Editorial: City must enforce Comcast upgrades Editorial: City must enforce Comcast upgrades (May 12, 2004)

Regardless of whether Palo Alto decides to create a "fiber utility," Comcast should meet its obligations under four-city franchise agreement
To the giant Comcast organization, Palo Alto's demands for better performance from Comcast in its promised technological upgrades for Palo Alto, Menlo Park Atherton and East Palo Alto must seem like a minor skirmish, an irritant.

City officials Monday night will consider a status report on the required upgrading from city staff, detailing alleged failures of Comcast to upgrade the cable system with fiber-optic wiring, as promised in a franchise agreement in 2000 -- following the sale of the Cable Co-op cable-television system.

The original system was built in 1983 entirely of coaxial cable. Under the July 2000 agreement with the AT&T subsidiary TCI, the anticipated upgrade would include a new fiber-optic backbone with new power supplies and connection equipment. The upgrade was to have occurred within 36 months -- July of last year.

It's not done yet -- and both the cities and schools are beginning to feel the effects of the technological shortchanging.

"We're right now pretty much on hold," Technology Director Marie Scigliano of the Palo Alto school district said of the delays in Comcast's enabling them to access a private fiber-based Internet system. If installed, the system would allow computers in every school to transmit video and audio feeds accessible to other schools.

School officials are planning new programs for September -- but without the "I-Net system" in place those could be sabotaged.

Palo Alto city buildings, including libraries, are linked by fiber connections, but other cities in the four-city joint-powers agreement are not connected because Comcast did not install all the fiber lines required, Palo Alto officials contend. The system was to serve 70 city, school and other public-facility sites within the franchise area. Palo Alto oversees the franchise agreement for all four communities.

City officials say Comcast made "unexplained and undisclosed" changes in how it was upgrading the system after it took the system over from AT&T/TCI in 2002, and installed only three fiber wires instead of the required six in some parts of the system.

Not being able to access the upgraded system means that those public agencies must continue to pay high rates for alternative access -- so there is direct financial damage to hard-pressed agencies.

City suspicions about the upgrade falling short of the commitments were confirmed by consultants hired by the city -- the Buske Group and Columbia Telecommunications Corporation -- in 2002. Columbia reviewed the system design in April 2002 and status of construction in December 2002 and April 2003. It found that the I-Net system has not been completed as required by the franchise agreement even though the upgrade was substantially complete and Comcast's private customers were receiving service on the upgraded system.

Should the city find Comcast in violation, it could assess up to $1,250 per day until compliance is achieved. Comcast disputes that, claiming that portion of the agreement does not apply in this case.

The cities also were not able to do an emergency override of programming, as required under the agreement -- but Comcast said that's because they have not gotten clearance from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

To make matters worse, Comcast is now refusing to open its records to city officials -- including City Auditor Sharon Erickson -- based on the position that the city may become a competitor if it moves forward with installing its own fiber-optic system, called "fiber to the home" but including small businesses. Palo Alto is currently evaluating financing mechanisms and risk factors in the $40 million venture of extending city-owned fiber.

But the city's decision on city-owned fiber is far from a sure thing, and even if it was it would not supplant the provisions of the franchise agreement. In any case, Comcast would be privy to city decision-making processes and both financial and technical information. For it to try to hide behind a possible city-owned fiber system is disingenuous at best.

Comcast's actions seem to have created a poisonous environment both in Palo Alto and in other communities where it operates -- such as San Jose, for one, where the city is embroiled in a lawsuit with Comcast. Palo Alto city officials should stand firm and insist that Comcast meet its contractual obligations in the franchise agreement -- and not let the communications giant walk over them.

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