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City groups express concern over cable TV contract
Wednesday, November 24, 1999 By Timothy McNulty, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Community group leaders reacted warily yesterday to the cable television agreement Mayor Murphy announced with AT&T Corp.
The 10-year cable contract disappointed local Internet companies, which had lobbied the city to force AT&T to allow them to use its cable TV lines to provide high-speed Web access.
With high-speed cable lines, connecting to the Internet is instantaneous, and surfing the Net is 40 to 50 times faster than using conventional dial-up access. Using the lines also allows enhanced video and audio capability.
Leaders of community groups said they'd like the agreement, which will oversee the implementation of a new technology infrastructure citywide, to close the so-called "digital divide" by offering cheap high-speed computer access to all city residents, regardless of income.
The key to closing the divide, they said, is getting AT&T to build fiber-optic cable links directly to schools, libraries and community organizations for free.
If the direct links, which are -- excuse the cliche -- like on-ramps to the new information highway, aren't provided by the company, the leaders said, the cost of connection could be too high for some institutions: As a result, the improvements the agreement oversees won't be extended citywide and many residents will be left without access, they said.
"If the fiber only goes outside, what does it cost to bring it in?" asked Rick Flanagan of the Bloomfield-Garfield Corp. and a leader of the Pittsburgh I-Net network, a consortium of dozens of community groups.
"Can a school district with a $20 million deficit pay to bring that fiber in?"
It appears the groups got part of what they wanted: Schools and libraries will get the direct links for free, the deal's negotiators said, but community groups will not.
Murphy announced yesterday that the city and AT&T had reached a 10-year cable franchise agreement that will allow the company to start installing $40 million in fiber-optic lines and other upgrades citywide.
The upgrades, which will take up to 2 1/2 years to complete, will spread high-speed fiber-optic cables citywide and give AT&T customers cable television, Internet, and local and long-distance phone service at home through existing cable lines.
The agreement, reached after months of negotiations, is subject to Pittsburgh City Council approval by Dec. 31, when a 15-year-old agreement with Tele-Communications Inc. expires. AT&T bought TCI earlier this year for $54 billion.
"We appreciate the city having some kind of language in there [about access], but it's certainly not all we'd hoped for," said Marcus Ruscitto, chief executive officer of Stargate Industries, the region's largest locally owned Internet service provider.
Stargate recently joined other local Internet companies to form the Pittsburgh Open Access Coalition, which had been urging the city to force AT&T to open its cable lines as a condition of renewing the cable contract.
Instead, the agreement calls for AT&T only to begin talks here if it provides access elsewhere, which could delay availability of AT&T's lines.
The agreement gives AT&T the rights of way to build and maintain its system along city-owned streets and utility poles. In return the city receives 5 percent of the company's gross revenue from city consumers -- almost $3 million annually.
The agreement also gives the city a chance to ask for cable services for residents.
In the new contract, the city sought stricter rules for customer service and a commitment by the company to build a high-speed fiber computer network among city-owned buildings, including police and fire stations.
The Pittsburgh I-Net group wanted a larger network to be built that would extend beyond government buildings to include schools, libraries and nonprofit groups. That is not part of the final agreement.
Instead, AT&T will install fiber-optic links for free from its upgraded system directly into schools and libraries, said City Councilman Dan Cohen, a telecommunications law-yer heavily involved in the negotiations. Fees the institutions pay for using the fiber link and other computer network issues will have to be negotiated separately, outside the city's agreement.
For community-based organizations, AT&T agreed to string the fiber only as far as the nearest utility pole for free, then charge to extend the fiber from the poles into their buildings.
The groups will have to come up with funding to pay for the link from the utility pole, and fulfill other planning requirements.
AT&T has agreed to run its fiber cable lines from its headquarters in the West End to 220 hubs citywide, making service available to all of the city's 88 neighborhoods.
But according to Ronald Gdovic, executive director of 3 Rivers Connect, a nonprofit technology advocacy group, getting the lines extended farther, right to the community groups' doors, is one of the "last mile" issues important to provide cheap access to everyone.
"There's a difference between running fiber through a neighborhood and running it down a pole and to a building," he said. "It's a large issue -- cost."
The agreement will likely be introduced to council next week, then publicly debated.
Because City Council still must approve the cable contract, the coalition will continue to push council members for changes, Ruscitto said.
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