Ordinance Number 539ORDINANCE NO. 539
NON-EXCLUSIVE FRANCH
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AN ORDINANCE OF THE CITY OF SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO,
CALIFORNIA, AMENDING ORDINANCE NO. 528 RELATING
TO THE NON-EXCLUSIVE FRANCHISE OF TIMES MIRROR
CABLE TELEVISION AND REPEALING ORDINANCES NOS.
333 AND 390
THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO, CALIFORNIA,
DOES HEREBY ORDAIN AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. Amendments to Ordinance No. 528.
A. Section 21, entitled "Franchises: Designated
Service Areas," is hereby amended to read as
follows:
"Section 21. Franchises: Designated Service Areas.
"(a) Grantee's franchise shall be nonexclusive and
shall authorize Grantee to construct, operate and maintain a
cable television system within the service area as shown on
the map attached hereto as Exhibit "A" ("Designated Service
Area").
"(b) Grantee's franchise shall further authorize
grantee to extend cable television service, and as necessary
to construct, operate and maintain a cable television
system, within service areas of the City outside of its
Designated Service Area, without any prior authorization of
the City. Provided, however, that Grantee shall be required
to obtain authorization of the City before extending cable
television service to service areas of the City outside of
its Designated Service Area if in the twelve (12) months
immediately prior to the proposed extension of cable
television service there has been any of the following:
"(1) One (1) or more fines have been imposed upon
Grantee pursuant to either the provisions of this Ordinance
or Government Code §53066.1;
"(2) Two (2) or more consumer complaints have been
reviewed by the City Manager and in each case a
determination reached, after Grantee has exhausted any
available review or appeal, adverse to Grantee; or
"(3) Grantee falls below
technical specifications for cable
FCC Cable Rules and Regulations for
thirty (30) consecutive days.
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any of the FCC's minimum
television as outlined in
more than a period of
1J` "(c) It is the City's intent to make cable television
service available to all citizens without placing an undue
burden on Grantee or subscribers. Grantee shall extend
service beyond the Designated Service Area in conformance
with the following Line Extension Policy:
"(1) Service at the established connection fee.
"(i) Any resident or business desiring
service shall be serviced upon request at the established
connection fee provided the dwelling unit is located within
150 feet of the cable feeder line in place.
r
"(ii) Any group of residents located in an
unserviced area anywhere within the City boundaries, shall
be served upon request at the established connection fee
provided the following density of participating subscribers
exists: overhead cable: at a ratio of 40 or more per cable
mile. Underground cable: 60 or more per cable mile.
Measurements shall be made from the nearest distribution
cable.
"(2) Measurement: Footage shall be measured as
follows:
"(i) Drop line extension: Measurement shall
be made from the nearest point on the cable line to a drop
entry point on the dwelling unit structure, even though
actual installation route may be longer. If any additional
easements are required, they shall be the responsibility of
the subscriber.
"(ii) Cable line extension: Measurements
shall be made along the most practical route from the
nearest point on the cable line to the nearest property line
of the dwelling unit.
"(3) Service on a cost-sharing basis: Upon
request from any residents or group of residents or business
desiring service who do not meet the conditions set forth in
item (1), Grantee shall extend service, but the cost of
extension shall be paid by each subscriber on a cost-sharing
basis except that Grantee shall provide at its own cost and
expense up to 150 feet of drop line as required.
11(4) Cost-sharing refunds: where line extension
has been financed by one or more residents, any new
subscribers taking advantage of the line extension shall be
required to pay a pro -rata share of the cost by refund to
the residents who financed the extension, if occurring
within three (3) years of installation.
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"Any resident or group of residents or business 1111
apply to the City Manager for information or assistance in
negotiations with Grantee, and in any event, the City
Manager must approve any agreement reached between Grantee
and residents for extension of services to ensure that
franchise terms are met.
"In no case is any resident obligated to subscribe to
cable service.
"The terms for line extension specified in this
paragraph apply to all areas of the City, including newly
annexed areas.
"(5) Time limitations on line extension: Any
requests received by Grantee for line extension shall be
reported to the City Manager, responded to within "thirty
(30) days, and construction commenced within sixty (60) days
of obtaining necessary permits, and completed within a
reasonable time.
"(6) Additional responsibilities of resident or
business: In the case of extensions made pursuant to (1)
and (3) above in underground areas, the resident or business
shall be responsible for providing a trench, back fill
restoration and conduit for the drop cable connection."
B. Section 22, Subsection (a), is hereby amended to
read as follows:
"(a) Amounts. In consideration of the granting and
exercise of a franchise to use the streets for the operation
of a cable television system, Grantee shall pay to the City,
quarterly, during the life of the franchise three percent
(3%) of its annual gross revenues generated from its
franchise. The City may at its sole option raise the
franchise fee to five percent (5%) in accordance with Federal
law."
C. Section 25, Subsection (b)(1), is hereby amended
to read as follows:
"(1) Not less than thirteen (13) months before the
expiration of the franchise, the Cable TV
Board shall review the performance of Grantee
and the provisions of this Ordinance."
D. Section 27, entitled "Rights reserved to the
City," Subsection (h), is hereby amended to read
as follows:
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"(h) The City shall have the right from time to time to
conduct air independent technical survey of any cable system
operating in the City. This survey shall be conducted by an
individual selected by the City in consultation with
Grantee. The selected individual will have the technical
expertise and demonstrated work experience in operating and
maintaining a cable television system. This initial survey
will be conducted at the sole expense of the City. If it is
determined that the Grantee is not in compliance with City
or FCC standards, the City shall notify the Grantee within
thirty (30) days of survey completion and provide forty-five
(45) days to remedy. The City may conduct a follow-up
survey within six months of the deadline set for the company
to remedy the identified problems. This survey shall be
limited to the failures cited in the initial survey and
shall be conducted by the City at the sole expense of the
Grantee."
E. Subsection (a) of Section 32, entitled "Bonds and
Security Deposits," is hereby amended to read as
follows:
"(a) Performance of law and franchise provisions.
Grantee shall keep on file with the City Clerk, during the
entire term of its franchise, an irrevocable letter of
credit in the amount of Ten Thousand Dollars ($10,000.00)
naming the City as beneficiary. The form of the letter of
credit shall be approved by the City Attorney."
F. Subsections (a) and (b) of Section 36, entitled
"Service Standards," are hereby amended to read as
follows:
"(a) Technical standards. Cable television systems in
the City shall be conducted, installed, operated and
maintained in a manner consistent with all applicable laws,
ordinances, construction standards, governmental
requirements and FCC technical standards. In addition,
Grantee shall provide the City, upon written request, with a
written report of the results of the annual proof of
performance tests conducted pursuant to FCC standards and
requirements. This report will be provided to the City
within fifteen (15) days of request.
"(b) Basis services. The cable television system
permitted to be installed and operated pursuant to Grantee's
franchise shall:
"(1) Be operationally capable of relaying to
subscriber terminals those television and radio broadcast
signals for the carriage of which Grantee is authorized by
the Federal Communications Commission;
"(2) Be constructed with the potential of two (2)
way digital signal transmission;
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"(3) Distribute color television signals which it
receives in color;
"(4) Provide, as a minimum, no less than one (1)
local access channel available to all cable system
subscribers. Such channel capacity shall not be less than
one (1) VHF channel for composite use, including use by
local government, educational institutions, and the public.
Said channels shall be provided upon the lowest level of
basic service and for the lowest monthly basic service fee.
"(5) Have a minimum capacity of twenty (20)
channels; and,
"(6) Include all the necessary equipment and
operational capacity for the emergency transmission of audio
and video signals from the headend over all channels
simultaneously; however, the City shall provide switching
and access equipment."
G. Section 37, entitled "Notification of Subscriber
Rights," is hereby amended to read as follows:
"Grantee shall provide at least annually a written
statement of subscriber rights and remedies to all
subscribers. Said written statement shall describe the
service standards contained in this Ordinance, as well as
those standards which may, from time to time, be established
by regulation of the City Council as well as remedies
available to subscribers including, but not limited to,
rebate and penalty provisions. Said written statement shall
specify the title, mailing address, and telephone number of
Grantee's responsible official for receipt and processing of
subscriber complaints and inquiries, as well as the
department of the City of San Juan Capistrano, as designated
by the City, responsible for processing consumer complaints
or inquiries by department, mailing address and telephone
number. Grantee shall submit its proposed written statement
of subscriber rights to the City Manager for review and
approval no less than thirty (30) days prior to
distribution. In the event that the City Manager determines
that the proposed statement of subscriber rights is
insufficient in any respect, and after giving Grantee
reasonable time to revise said proposed written statement of
subscriber rights consistent with the City Manager's
directions, the City Manager may, but is not required to,
substitute his/her own statement of subscriber rights in
lieu of that submitted by Grantee."
H. Section 39, entitled "Subscribers: Complaints,"
is hereby amended to read as follows:
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"(a) Office of Grantee: Hours: Telephone service.
Grantee shall maintain a local office which is no farther
from the City than is the current office. Such office shall
be open during all normal business hours, with a toll-free
telephone listed in the directories of the telephone company
serving the City, and shall be so operated that complaints
and requests for repairs may be received at any time of the
day or night, seven (7) days a week. All complaints and
inquiries shall be investigated and acted upon as promptly
as practical, but in no event longer than twenty-four (24)
hours after their receipt and/or after the next normal shift
unless it is determined to be an outage in which instance
the Grantee will provide repair service within twenty-four
(24) hours of subscriber notification.
"(b) Procedure. The following procedures shall be
adopted by Grantee and the City for the investigation and
resolution of complaints:
"(1) Grantee shall maintain a written record or
log listing of all complaints received from individual
subscribers, other than complaints regarding substantial
system failures. The log shall show the date and time of
the complaint, the name and address of the complainant, the
nature of the failures, and recording when and what action
was taken to resolve the failures.
"(2) Grantee shall maintain a separate written
record of substantial system failures including all
substantial planned outages showing the date and time of
such failures, describing the nature of the failures, and
recording when and what action was taken to resolve the
failures.
"(3) Such records shall show the disposition of
the complaints or substantial system failures and shall be
maintained by Grantee for a period of three (3) years after
the receipt of such subscriber complaints or following such
substantial system failures. A copy of any specific
subscriber complaint shall be submitted by Grantee to
the City within two (2) days following the receipt of a
written request by the City official designated to handle
complaints. Grantee's records of complainants and
substantial system failures shall be open to inspection by
the City during normal working hours.
"(c) Procedure: Notices. Grantee shall provide notice
of the procedures for reporting and resolving complaints to
each subscriber at the time of his initial subscription to
the cable television system and to each current subscriber
on an annual basis.
"(d) Service Standards. The standards for rendering of
any single service or CATV service as a whole, whether said
service(s) are provided to an individual subscriber and/or
to all subscribers of the system as a whole, shall be as
follows:
Mi
"(1) The service ghall operate in an efficient
technical manner.
"(2) Down time or unavailability of service shall
not exceed three (3) hours of the total hours of service
available in any one week.
"The total hours of service available shall be
calculated on the basis that service is available from 6:00
a.m. until 12:00 p.m. each day of the week.
"(3) Visual and audio quality of television
signals delivered by a service shall meet or exceed the
FCC's technical specifications as outlined in the Federal
regulations pertaining to cable television.
"(4) Repairs to or replacement of Grantee's
equipment involved in a service shall be made within the
following time periods except where said repairs or
replacements are barred by acts of God or other
circumstances beyond Grantee's control: (i) Within
twenty-four (24) hours of a subscriber's notification to
Grantee of an outage or interruption of service; or (ii)
within forty-eight (48) hours of a subscriber's notification
to Grantee of all other system malfunctions.
Any periods during which Grantee is refused, or is
unable to obtain, access to subscriber premises shall be
added to the time periods specified above.
"(5) Grantee shall instruct all subscribers
carefully in detail in the use of the service. Grantee
shall be obligated to provide no more than four (4)
repetitions of such instruction.
"(6) Grantee shall furnish to all subscribers a
written description of the service which shall set forth its
name, describe what it provides to the subscriber and what
the subscriber must do to operate the service, and set forth
a schedule of times when the service is available if it is
not continuously available.
"(7) Grantee shall operate the service in the
manner and provide the materials or capacities described by
Grantee.
"(8) Grantee shall make an annual demonstration at
any of the three (3) longest distribution paths in its
system consistent with FCC rules in force at the time of
adoption of this Ordinance for the duration of the franchise
term at Grantee's expense. Furthermore, Grantee shall
conduct additional demonstrations at its expense, upon
request by the City, whenever it is alleged that Grantee has
failed to meet technical performance standards as outlined
in FCC Cable Rules.
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"(9) Notice of planned interruptions of service of
less than twelve- (12) hours, other than interruptions
between the hours of 5:00 a.m. to 7:00 a.m., shall be
preceded by announcements of the period of the interruption
as well as its anticipated duration, at a frequency of every
(2) hours on the system's automated program log channel for
at least forty-eight (48) hours prior to the anticipated
interruption. For planned interruptions of service for more
than twelve (12) hours, Grantee shall provide written notice
of the interruption and its length by mail to all affected
subscribers or users at least five (5) days prior to the
interruption. Written notices shall inform subscribers that
because of the length of the interruption they are eligible
to receive, if they so notify Grantee, billing credit for
any period exceeding twenty-four (24) hours in a one (1)
month period during which service will not be delivered.
"(e) Credits and Refunds.
"(1) In the event that service to a subscriber is
interrupted for eight (8) consecutive hours or for a total
of thirty-six (36) hours within any thirty (30) day period,
except for acts of God or other circumstances beyond
Grantee's control and except in circumstances for which
prior approval of the interruption is obtained from the City
Manager, Grantee shall provide a ten percent (10%) rebate of
the monthly fees for the affected service only to affected
subscribers who request said rebate.
"(2) In the event that service to a subscriber is
interrupted for forty-eight (48) or more consecutive or
non-consecutive hours in any seven (7) day period, except
for acts of God or other circumstances beyond Grantee's
control and except in circumstances for which prior approval
of the interruption is obtained from the City Manager,
Grantee shall provide a twenty percent (20%) rebate of the
monthly fees to affected subscribers.
"(3) Rebates shall not exceed, in any given month,
actual charges paid by the subscriber.
"(4) In the event that Grantee's system fails to
meet any FCC performance standards as set forth in
Subsection (d)(3) above for a full three (3) month
consecutive period, Grantee shall reduce all subscriber fees
by twenty-five percent (25%) until all such FCC performance
standards are met. The City Manager shall notify Grantee
during the first month of the three (3) month period that
the system has failed to meet performance standards.
"(f) City procedure for handling complaints. It shall
be Grantee's responsibility to resolve subscriber
complaints; however, when the City is called on to help
resolve a complaint the following procedure will be used:
"(1) Upon receiving a complaint, the City will
notify Grantee as soon as possible of the circumstances.
Grantee will notify the City within twenty-four (24)- hours
of the actions taken or to be taken.
11(2) If complaints have not been resolved between
Grantee and subscriber and a request for resolution has been
received from either party, the Director of Administrative
Services shall forthwith notify the respondent of the nature
of the complaint or controversy, and the solution sought.
Such notification shall be made in writing and shall require
the respondent to reply within twenty-four (24) hours after
receipt.
"If satisfactory resolution has still not resulted,
either party may request a conference before the Director of
Administrative Services who shall hear the matter and
arbitrate the dispute.
"(3) In the event that the decision of Director of
Administrative Services is not satisfactory to either party,
either party may request that the complaint be reviewed by
the City Manager as authorized in Section 27(e).
"(4) The City Manager may also impose a penalty of
up to TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS ($200.00) for any occurrence
giving rise to the complaint upon a finding that Grantee
acted without good cause and in violation of any of the
terms and provisions of this Ordinance. Funds for the
penalties shall be taken from the security deposit
established in Section 32. If a penalty is levied, Grantee
will reimburse the security fund within thirty (30) days.
"(g) For purposes of this Section, the following
definitions shall apply:
"(1) "Service" shall mean any service for which a
separate and distinct fee is charged. In cases where a
service includes more than one channel, service shall be
deemed interrupted if more than one-third of the channels
are interrupted; and,
"(2) "Outage" shall refer to a situation where
three (3) or more subscribers on the same street are unable
to receive service."
I. Section 42, entitled "Effect of Annexation," is
hereby amended to read as follows:
"In the event any new territory shall become annexed to
the City, Grantee shall have the right to extend cable
television service to, and as necessary to construct,
operate and maintain a cable television system in, the
annexed territory, without prior authorization of the City,
subject to the provisions of Section 21(b). In the event
an area is annexed to the City that is presently served by
Grantee prior to annexation, then the Grantee shall service
all new subscribers within the new annexed area in
accordance with all applicable ordinance regulations
relating to Grantee, including this amendatory Ordinance No.
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1 8 SECTION 2. Former Storer Subscribers/Rate Charges.
The present fee of ten dollars and fifty cents ($10.50)
per month for basic service shall be frozen for existing Storer
Subscribers at least until January 1, 1986; at that time Times
Mirror will have the option pursuant to the provisions of Federal
law to increase the basis rate charge of ten dollars and fifty
cents ($10.50) per month up to five percent (5%) for these
subscribers; after January 1, 1987, the basic rate charge within
the entire system will be subject to deregulation provisions of
the Federal Cable Communications Act of 1984.
SECTION 3. Transfer Fee.
In recognition of the City of San Juan Capistrano's
administrative costs incurred in processing the transfer of the
Storer Franchise to Times Mirror, Times Mirror agrees to pay the
City the total sum of $5,000.00 for the purpose of recouping
these administrative costs.
SECTION 4. Regulations Repealed.
Ordinances Nos. 333 and 390 are hereby repealed in
their entirety.
SECTION 5. Effective Date.
This Ordinance shall take effect and be in force thirty
(30) days after its passage.
SECTION 6. City Clerk's Certification
The City Clerk shall certify to the adoption of this
Ordinance and cause the same to be posted at the duly designated
posting places within the City and published once within fifteen
(15) days after passage and adoption as required by law; or, in
the alternative, the City Clerk may cause to be published a
summary of this Ordinance and a certified copy of the text of
this Ordinance shall be posted in the Office of the City Clerk
five (5) days prior to the date of adoption of this Ordinance;
and, within fifteen (15) days after adoption, the City Clerk
shall cause to be published, the aforementioned summary and shall
post a certified copy of this Ordinance, together with the vote
for and against the same, in the Office of the City Clerk.
PASSED, APPROVED AND ADOPTED this 21st day of
May , 1985
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PHILLIP R. SCHWARTZE, YOR
ATTEST:
CITY C K
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STATE OF CALIFORNIA )
COUNTY OF ORANGE ) ss.
CITY OF SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO )
1IQ
I, MARY ANN HANOVER, City Clerk of the City of San Juan
Capistrano, California, DO HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing is a
true and correct copy of Ordinance No. 539 , which was
introduced at a meeting of the City Council of the City of San
Juan Capistrano, California, held on May 7 1985 , and
adopted at a meeting held on May 21 , 1985 , by the
following vote:
AYES: Councilmen Friess, Buchheim, Hausdorfer,
and Mayor Schwartze
NOES: None
ABSTAIN: Councilman Bland
ABSENT: None
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