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Show Cable Franchise Sold- Park City C.A.T.V. Associates, Associ-ates, holder of a non exclusive municipal franchise franch-ise to ' operate; a cable television system sold out last, week to T.C.I. Corporation Corpora-tion one of the nation's largest cable operators. lC.'-:-a-. C.A.T.V. Associates was granted the franchise by the City in 1977 but Earlier this month the document was determined to be invalid because of a publication error. The invalidity- of the ordinance was deemed a :J "blessing" by City Attorney Mike McCoy because it was -. apparently highly inadequate. inadequ-ate. A1 new franchise ordinance ordin-ance was drafted with the ' assistance of Community v Wireless President Blair Feulner acting as the City . Council's advisor on matters , of cable television. That franchise was reawarded only recently stipulating that ; P.C.C.A.T.V.,: Associates' provide the service to at least 1 ,000 housing units by October 15. With the sale of the system, Councilmen were forced last week to consider a new ordinance listing TiC.I. V Corp. as the franchise t holder. Since the' considera-v considera-v tion of the; ordinance hads not S been published on last ; Thursday's Council agenda, a special meeting was held Monday to deal with the matter. the franchise awarded T.C.I. Corp. is essentially . the same as that awarded to P.C.C.AiT.V. Associates with the exception of several 1 points. While the former franchise holder was required requir-ed to post a $500,000 bond to insure completion of the system, T.C.I, w not. Like the former organization, T.C.I, will provide the City a , letter of credit in the amount of $75,000 to act as an incentive to complete the system as soon as possible. If T.C.I, fails to make the service available to 1 ,000 housing units by October 15, they will forfeit $25,000 of the $75,000 to the City. If the services is not available to 2,500 .housing units (which includes hotel or motel rooms) by June 30, 1981, they forfeit an additional $25,000. And, if the system is not available to all housing units in Park City in areas of specific density by December 31. 1981, they forfeit the remaining $25,000 and most likely the franchise as well. This portion of the franch- 1 ise ordinance is similar to that awarded P.C.C.A.T.V. Associates with the exception excep-tion of the second date. The previous franchise called for the service to be extended to 2,500 housing units by December 31, 1980 rather, than June 30, 1981. ; At the meeting, Blair Feulner objected to the extension of the second deadline, claiming that T.C.I, could easily provide the prescribed service by the December 31, 1980 date. Councilmen, however, bended bend-ed to the wishes of T.C.I, and extended the date. Council-men Council-men claim that the action was taken because ihey felt there would be a financial incentive for T.C.I, to make the service available to as many homes as possible in order to extract the most amount of revenue from monthly fees. Both the City Council and Mr. Feulner agree that T.C.I, is the preferable operator of the system because of their extensive experience. |