Town, Mid-Hudson not yet on same channel
The Daily Mail
Dec. 3, 2008

ATHENS — An agreement between Mid-Hudson Cablevision and the Town of Athens to extend television and Internet service has not been reached, the town board of supervisors said at their meeting Monday evening.

Negotiations between the town and the company to provide service to homes around Potic Mountain and Green Lake have been continuing, Town Attorney Carl Whitbeck said at the meeting.

Whitbeck, Athens Town Supervisor Al Salvino and other board members discussed the most recent correspondence they had received from the company, in which it was suggested that Flats Road could be covered, but for a new, higher installation fee for each new user. The town could pay $2,000 for the service extension, as well.

Various proposals offer a 15-year contract for service to Cablevision, a service area review by the company every five years and a yearly report by the company to the board, Whitbeck said.

But if the service area is assessed once every five years, interested users who are not connected now might have to wait until the next assessment for inclusion, Councilwoman Colleen Fischer pointed out.

In the meantime, residents are still waiting for a hookup.

Glen Coker, who lives where Valley Road meets Black Lake Road, said he has had two different conversations with company representatives who provided him with two separate cost estimates for extending service to his home, only 10 telephone poles away from the current service’s reach. He said that living without the services Mid-Hudson Cablevision offer is like living in the stone age.

Mid-Hudson Cablevision President James Reynolds, who did not attend the meeting, said Tuesday that the town and the company will be able to work toward an agreement, and that this is a step in the right direction.

Reynolds said that the fees from the town could come from money the company pays the town to use its easements as allowed in the franchise agreement.

“This is a challenge that is not unique to one little area, it is not unique at all,” Reynolds said.

Although an arrangement has not been reached, the two sides will continue to work with each other to reach reach a solution.