 Travelfan1RIP Analog Go Digital
join:2005-08-23
Woodbridge, NJ | [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congress Hi, does anyone have an update on the status of the legislation seeking a statewide franchise agreement for FIOS TV in NJ? And what about the proposed draft legislation in congress? |
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Artec
join:2003-02-23
Middletown, NJ | Re: [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congre I know there is a web site to sign up. but I am at work and I will post it later for you |
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| reply to Travelfan1
Re: [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congress www.TVChoiceNJ.com
New Jersey Residents Want Choice and Competition for Cable TV
From Verizon's website:
»newscenter.verizon.com/proactive···id=91898 |
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Travelfan1RIP Analog Go Digital
join:2005-08-23
Woodbridge, NJ | Re: [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congre Thanks Artec, but I've been looking for updates as far as both the bills in the NJ House as well as the one in the Congress. I haven't found any recently. |
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| Actually, it was me that supplied you with the website. And you're welcome.
NJGirl |
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Artec
join:2003-02-23
Middletown, NJ | I did not take credit. I got the web site from you and I was going to post it for him. |
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March9
join:2005-09-24
Randolph, NJ
1 edit | I didn't say that you took credit Artec. My apologies if I offended you in any way.
I never recieved a confirmation email from Broadband beat for my user ID of "March", so I've been using a temp ID of NJGirl. Somehow, it let me log in today without the confirmation email and verification. |
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cdobol
join:2002-02-12
Denville, NJ | reply to NJGirl
Re: [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congress I completed the form letter on the tvchoicenj.com site and sent it on its way. A few days later I received a letter from the mayor of our town. What I read was not too encouraging for getting FIOS TV anytime soon. Basically the mayor said he is against the state wide franchise for Verizon for a few reasons.
•Cablevision pays the town $40,000 per year for a community TV station.
•Without a franchise agreement Verizon can 'cherry pick' the most profitable areas of a community without a guarantee they will offer everyone in the community the service.
•A franchise is a lease agreement to allow the private use of public lands
•The franchise agreement provides free cable service to the municipal building, schools and firehouses.
I thought that I might write him back, but I'm not too sure it will help considering its in the state's hands. I do see his point of view, but I'm not sure I agree with it.
If the state legislation does not pass they will have to go town to town to work out franchise agreements. I think Verizon is in a hold pattern now in NJ until the state legislation passes or fails; the mayor of my town indicated Verizon has not contacted him about a franchise agreement. |
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cdobol
join:2002-02-12
Denville, NJ | Forgot to add - unless I am mistaken the www.TVChoiceNJ.com website appears to only send a form letter to your local mayor. Since local government is most likely against this measure it might make sense to send the form letter to someone higher up the food chain. |
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said by cdobol:I completed the form letter on the tvchoicenj.com site and sent it on its way. A few days later I received a letter from the mayor of our town. What I read was not too encouraging for getting FIOS TV anytime soon. Basically the mayor said he is against the state wide franchise for Verizon for a few reasons. •Cablevision pays the town $40,000 per year for a community TV station. •Without a franchise agreement Verizon can 'cherry pick' the most profitable areas of a community without a guarantee they will offer everyone in the community the service. •A franchise is a lease agreement to allow the private use of public lands •The franchise agreement provides free cable service to the municipal building, schools and firehouses. I thought that I might write him back, but I'm not too sure it will help considering its in the state's hands. I do see his point of view, but I'm not sure I agree with it. If the state legislation does not pass they will have to go town to town to work out franchise agreements. I think Verizon is in a hold pattern now in NJ until the state legislation passes or fails; the mayor of my town indicated Verizon has not contacted him about a franchise agreement. What's to prevent the state from doing all the above? Makes his points moot. The legislation can state the local muni gets all the above, except an exact $ amount, they'll get a % of revenue instead. It can mandate that the entire village or community must be passed with fiber, not cherry picked or else face severe fines. Hope it passes in NJ, regardless of what your mayor states. |
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cdobol
join:2002-02-12
Denville, NJ | What's to prevent the state from doing all the above? Makes his points moot. The legislation can state the local muni gets all the above, except an exact $ amount, they'll get a % of revenue instead. It can mandate that the entire village or community must be passed with fiber, not cherry picked or else face severe fines. Hope it passes in NJ, regardless of what your mayor states. I agree with you 100% and hope it passes!!! I'm just reporting what he wrote back. |
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 Rob AJets AFC ChampionshipPremium
join:2005-01-17
Pompton Plains, NJ | reply to Travelfan1
I hope NJ approves it. I'm psyched for Fios and FiosTV.:D |
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cdobol
join:2002-02-12
Denville, NJ | I think this was asked for earlier in the thread. Does anyone have a bill number or something that can be referenced on www.njleg.state.nj.us? |
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amdmaxx
join:2005-08-05
Fair Lawn, NJ | I would so jump from cablevision to fiosTV..
NJ, please approve it.. |
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Artec
join:2003-02-23
Middletown, NJ | Re: [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congre They will I dont think they want to piss off over 2 million voters |
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March9
join:2005-09-24
Randolph, NJ | reply to cdobol
Re: [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congress From what I have heard (and I cannot remember where), Verizon applied to "The State of NJ" for FTTP TV service, for the entire state for approval and it was turned down. I would believe that is why the website sends a letter to "your" mayor. They are now sending applications to each individual town for approval. |
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 eXodusPremium
join:2005-08-04
Rockaway, NJ | Wow that sucks. I hate my town mayor, I work in the library and when she comes in shes a complete stuck up b*tch. She never says hi. I mean come on your the mayor, say hi to your town employees. Oh well, hopefully verizon tries to set it up in Rockaway Boro.
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I love my FiOS!
-eXodus |
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cdobol
join:2002-02-12
Denville, NJ | reply to Travelfan1
I haven't found any reference to the NJ state franchise approval/denial. I did find the form letter my mayor sent to me about opposing the federal bills (S.1504 H.R. 3146). »www.njslom.org/ml090705c.html
When I sent the form letter from the web site it was for support of NJ to change its franchise laws - it was not about the federal bills. My mayor's response was sent in opposition to the federal bills. In any case it looks like local mayors want to keep control of this cash cow (franchise).
My mayor indicated that he has not received any communication from Verizon about the franchise fee. I hope Verizon starts negotiating with FIOS towns because the legislation does not look like it will be worked out any time soon here in NJ. |
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cdobol
join:2002-02-12
Denville, NJ | reply to Travelfan1
I guess I can't find any info on the NJ legislation because it is still in draft. Here is some info on the development of the NJ bill: »www.njslom.org/magart1005_page106.html |
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 cdruGo ColtsPremium,MVM
join:2003-05-14
Fort Wayne, IN
kudos:5
 ·Frontier FiOS
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Re: [TV] FIOS TV legislation - in NJ and in congre My responses would be:
•Cablevision pays the town $40,000 per year for a community TV station. Easy enough, shift the $1/customer or whatever it comes out to from a franchise fee (which the customer ultimately pays anyways) to a income tax, property tax, or some other tax-based income the city already gets. Low income, the elderly, etc who may not be able to afford it can apply for a tax credit to get the dollar back. The overall effect is that the overall load per pay-TV customer is less as it would also include satellite and telco TV customers, not just Cablevision.
•Without a franchise agreement Verizon can 'cherry pick' the most profitable areas of a community without a guarantee they will offer everyone in the community the service. Can they do that now with phone? Ultimately they are rolling out fiber everywhere, not just the "rich" areas. It costs $0 extra to roll out fiber to a poor area with TV as it does to roll out fiber to a "poor" area without TV. Did cable TV initially roll out to 100% of a community? Probably not immediately but eventually it did.
•A franchise is a lease agreement to allow the private use of public landsAnd the telcos already pay for that as part of the telephone service. Basically the city wants to double dip, charging Verizon twice for the same piece of fiber.
•The franchise agreement provides free cable service to the municipal building, schools and firehouses. The same response that falls in for the first bullet can be used here as well. Let the community pay for what the community uses. They already pay for it anyways. Plus this could easily also be written into a state-wide franchise agreement as well.
My town is slated to get FiOS turned on here before the end of the year. I think we did it "the right way". You can read about it a little bit here. Fort Wayne in recent years has lost quite a few major employers and the tech drain across the area has been harsh the last decade. Getting a high-speed infrastructure like FiOS was thought to be a building block to help reverse the trend.
From the article:
Mayor Richard of Fort Wayne likened the importance of Fiber to the Home as the equivalent of building the interstate highway system in the 1950s in terms of Fiber to the Home’s impact on economic development. Richard pointed out that a mayor is measured on the local economy and how many jobs are created. Fiber to the Home is one part of a holisitic group of programs designed to make it easier to do business in Fort Wayne. Seeing that Verizon had not slated Fort Wayne to be included in Verizon’s first 50 FIOS communities, Mayor Richard began schmoozing and selling Ivan Seidenberg, the CEO of Verizon.
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The city pre-permitted Verizon’s efforts, so when Verizon broke ground they did not have to deal with the normal delays caused by the regulatory process. These efforts paid off as Verizon changed their plans to include Fort Wayne and will, by the end of 2005 have most of the city built with approximately 110,000 premises with fiber deployments. So instead of kicking and screaming like a little baby like some communities, we embraced Verizon and actively courted them in order to woo them. It's paid off. Every community currently under development is a part of a larger metroplex. We are a test bed for the rest of the country to see how profitable it can be to put FiOS in to the smaller cities instead of just focusing in the more densely packed areas. Hopefully it works out for Fort Wayne and Verizon and the rest of the country can soon follow. When Verizon came to push FiOS to my company yesterday, it sounded like their goal was around 20% of the community initially. It's ambitious, but from the response just within my company, I definitely think it's within reason.
Having existing dual SONET fiber rings, a GTE/Verizon call center, as well as several other Verizon infrastructures based out of there probably didn't hurt a whole heck of a lot either.
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"What gives them the right to come in and do this?" she said. - Lady complaining that she was getting FIOS in her backyard. |
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