East Lansing rental property owners are uncertain as to whether a rule approved by federal regulators will eventually lower the prices on cable bills for the city’s apartment dwellers.
The Federal Communications Commission approved a rule last week banning exclusive contracts between cable providers and apartment buildings. Chairman Kevin Martin said the FCC rule will foster competition as well as drive down cable rates, which have increased 93 percent in the last dozen years.
“Competition and choice in the video services market results in lower prices, higher quality of services and generally enhances the consumers’ experience by giving them greater choice over the purchased video programming,” Martin said in a statement.
DTN Management Co., East Lansing’s top property owner based on maximum occupancy of possible tenants, has a contract with Comcast Corp., the area’s dominant cable provider.
DTN vice president Raji Uppal said it was too early to tell if the rule will resonate with East Lansing apartment owners.
“Until we understand the rule a little bit more, it shouldn’t affect us at all,” he said.
Richard Laing, DTN’s director of information technology, said the real estate company has been open to deals with other providers before, including AT&T Inc.
“We do our own work to find the best deal and weigh the best options,” he said.
“If that means a variety of options for cable service to choose from, then that’s the right idea.”
Laing said AT&T has approached DTN with an interest in providing cable services, but setting up an infrastructure for providing cable was too much of an obstacle for the company.
Andy Evans, a social relations senior who lives in DTN-owned University Villa Apartments, 635 Abbot Road, said he didn’t agree with the FCC’s ban.
“By regulating this, it seems like the FCC is just picking which of the big cable companies they’re going to help out,” Evans said.
While AT&T and Verizon Communications Inc. will likely benefit from the ruling, FCC commissioner Robert McDowell said the rule may prompt legal action.
Comcast spokeswoman Sena Fitzmaurice said the likelihood of litigation guarantees uncertainty and called the FCC’s ruling “a blow to consumers.”
“The net result is that many consumers are likely to wind up paying more for service if the FCC’s interference in the competitive marketplace stands,” Fitzmaurice said in a statement.
Community Resource Management Co., East Lansing’s second-largest real estate company, owns 10 student apartment buildings.
CRMC refers its tenants to Comcast for cable but doesn’t have a contract with the provider.
“We never get involved with the cable companies in terms of a contract,” CRMC president Joseph Goodsir Jr. said. “We leave it up to our tenants to make their own choice.”
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