Dyersburg Cable Committee meets to voice concerns over Cable One's new programming

Present at the meeting were Cable One General Manager Elvis Brown and members of the city's cable committee: Freeman Dudley (chairman), Mayor John Holden, Bart Williams and Charles McCright. Also present were aldermen: Lewis Norman, Dennis Moody, Bob Kirk and Kevin Chaney. Steve Anderson (treasurer), Gleyn Twilla (city recorder) and local resident John Hamilton were also in attendance.

Chairman Dudley started the meeting off by voicing the public's displeasure in WBBJ being dropped. "I really wouldn't have a problem with 6 and 12 myself personally, but I've got a world of calls the past week on Channel 7," said Dudley. "For lots of people in this area, Channel 7 is the channel they watch." He also mentioned the fact that WBBJ is the closest station to Dyersburg and asked Brown was there any way in which he would consider not dropping WBBJ.

"Nothing is impossible," responded Brown. However, he went on to say that after weighing the options of dropping WPTY (Memphis) and WBBJ (Jackson), Cable One would be able to deliver the Memphis stations much more reliably than WBBJ.

"Ultimately that was the main reason that we made this choice; another main reason is duplication," said Brown. "They don't have all of the same programming, but I would say 75 to 85 percent of the programming is the same."

Dudley noted that the biggest thing for him was WBBJ does carry a lot of local stories from Dyersburg and the surrounding towns and for their weather coverage.

Norman reminded the committee of the significant tornadoes last February, and that he felt that WBBJ had better weather coverage than any of the Memphis stations.

"One thing that is not clear to me, Mr. Brown, is you said in your letter 'it (WBBJ) was difficult to receive because of distance.' WBBJ is probably 40 air miles from Dyersburg," said Norman. "And you addressed the issue of redundancy, what about 2 and 9, aren't they both ABC?" Committee members answered that they were both ABC.

Norman also inquired: Why was Cable One announcing a few days before Jan. 1 that they were dropping the channels?

Brown reiterated that duplication, signal strength and channel capacity were the main reasons they were dropping the channels. Brown added that he was referring to the Paducah and Cape Girardeau stations when he mentioned signal strength in his letter, noting they were over 90 air miles away from Dyersburg and were having trouble picking those up reliably.

"I realize that Jackson is within a 50-mile radius, signal strength is not as big a problem with them, but they elected the retransmission consent and the non-dup(licate) in their market. They sent me a notice back in September, stating their position," said Brown. "Dyersburg is not in the Jackson market."

Brown went on to explain that the FCC designates every county in the nation to a television broadcast market and Dyersburg has been designated to the Memphis market for decades.

"We're obligated to carry the broadcast stations in our market, since we're in the Memphis market," said Brown. "I realize how close Jackson is. Me choosing the market wasn't my doing, the FCC mandated that."

Brown also said that Cable One was operating at capacity on their bandwidth and they had to make decisions based on that. In those decisions, he said, they had to take into account they had competition from Direct TV and Dish Network and needed to add stations that customers were requesting.

Brown questioned, rather rhetorically, whether it was it necessary, the way Cable One's programming currently is, to be able to watch "Wheel of Fortune" on three different networks.

Kirk interjected that the redundant stations are good for backup, because customers are unable to get good service on channels 3, 5 and 6.

Next, Moody asked Brown what was going to be placed on channels 6, 7 and 12.

"We've got plans to add more high-def channels," said Brown. "Nothing in particular, we hadn't chose them yet."

"We just recently went through a rate increase based on the package of channels that we were offered just a couple of months ago and now you're going to take three channels off of that," said Chaney. "Are you going to take the rate increase back off? This is just another decrease in service for the price that we are paying." Chaney then noted that earlier that morning he had to switch to Channel 12 to finish watching the news program on Channel 3 due to the station going out.

Brown again said Cable One was doing away with duplicate networks.

Kirk and Chaney then pleaded with Brown not to take Channel 12 because it was the only CBS backup station.

Brown then noted he would use up all of his bandwidth if he backed up every channel he had. The aldermen asked him to just back up the ones that were problematic for the customers.

"Mr. Brown, I just can't believe the management of Cable One is doing to this community what they're doing," said Norman. "We've had a sloppy signal for pretty close to a year." Most of the aldermen agreed with Norman about the "sloppy service" and the problems with the Memphis stations over the last year.

Brown told everyone that within the last year, all of the broadcasters had to start broadcasting in digital as a test and in February the analog signal will be no more.

"The stations have been tweaking all year. Some of it has been our fault, but I'll tell you right now, 75 percent of it has been the broadcasters," said Brown. "They haven't been transmitting at high power, they've been having troubles with the transmitters. They don't let us know when they're having problems. We call them and say, 'hey, what's going on' and all of a sudden the problem clears up after the phone call. You all look at us and say, 'hey, straighten it out'."

"Well, that's who we pay every month, is you," Kirk immediately said. "We expect service, and we're not getting service from you people."

Brown then went back to Chaney's issue about a reduction in rates. He said over the years, nobody has presumably ever asked for credit because of the duplicate channels, but now they want reduced rates because of the channels being dropped. Brown said the rates would not go down.

Norman said that Cable One would probably lose some customers.

Kirk then asked Chairman Dudley if the committee had exhausted all of its efforts to try to get another vendor to take the place of Cable One. "To me that's what we ought to be doing is pursuing another vendor like ComCast or some of these others that give good service at other communities, to come in here and offer cable with good service so they'll have some competition," said Kirk.

"I think we've had an agreement with Cable One for 22 years," said Mayor Holden. "A seven-year contract that came due in August of 2008. We are currently in the middle of negotiations with their corporate office, in Phoenix, about signing an extension. We all know that AT&T, last year, received approval from the legislature to go into certain cities. Dyersburg was one of 56 cities that AT&T applied for a franchise. There is competition on the horizon, if AT&T chooses to follow through with their initial application."

Holden also noted that other vendors had shown interest in Dyersburg, but never got past initial discussions.

"We honestly get more complaints from our citizens about Cable One than almost any other thing, and it has not been resolved," Holden said to Brown. "Either it's your fault, the station's fault or whoever's fault, like Mr. Kirk said, 'we pay Cable One' and we're looking to you to try to get something resolved to help our citizens."

Brown then told the committee what bringing in another company would encompass. "That would take another company coming in and overbilling us at humungous costs," said Brown. "And some municipalities have had issues."

Kirk said he didn't want Dyersburg to be in the cable business, but there are a lot of vendors that give good service. Brown asked Kirk if he was saying that Cable One didn't give good service. "I say it stinks," said Kirk.

Moody asked if it was possible to hold off on dropping the channels on Jan. 1 to see if channels 3 and 5 clear up. Brown said that was a reasonable suggestion, but Cable One was obligated under FCC guidelines.

Cable One's negotiations and contracts with the broadcast stations will end at the end of this year and they have been in negotiations for the past month.

Brown then brought up that Cable One had to put the community on notice 30 days prior to the end of the contract they had with the broadcasters. Holden mentioned that on Dec. 1 a notice ran in the State Gazette about preliminary negotiations taking place.

"Give me a little time and this broadcast problem is going to go away," said Brown.

Brown then mentioned that he notified corporate officials that their decision to drop WBBJ would be a "hot potato" to the Dyersburg Cable One customers, but ...

"There are a lot of other elements at play here that I can't discuss, but you all are going to be some happy people here in just a little while," said Brown. "I won't tell you anything I can't deliver on."

Moody asked Brown if people on the basic lifeline plan would ever get channels to replace the three being dropped. Brown responded that Cable One would fill those channels up, but could not tell him what they would be at this time.

Currently, Brown said Cable One was in negotiations with WBBJ, but they had not worked out an agreement. The idea was brought up to see if the cable committee could negotiate with WBBJ. Brown said that they could do that, but Cable One may not agree to the terms.

Norman made note of the 5 percent franchise fee on his Cable One bill.

"It seems like we're not getting much consideration for our efforts," said Williams, noting the committee's previous efforts in trying to keep AT&T from getting a market franchise in Dyersburg.

Brown said he was going to raise his voice loud to corporate officials after the meeting, referring to the loss of WBBJ.

Kirk asked if Cable One could replace Channel 2 with Channel 7. Brown said that the agreement came out to be with WPTY out of Memphis instead of WBBJ.

The question of the fate of the PBS stations came up and Brown said they were having problems with WLJT and they would probably have a meeting regarding that.

Williams revisited the issue if the committee needed to contact WBBJ and voice its concerns. Holden said it would be best to write Cable One a letter and copy in WBBJ.

"We have the utmost confidence that you (Mr. Brown) are going to save the Jackson station for us," said McCright. "I feel that you can do it."

Mayor Holden concluded the meeting by saying the city is here to support Cable One, but there was a level of frustration noting the 6.2 percent rate increase at the first of the year and in August. And he didn't feel that Cable One corporate representatives were acknowledging issues that needed to be addressed.

The city's cable committee will reconvene (on short notice) if any positive developments take place before Jan.1.