Red Bank TV

During sporting events the television broadcasters all like to take time out to do what the call a “Game Reset”, it’s a quick way of recapping the events of the game and getting new viewers up to date.  Now would seem like a good time to do something similar here on the blog.  So without further ado I present RedBankTv.org’s blog reset:

Local Franchise Summary – Red Bank has approved Verizon’s application to operate a cable TV franchise and Verizon’s application has been forwared onto the NJ State Board of Public Utilities for final approval; after gaining the BPU approval Verizion will enter franchise negotiations with Red Bank.

State and Federal Franchise Regulation – Verizon has spent untold millions of dollars lobbying for new legislation at the State and Federal level that removes the requirement to work with local municipalities on cable franchises.  What has been the result of their big spending?  You guessed it; New Jersey’s legislature has passed a state wide cable franchise bill and it is now awaiting Gov. Corzine’s signature.  With pockets as deep as Verizon’s why should they stop at the state level?  Well, they haven’t and their lobbying efforts are paying off big at the federal level as well.  Steadily moving through the House and Senate are bills that would remove the need to work with towns or states on franchises.  The federal legislation looks set to pass and, depending on just how much Verizon wants to spend, it looks likely to pass in the few remaining sessions of this year.

A La Carte cable plans – Senator John McCain has introduced a bill calling for A La Carte cable plans, the FCC supports Sen. McCain’s bill and a Verizon spokesman was recently quoted as saying that A La Carte cable plans could offer them a competitive advantage to other cable companies.  That all sounds good but realistically no real progress has been made on this issue.

Municipal WiFi – It seems to me that the most interesting item to follow regarding Verizon and municipal WiFi’s has to be what is going on in Summit NJ.  Summit sent their RFI to Verizon and responses to the RFI are due in the coming week.  I’ve been corresponding with someone involved in the Summit project and I hope that she will keep me up to date with their progress.  If Verizon responds to the RFI it should tell us what tack they will be taking to discourage municipalities from getting into the WiFi game.

Net Neutrality – This topic has been all over the news as of late.  There is a continuing ill fated effort to put federal legislation in place to guarantee Net Neutrality.  The reality is that the telcos lobbying machine is too powerful for Congress to do anything other than pay lip service to Net Neutrality legislation.  I continue to advocate that efforts be made to raise Net Neutrality as a local issue and to tie it to Cable TV franchises.  So far there has been little reaction to my method.