TCI, CITY DISCUSS CABLE TV SYSTEM

Officials of Tele-Communications Inc. and the city of Cape Girardeau have opened a dialogue to address the recent controversy surrounding the local cable television system.

Company representatives, including Roger Harms, general manager of the local TCI system, met Tuesday with Mayor Al Spradling III and City Manager Michael Miller at City Hall.

"I think it would be fair to say we had a good discussion and a frank discussion," said Tom Cantrell, TCI's district director of franchise and government affairs. "TCI and the city agreed that it is in everyone's interest to try to work together to resolve a number of outstanding issues."

The meeting came one day after the City Council unanimously passed a resolution censuring TCI for proceeding with recent programing changes in the wake of strong public opposition.

"We had an open discussion," said Miller. "Our main purpose was to let them know our disappointment with the way things have been handled."

Cantrell said future discussions are likely. Miller said his door is always open.

"They said they would like to talk to us in the future and we said we will always listen to anything anybody has to say," Miller said.

Denver, Colo.,-based TCI, which serves 14 million customers nationwide, operates the cable television system in the Cape Girardeau and Jackson areas.

The company announced in December that it would drop Chicago superstation WGN and Comedy Central and VH-1, which shared channel space, sparking a negative public response. Those channels were replaced Dec. 30 with Animal Planet and the Cartoon Network.

Cantrell said it was too early to discuss what steps can be taken to remedy the situation, but the company is deeply concerned about any bad will among the public its decisions may have generated.

"Without customers we are not much of a business, but these problems are complex and we need our city's help in resolving them," said Cantrell.

The constantly changing face of the telecommunications marketplace makes tough business decisions necessary, Cantrell said.

"The cable business is operating on moving ground right now," Cantrell said.

A new federal telecommunications law passed in 1996 is spurring many of the changes. The law, among other things, is intended to foster increased competition in the telecommunications industry.

"In the short term it will be very confusing, sometimes painful, and will sometimes make people angry," Cantrell said of ongoing industry developments. "But these changes have to happen, and in the long term consumers will benefit from the competition."

TCI pays annual fees to the city to operate locally. Its franchise agreement with the city dictates a number important aspects of how it can operate, including what type of technologies can be used.

However, the city has no control under the agreement over programming decisions.

In its resolution, the City Council asked the company to reconsider the recent programming changes and seek customer input before making future changes.

Cantrell said he that TCI is "willing in a larger context to reconsider" the changes.

The recent changes in the local cable system was largely a cost-cutting move.

Cantrell said TCI and other cable companies are caught in a "squeeze play" because the rates cables customers pay are regulated by the Federal Communications Commission while the fees programing providers charge are not. In other words, Cantrell said, programming costs are going up but can't be passed on to consumers.

WGN is particularly expensive because it is an over-the-air broadcast station in Chicago. Unlike non-broadcast channels such as ESPN or MTV, companies which use WGN's signal must pay copyright fees for each individual show on the channel.