LANSING – Michigan has a fledgling video services market now, a year after legislation opening cable TV services up to greater competition was enacted, a report issued Friday by the Public Service Commission said, and the three commissioners expressed the hope that greater competition would develop through 2008.
“While many parts of the state still do not have a choice when it comes to a video service provider, some communities now have a choice when it comes to a video service provider, some communities now have choices available to them, and that’s a good start,” said PSC Chair Orjiakor Isiogu.
However, the optimistic tone of the PSC report is in contrast to a report issued by the Detroit-area law firm of Howard and Howard earlier this week saying the state’s cable law has not met expectations in providing competition.
The PSC report said that under the first year under PA 480, 2006, there were 39 companies offering video services in the state, with the largest being Comcast Cable Communications, Charter Communications and Wideopenwest Michigan. At the end of the year, there were more than 2,72 million cable customers in the state, a figure that does not include satellite customers.
But the report also said that of the cable providers responding to the PSC survey, 60 percent of them had not seen a competitor come into their area since PA 480 took effect.
The PSC report also called on the Legislature to expand the time frame that a community has to approve a cable franchise agreement and to move the deadline for annual reports under the act from February 1 to April 1 each year.
In its findings, Howard & Howard said that fewer than 110 communities in the state, out of nearly 2,000, had any kind of cable competition and that translated into one out of every 20 customers having access to competition.
Howard & Howard has practiced law on cable television for several decades.
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