LUS Fiber wants to be treated like a small cable operator with all the group discount privileges that come along with being a member of the National Cable Television Cooperative (NCTC). Unfortunately, it says, primarily because of Cox Communications, it's been denied membership.
The municipal FTTH system in Lafayette, La. has filed a letter of complaint with the FCC suggesting that other community-owned service providers have been granted membership in NCTC but that it has been turned down repeatedly because Cox doesn't want the competition.
"A significant difference between LUS Fiber and these other municipally owned providers is that LUS Fiber's major competitor, Cox Communications, is NCTC's largest member as well as a member of the NCTC board of directors," the muni provider said in a letter to the FCC. "LUS Fiber is being singled out by a large corporation that does not see the benefit of competition in the membership. Denial of membership in NCTC could eventually cost LUS Fiber millions of dollars."
LUS especially wants a piece of NCTC's bargaining power when it comes to programming costs and has requested an "expedited response from the FCC."
For more:
- see this news release (PDF)
- and this story
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