2014_0616_CCpacket - Laserfiche WebLink

Home

PUBLIC DOCUMENT-TRADE SECRET DATA HAS BEEN EXCISED Comcast of Minnesota Page 22 expenditures for PEG facilities must be calculated as part of this franchise fee and subject to this 5% cap.�3 The Staff Report and the RFRP repeatedly and without pretext demand PEG operating support °over and above franchise fees and all other financial and in-kind commitments."44 The report specifically demands an average of $1.3 million per year in PEG operational support, with a 2% increase per year.45 The RFRP requires Comcast to make these substantial PEG operating grants to the NSCC and NSAC but would not allow these grants to represent any part of the limited franchise fee that the LFAs are allowed to collect. The RFRP also requires Comcast — on top of the substantial grants to the NSCC and NSAC — to pay the statutory maximum franchise fee of 5% of gross revenues.46 Prohibiting the franchise fee from being offset required by the PEG operating grants violates the Cable Act. I-Net Demands. As mentioned above, the NSCC report and RFRP condition renewal on Comcast's contribution to the member cities of a free data and telecommunications network ("I-Net") that would provide voice, video, data, and internet-access services for the member cities. Section 621(b) (3) (D) does not affirmatively authorize demands on cable operators to construct and provide I-Nets free of cost to LFAs.47 Section 611(b) allows LFAs to seek capacity on an I-Net that the cable operator has chosen to build for its own commercial purposes, but only for providing "channel capacity [that may] be designated for public, educational, or governmental use."48 Thus to the extent the NSCC demands an I-Net that does not serve the 43. 621 Order ¶¶ 43-44, 94-96,105. 44. Staff Report at 38, 67-68, 74, 78, 90, 93. 45. Id. at 73-74. 46. Id. at 99. 47. 47 U.S.C. � 541(b) (3) (D) ("Except as otherwise permitted by sections 531 and 532 of this title, a franchising authority may not require a cable operator to provide any telecommunications service or facilities, other than institutional networks, as a condition of the initial grant of a franchise, a franchise renewal, or a transfer of a franchise."). 48. 47 U.S.C. � 531(b) ("A franchising authority may in its request for proposals require as part of a franchise, and may require as part of a cable operator's proposal for a franchise renewal, subject to section 546 of this title, that channel capacity be designated for public, educational, or governmental use, and channel capacity on institutional networks be designated for educational or governmental use, and may require rules and procedures for the use of the channel