DON'T TUNE US OUT - YOUR CABLE COMMITTEE RESPONDS

Hi all,
The following has been submitted as a draft article to the UCO Reporter; it may or may not be published, depending on the decision of the Editorial Committee. In any case our BLOGGERS will get first chop:

Dave Israel
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DON’T TUNE US OUT – YOUR CABLE COMMITTEE RESPONDS
By Dave Israel

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It is interesting to note that the signer of the “Mail Bag” letter, don’t tune us out, cannot be verified as a Unit Owner in Century Village and hence the article is Un-attributable. The letter shows misunderstanding of the process, but we have chosen to respond to it nonetheless, as an information vehicle for our Unit Owners. The responses will be intermixed with the original and my entries will be in a Bold blue type.

I went to the last Delegates Meeting and sat through a tremendous amount of discussion about the Cable Committee’s review and decision about the need to sign a new cable contract. I had attended previous meetings where there was discussion about why we needed a new contract — but for the life of me, I can’t remember why. Our current one doesn’t expire till 2011.

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When the original cable contract was signed with Adelphia Cable in 2005 we had a channel lineup consisting of 74 channels, over recent years, arbitrary removal of channels by Comcast has reduced this to 67 and Comcast advised that this removal to the digital tier would continue. If we simply let the current contract play out, by 2011 we could be facing a channel lineup of 30 channels or less, with consecutive increases of 5% in January of 2010 and January 2011. When the contract expired, we would have no other competitor ready to pick up the service, as there would be no time for them to place their new infrastructure. We would have to simply rollover the Comcast contract with ever reducing service and there would have been no signing bonus.

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I can understand us not liking Comcast removing stations at will — theirs, but if you read the disclaimer at the bottom of the sheet that was handed out at the meeting, nothing has changed in that regard; they can still remove stations at their own discretion.

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Actually, we have had language inserted into the contract stating that Comcast may only remove channels from our lineup, if they remove the same channels from all customers in our Franchise area. This effectively precludes arbitrary redaction of content from Century Village product only.

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Do we really think they’re going to add programming and not charge us?

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Actually, if indeed they add programming, there will be no change in cost; the most probable course of events will be a swap of equivalent programming. This has already occurred; Comcast has taken away “Movieplex” and substituted “Lifetime Movie Network”. I would call that a reasonably equivalent swap.

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What I think was that decisions were made at committee meetings that no one knew anything about. It seems to me that there was a royal stink a few months ago about transparency and openness. I’m a regular viewer of Channel 63 and always read the Reporter, but I saw no notification of Cable Committee meetings. I can go to Security, Maintenance, Transportation, Delegates, etc. meetings as a resident and time constraints considered, be heard or question any items discussed or commented on. Why no notification of the Cable Committee? We are talking about a new contract, worth a tremendous amount of money to Comcast and us and we were told take it or leave it, without as much as a clue of what was going on. I am not complaining about the new contract. How could I? I have no idea what the other companies were offering. But I was told that this was the best. What am I? Am I a child that won’t understand the big words?

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Yes indeed there was a major brouhaha over “Open Meetings”, of which I was a major proponent. However, your Cable Committee was hearing from four major providers simultaneously, and none of them wanted the other to know what they were offering. This is very typical in contract negotiation, the offerings and proposals are all marked “Proprietary and Confidential”. The Cable Committee made every effort to release information in as timely a manner as possible. Every meeting that could be open was open, but some had to be limited to the principals involved. Some of our Unit Owners have come to the UCO Office to inquire about the other Companies and their proposals; and the Cable Committee has prepared a Decision Matrix chart showing the key components. This chart is available to any Unit Owner of Century Village, drop by the UCO Office and ask for Dave Israel; just do not blab it to Golden Lakes.

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From what I can see, UCO will be getting a $2.3 million signing bonus, plus $27 thousand for the loss of the two remaining HBO channels — they already looted the third one.

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Actually, the exact numbers are confidential and UCO has signed a Contract with a specific confidentiality clause. However any Unit Owner may have the numbers if they so desire; just come in to UCO and ask for Dave Israel. To correct one misconception, we were compensated for the loss of one HBO channel from the time it was pulled by Comcast in September 2008; it is virtually unheard of for Comcast to pay compensation for Channel realignments.

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If you read the Treasurer’s report, you can see that the signing bonus is one year’s budgeted amount. So we get one year free basically. For the remainder of the time, we’ll pay an additional $4.12 per unit x 7,500+ units x 12 months x 5% annual increase. That’s a lot of money without residents’ input and hoping that Comcast will keep their word and not remove channels because they’ve got a newer and cheaper technology.

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Actually there was extensive opportunity for Unit Owners to be heard at the Delegate Assembly; and many came forth and were heard. The issue of the cost is of course important; the initial cost of the new Bulk Cable Contract will be $22.95 per month plus Taxes and fees; this will be reduced by approximately $18.00 per month for the first year. The same product off campus at retail rates would cost $55.00 per month, and in some markets more. This is a bargain in any market. Our new lineup brings us back the missing channels, except for HBO, and adds some 18 additional channels. In particular, we will receive the Video on Demand channel which includes some 200 free movies, and other programming from HBO, Movieplex, Lifetime, Sundance and other major providers. In addition, our Bulk Channel Rate includes a Standard Set Top Box and two additional special Digital Converters. The concern over a new technology is a good one, common sense would suggest that if such new science or art were to emerge, that Comcast would deploy it at their discretion; there would be no impact on our cost during the contract period. It is the considered belief of the Committee that when our Unit Owners become familiar with the new channel lineup and with Video on Demand, they will be very pleased with the entertainment value available to them.