§ 52-25. Minimum design requirements.

In order to provide for a technologically advanced cable system which will satisfy the communication needs of the community, all applicants for a franchise shall agree to provide certain minimum design features in their applications. Nothing in this section shall be construed to limit or in any way discourage the development of more extensive systems or better facilities and equipment. The grantor is expressly authorized to negotiate any state of the art improvements with applicants which will serve to ensure that the grantor maintains a modern cable system.

(1)

Channel capacity. All applicants for a franchise shall agree to construct and maintain the following minimum channel capacities:

a.

A cable system constructed to provide sufficient bandwidth capacity such that, when used with an appropriate converter device at a subscriber's receiver, it shall enable the reception of a minimum of 54 downstream video channels and 400 megahertz on a single cable.

b.

A cable system having at least 36 activated video channels at all times.

(2)

Allocation of public benefit channel capacity. All applicants for a franchise shall provide a percentage of system channel capacity to support the cablecasting of public, educational and governmental access programming.

(3)

Community installations. Cable service shall be provided to every school building, fire station, city hall, community center, library, police station and other public buildings with not less than one outlet on each floor at no cost to the user.

(4)

Parental control devices. All applicants shall make available, upon request by any subscriber, a converter or other device capable of removing from the subscriber's service both the video and audio of any channel which the subscriber considers offensive. The grantee shall inform subscribers of this capability in writing, and the appropriate device shall be installed and maintained at no additional cost to the subscriber. Grantee may charge a deposit.

(5)

Video production capability. All applicants shall purchase and maintain video production capability within the cable system for the production of local programming. Ownership of such equipment shall remain with the grantee, and the maintenance of such facilities and equipment shall be the responsibility of the grantee. Whenever it is necessary to replace equipment, the grantee shall replace such equipment with new equipment reflecting advances in the state of the art, provided that such equipment is compatible with the balance of the system. The franchise agreement shall specify the type, quality, and quantity of equipment with a cash value of the proposed equipment package. This package shall provide character-generated services. The grantor reserves the right to specify equipment which best suits the needs of the communities. All grantees shall purchase and maintain such video production capability as to be able to produce both live and video-taped programming from remote points in the cable system including all necessary equipment to transmit upstream signals to the headend for immediate processing and retransmission downstream to subscribers. The grantor shall designate remote points for live cablecasting in the franchise agreement which may be changed by the grantor from time to time upon 30 days' prior written notice to the grantee.

(6)

Leased access channels. Every grantee shall at all times comply with the provisions of the Cable Act of 1984 pertaining to the availability and use of leased channel space.

(Code 1984, § 9-7; Ord. No. 569, 9-12-1995)