(a) Following completion of the system upgrade/rebuild, the grantee shall make available to each of its subscribers who receive some or all of the services offered on the system, reception of at least three public, educational and government (PEG) access channels to be allocated among public, educational and government usage as determined by the grantor. The channels designated for access shall be provided by the grantee as a part of the basic cable service. The access channels shall be made available by the grantee for use by the City and its citizens in accordance with the rules and procedures established by the City or any lawfully designated person, group, organization or agency authorized by the City for that purpose.
(b) To the extent that any access channel is not being used for the provision of non-commercial, public, educational or governmental access purposes, the grantee shall be permitted to use such channel(s) for the provision of other services, subject to any reasonable rules established by the City regarding such use. The grantee's permitted use of any access channel made pursuant to this section shall cease within ninety days of the grantee's receipt of notice from the City that such channel will again be used for public, educational or governmental access.
(c) Unless otherwise provided for in the franchise agreement, and notwithstanding the above, the grantee may accommodate a request from the City for additional access capacity made pursuant to Section 816.27(b) by combining more than one access use on a channel, provided that:
(1) It is technically and economically feasible for the grantee to do so;
(2) The scheduling needs of all users of the channel can be reasonably accommodated; and
(3) The access entity which requires use of the alternate channel must be able to access the alternate channel from the site where it normally originates playback of its programs and may not be required to transport tapes to a remote site for playback.
(d) However, unless otherwise provided for in the franchise agreement, the grantee shall provide an additional PEG channel for non-commercial public, educational or governmental broadcasts in the event that the three PEG channels provided under this section are then fully utilized. In no event shall the grantee be required to provide in excess of one additional access channel, and only after the cable system offers at least 150 channels. As used in this section, "fully utilized" means utilized for original, nonduplicative programming not less than eight hours per day, five days per week, for a period of ten consecutive weeks. The additional PEG channel provided under this section shall be reviewed annually by the grantee. Upon such annual review, the additional PEG channel will continue to be made available to the grantor to the extent that the PEG channels provided under this agreement (including the additional PEG channel(s)) are at least seventy percent fully utilized. To the extent that such capacity requirement is not met, the additional PEG channel shall be terminated, subject to reactivation at the request of the grantor upon demonstration by the grantor that the three original and any other additional PEG channels provided under this section are fully utilized, and to the annual review provided herein.
(e) Unless otherwise provided for in the franchise agreement, the grantee shall provide free cable transmission facilities and free modulation equipment to introduce programming onto these transmission facilities by linking the below listed origination points with the head-end, or through hubs to the head-end, for distribution to all subscribers generally and for distribution to discrete audiences via scrambled signals and decoders at the origination points for such channels.
(f) Unless otherwise provided for in the franchise agreement, the grantee is responsible for all head-end equipment essential to playback of programming for PEG access use in a location and under reasonable rules determined by the grantee. The grantee shall also be responsible for the operation and maintenance and all equipment necessary to perform those functions. The grantee shall also either provide a studio and equipment acceptable to the grantor for PEG access use or pay a fee in lieu of providing the same, equal to up to one percent of adjusted gross revenues (gross revenues above net of the franchise fee), as stated in the franchise agreement, to be placed by the grantor in a special fund for such PEG access purposes.
(g) Unless otherwise provided for in the franchise agreement, the grantor shall be responsible for the operation of access facilities and equipment. In this regard, the grantor may delegate from time to time its responsibilities to others who then shall assume the responsibility of the grantor in accordance with the grantor's delegation. The grantor will develop reasonable rules regarding use of access facilities and equipment and determine the needs of the City for public, educational and governmental access services. In this regard, the grantor shall regularly coordinate with the grantee for the purpose of developing and maintaining reasonable access facilities.
(h) Unless otherwise provided for in the franchise agreement, costs of providing said facilities shall not be a credit against payment of the franchise fee imposed under the franchise agreement.
(Ord. 1999-54. Passed 9-15-99.)