Franchise Agreement Highlights

Highlights of the Comcast Franchise Agreement

Below are some key provisions of the franchise agreement.

  • The new agreement has a 10-year term, with a 15 home-per-mile minimum density for build-out, as well as a detailed cost sharing formula for extending service in areas falling below the new density requirements.
  • The agreement increases the length of a standard installation from 125 feet to 300 feet per home, provides greater clarity regarding system maintenance, and includes explicit reporting requirements and customer services standards.
  • The county's public access channel (channel 6) will convert to high-definition (HD) format under the agreement.
  • Up to 73 government, library and school facilities will receive free cable services.
  • The agreement includes a five percent franchise fee on gross revenues to be paid by Comcast to the county for use of the public right-of-way and establishes a 72 cent Public/Education/Government (PEG) fee to support local access programming.
  • Comcast commits to test, repair and maintain the cable system and agrees to review deficiencies found during an inspection of cable infrastructure conducted in preparation for the franchise update.
  • The agreement includes a comprehensive customer service program covering:
    • Acceptable on-hold times for phone calls
    • The maximum wait period for standard installations
    • Requirements for subscriber notices related to rate, programming or channel position changes
    • A detailed complaint procedure
    • Time requirements for responding to service interruptions under normal circumstances
    • Requirement to provide credits for customer-reported outages lasting six or more hours