisions of this
Ordinance or the license to the contrary, a licensee shall
at all times comply with all laws and regulations of the
State and Federal governments or any administrative agencies
thereof; provided, however, if any such State or Federal law
or regulation shall require a licensee to perform any
service, or shall permit a licensee to perform any service,
or shall prohibit a licensee from performing any service in
conflict with the terms of this lic~ns~.~ or of any law or
regulation of the City, then as soon as possible following
knowledge thereof the licensee shall notify the City of the
point of conflict believed to exist between such regulation
or law and the laws or regulations of the City and of this
Ordinance and the License Agreement.
B. If the City determines that a material provision
of this Ordinance is affected by any subsequent action of
the State or Federal government, the. City and the licensee
shall renegotiate the terms of the License Agreement to
carry out its intent as much as possible.
Section 10. That all ordinances or parts of
ordinances in conflict herewith be and the same are hereby
repealed.
Section 11: Should any section or provision of this
ordinance or portion hereof, any paragraph, sentence, or
word be declared by a court of competent jurisdiction to be
invalid, such decision shall not affect the remainder of
this ordinance.
Section 12: This ordinance shall become effective
immediately upon passage.
FIRST READING this 5th day of July, 1988.
SECOND, FINAL READING and PASSAGE this
~~ , 1988.
day of
CITY OF BOYNTON BEACH, FLORIDA
Vice Mayor~
Commi~i6fier
Commissioner
ATTEST:
(Corporate Seal)
Commissioner
6
Comcast Cable
Communications, Inc.
Southeast Regional Office
900 South U.S. Highway # 1
Jupiter, Florida 33477
(305) 744-3900
COMCAST
February 18, 1988
Mr. Peter L. Cheney
City Manager
CITY OF BOYNTON BEACH
120 East Boynton Beach Boulevard
Boynton Beach, Florida 33435
FEB ~3 ~
CiTY MANAGER'S
Dear Mr. Cheney:
In accordance with Section 626 of the Cable Communications
Policy Act of 1984, Comcast Cablevision of West Palm Beach,
Inc. is herewith requesting a 20-year renewal of our franchise
to provide cable television service to the residents of the
City of Boynton Beach. The current franchise expires in August
of this year. Accompanying this request is Comcast's proposal
to completely rebuild the entire cable television system. Our
commitment to undertake the multi-million dollar project is part
of our renewal request, because the project cannot go forward
without prior approval of Comcast's renewal by the City of
Boynton Beach and Palm Beach County~
With regard to the renewal process, the Cable Act includes four
criteria for a franchising authority to use when determining
whether a renewal should be granted. We are confident that
our proposal, and Comcast's performance since taking over the
management and control of this system from Group W in December
of 1986, meet these criteria. They are:
1. Has the cable operator substantially complied with
the material terms of the existing franchise and with applicable
law?
2. Has the quality of the operator's service been reasonable
in light of community needs? (Service quality includes signal
quality, response to consumer complaints, and billing practices,
but without regard to the mix, quality, or level of cable services
of other services provided over the system.)
3. Does the operator have the financial, legal, and
technical ability to provide the services, facilities and equipment
described in his proposal?
EXHIBIT "A"
Page 2.
Mr. Peter L. Cheney
4. Is the operator's proposal reasonable to meet the
future cable-related community needs and interests, taking
into account the cost of meeting such needs and interests?
With regard to our proposal to rebuild the system, it is based
on a year-long inspection and analysis conducted by Comcast
in order to determine what changes are needed and to develop
a plan. The five-point plan described below will provide
Boynton Beach consumers with a state-of-the-art cable television
system. The existing system is more than twenty years old
and needs to be completely rebuilt. The cost of this rebuild
will require an investment by Comcast of millions of dollars.
However, before work can begin on this project, we need your
approval of our franchise renewal.
1. System Rebuild
Comcast plans to rebuild the Boynton Beach cable
system including all wiring and electronics upon renewal
of the franchise. This means that we will be building
a brand new cable system side by side with our existing
cable system. I am clarifying this fact for you since
many of the rebuilds around the country have been partial
rebuilds which simply replaced the hardware such as amplifiers
and left the existing wiring in place. It has been the
determination of our engineers that as a result of the
salty atmosphere which causes corrosion, the proper way
to rebuild this system is to also replace all wiring.
Once all the new hardware and wiring is replaced in Boynton
Beach, then the old wiring and amplifiers will be taken
down by Comcast. This means that we will, in fact, be
building you a brand new cable system. As I stated earlier,
Comcast will commence this activity immediately upon
renewal of the contracts in the City of Boynton Beach
and Palm Beach County. This is necessary because this
investment from Comcast will mean the beginning of a
multi-million dollar project. We simply cannot begin
this project without a long term commitment from Boynton
Beach. The electronics we will use will be a minimum
of 450 MHz (the latest in the state of technology) and
eventually be able to offer the consumer over sixty (60)
channels. We feel that this equipment will position
our system and the consumer for future growth in television
viewing.
2. New Television Studio
Comcast is preparing to build a new television studio
which includes the following equipment:
Page 3.
Mr. Peter L. Cheney
° state-of-the-art camera and recording set ups
° new editing facility to include, players, recorders,
and time base correctors
o complete new audio and lighting set ups
° new IBM computer system to coordinate the entire
facility
We have found that cable television can be an excellent
vehicle for public officials and key business leaders
and can assist in comminicating local information segments
to constituents. Comcast would be pleased to perform
this community service in Boynton Beach. We would be
pleased to work with you to plan for this project.
3. Consumer Service
Comcast recognizes that customer service is the key to any
business. One area of the business that we feel that
former Teleprompter and Group W cable system, and now the
Comcast system, has fallen short in is telephone response
time. As a result we have purchased the Rolm VSCBX Telephone
Management system. This telephone system offers the
latest in computer technology for managing the telephone
volume business. We feel this telephone system will
greatly assist us in managing our day-to-day business
operations.
4. Standby Power Installation
Comcast will install a stanby power system throughout
Boynton Beach. This standby system will serve to backup
our existing system and avoid outages that ordinarily
are caused by power surges which blow fuses in our
amplifiers. This process will be done when we rebuild
the system and should serve to prevent power surge
outages.
5. Beautification of Boynton Beach Tower Site
As you may be aware, Comcast is performing landscaping,
fencing, and sprinkler system work at our tower site
in Boynton Beach. Along with the rebuild we will replace
the new building structure on that site so that we can
accomodate the additional equipment. This total building
site and land will be significantly more presentable
than the existing structure.
Page 4.
Mr. Peter L. Cheney
In conclusion, please be assured that Comcast is prepared to
cooperate with you to the fullest extent in order to expedite
this project. We have been in the business of building and
operating cable systems for more than 28 years and, I believe,
Comcast has earned its reputation as one of the finest cable
operators in the nation. Our commitment to rebuild the Boynton
Beach system will provide your constituents with state-of-the-art
technology and high-quality cable television service.
Please do not hesitate to call me, if you have any questions.
I will contact you in the near future to determine what the
next step should be in this renewal process.
Very truly yours,
Michael A. Doyle
Regional Vice President
MAD: ss
CC:
Mayor Nick Cassandra, City of Boynton Beach
Diane L. Christie, General Manager, Comcast West Palm Beach
Barbara Lukens, Vice President Public Affairs, Comcast