WPSD AND TCI AGREE TO EXTEND NEGOTIATIONS

Cape Girardeau and Jackson cable television subscribers can continue to view NBC programming, at least for now.

The area's NBC affiliate, WPSD-Channel 6 of Paducah, Ky., and TCI Cablevision have elected to extend negotiations past Wednesday's deadline in an effort to reach a retransmission agreement.

The deadline has now been extended to Jan. 14, TCI officials said Monday. The same deadline extension has been worked out with the TCI system serving Southern Illinois.

WPSD has agreed to allow TCI to continue carrying the station on its cable systems during this period of negotiations without any compensation.

"We feel confident that given this extension we can reach an agreement that will benefit the broadcaster, our system and, most of all, our cable customers," said Roger Harms, general manager of the TCI system serving Cape Girardeau and Jackson. The local system serves 13,000 subscribers.

"We are committed to doing everything we can, other than direct payment, to keep this popular station on cable," said Harms.

According to the 1992 cable act, cable operators must obtain consent from broadcasters to carry their signals. Some broadcast stations, such as WPSD, have been seeking compensation in return for allowing cable operators to carry their signals.

Had the deadline not been extended, WPSD would have been taken off the cable system Wednesday, officials had said.