Century Cable Wins Extension on Deadline

The Beverly Hills City Council has extended until Feb. 17 the deadline for Century Southwest Cable Television Inc. to meet the financial conditions under which the city will renew the company’s franchise.

Century, the embattled cable company that dropped its quest for several South Bay cable franchises last week, must execute a $4.5-million letter of credit, provide $875,000 worth of communications equipment or cash and give the city access to the franchise’s assets in the event the company defaults on its bank loans.

Charles Firestone, the city’s special counsel who is negotiating the agreement with Century, recommended that the council give Century until Feb. 17 to comply, which is the day the current franchise agreement expires. Mayor Charlotte Spadaro and Councilman Robert Tanenbaum opposed the delay, saying that the city should have stuck to a two-week deadline it gave Century on Jan. 20.

Asked to Renew Franchise

Century has asked Beverly Hills to renew the cable franchise agreement and transfer ownership of the system from Group W Cable Inc. to Century, which was part of a consortium that bought the cable giant from Westinghouse Electric Corp. last June for $2.1 billion.

Beverly Hills officials, who have been trying to upgrade its 29-channel cable franchise since 1983, want Century to build a public-access channel and provide up to 75 channels. Bill Rosendahl, Century’s vice president, said the company has the funds to improve the 9,000-subscriber system, but it needs the extra time to put together the whole package. “Too many people have been working too hard and too long to throw the baby out with the water,” Rosendahl said.

City officials are concerned about Century’s ability to pay for the improvements and to run the franchise while servicing a $390-million debt the company has with several banks.

The delay was a victory of sorts for Century, which last week gave up franchise bids in El Segundo, Gardena, Hawthorne, Lawndale and Torrance to the American Television and Communications Corp. ATC is also part of the five-company consortium that bought Group W.

Officials in those cities had refused to transfer ownership of their franchises to Century, which they feared would raise subscriber rates and have difficulty coming up with funds to run the franchises because of its high debt load.

Century’s franchise was recently terminated effective December, 1987, by Santa Monica officials who said the company had violated the city’s cable agreement with Group W. The Santa Monica City Council is expected to review a list of proposed cable franchise operators sometime this month.

The cities of Los Angeles and West Hollywood have approved franchise agreements with Century, but Los Angeles officials said Century must demontrate that it can run its 100,000-subscriber franchise if the company loses Santa Monica. Some of Century’s key facilities are in Santa Monica.

Rosendahl said Century pulled out of the South Bay cities “for a combination of reasons.” He said in Torrance, for example, the $7.45 monthly fee set for the city’s 120-channel cable system was “way out of line for the marketplace.” Century, he said, is negotiating with Santa Monica officials to reinstate the company’s franchise.

Century, he said, has 675,000 subscribers in 21 states. “We have the money to do the (Beverly Hills) upgrade.” He said Century doesn’t expect to increase the $10 subscription fee in Beverly Hills.

Missed Tuesday Deadline

The council had set a Feb. 3 deadline for Century to sign the new agreement or face losing the franchise, but Vice Mayor Benjamin H. Stansbury Jr. and council members Donna Ellman and Maxwell Salter said the extension was needed because the city was very close to an agreement.

“I want to make it very clear that my vote tonight is not to accommodate (Century),” Ellman said. “The major interest to me is to get a rebuild of our system as quickly as possible and stay out of the courts as long as possible . . . If these two weeks don’t produce what we want . . . we can proceed,” Ellman said.

Stansbury, who said Jan. 20 that the city should “walk right over” Century if it failed to reach an agreement with the city, said that while he was impatient with the process, he was satisfied that the city and the company had made enough progress toward the new agreement.

Tanenbaum, however, said the city should not “bend over backward to accommodate” Century.

“The issue is in part a major failure by the company to provide the financial assurances that we request. And on our part, (that) we mean what we say. When we say something to someone, we mean it. Not to stand on principle here is wrong.”