Hold the Thank-You Note for Cox Cable’s Largess

“Good news for Cox Cable customers,” a press release proclaimed last week. Because of several factors, the Cox memorandum explained, the implementation of a rate increase will be delayed a whopping six weeks, from November to January.

Lost in the excitement of the news were the reasons for Cox’s again raising its rates, adding $1.50 a month to the $19.95 subscribers now pay for expanded basic service.

Nowhere in the press release were the reasons for the increase specified, as if annual rate jumps are simply an accepted part of cable television. All of the major local cable systems are at least considering similar “rate adjustments” for the spring.

According to a recent survey by “U.S.A Today,” Cox has raised its rates 69% in the last five years, even before this new increase. Of the 20 systems surveyed, Cox was about average. Some systems had increased their rates as much as 149% in those five years.

On Thursday, Cox General Manager Bob McRann, invoking a mantra of cable television, attributed the increase primarily to “programming costs.” He refused to get into specifics or to say which programming services are raising their prices more than others.

Cable systems zealously guard information about the cost of programming because contracts can vary greatly from company to company. They also don’t want to give information to cable opponents, who question the real impact programming costs have on cable rates.

Gene Kimmelman, legislative director of the Consumer Federation of America, says that the price of programming is often as low as $2 to $2.50 a subscriber. Even if the programming costs have risen by 20% to 30% in the last year, as cable executives claim, that would account for only a small percentage of a $1.50 increase, argues Kimmelman, who is lobbying for regulation of the cable industry.

Paul Kagan & Associates, an independent media analyst, is forecasting that the cable systems nationally will spend $1.18 billion on basic cable services such as ESPN, CNN and USA in 1991, up only slightly from the $1.02 billion Kagan & Associates says the industry spent in 1990 for the same programming. That accounts for only part of the industry’s programming costs, but it certainly suggests that there have not been the dramatic increases McRann and Co. are claiming.

It’s also worth noting that some of Cox’s additional expenses are offset by additional subscribers. In 1989, Cox listed 306,000 customers; now it claims 323,000.

Contacted again Friday, McRann changed his tune slightly, saying programming, though still the major factor, is just one of many costs on the rise. Employee expenses are a major part of that, and Cox’s growth is expected to slow dramatically in the next few years because of increasing competition, he said.

As for programming, McRann acknowledges that, on a national basis, the figures from Kimmelman & Kagan are essentially accurate. “But we have about 500 expense codes, and at least 350 to 400 of them are up, and I guarantee very few of them are down,” he said.

Cox has been gradually upgrading its capacity to from 36 to 62 channels. But McRann said the upgrading was not a major factor in the rate increases.

Changes in taxes and franchise fees don’t effect cable systems because cable is one of the few businesses on Earth that simply passes on fees and taxes directly to customers.

In fact, at the same time Cox is raising its $19.95 rate, the monthly tax, copyright and franchise fees (which are separate from the basic rate) it passes on to customers will be pared about 40 cents. This reduction comes after pressure from the cities of San Diego and Chula Vista, who were unhappy with how Cox calculated those fees. Now, of course, customers will hardly notice because of the $1.50 increase.

In the press release, McRann said implementation of the increase had been delayed “because of billing administration reasons.” But, in the next paragraph, he couldn’t resist portraying Cox as the benevolent benefactor of the community.

“We also felt that implementing a price increase during the holiday season could place a burden on our customers, especially in the midst of a recessionary environment,” he said.

There’s no need to send Cox a thank-you note.

If San Diego Catholic News Notes was founded to tweak the sensibilities of the local Catholic diocese, it is clearly succeeding.

In a recent memo, Msgr. Daniel Dillabough, chancellor of the diocese, instructed his staff not to grant interviews or “respond to . . . requests for information and opinions” from personnel from the year-old monthly paper, which is mailed free to about 7,000 local Catholics.

“Catholic News Notes has repeatedly demonstrated a negative attitude, including misleading reports, toward diocesan personnel, programs and policies,” Dillabough wrote.

The memo clearly didn’t work. It was leaked to the Catholic News, which printed it.

Catholic News Notes is the product of two local Catholics--free-lance writer Tim Ryland and Jim Holman, publisher and editor of the Reader. They envision it as a “spine stiffener,” an opportunity to challenge the diocese to take stronger stands on issues and to explore areas untouched by the diocese paper, the Southern Cross.

“We were motivated by what we saw as a real weakening in the courage of the diocese, mainly on pro-life issues, but other issues as well,” said Holman, who has been arrested twice while participating in Operation Rescue anti-abortion rallies.

Contacted Thursday, Dillabough declined to comment on Catholic News. The memo was “simply an internal memo,” he said.

To Holman, the memo was further evidence of why he and Ryland have chosen to devote their time and money to Catholic News.

“It makes them look extremely authoritarian, if not totalitarian, which is certainly not the way the church should be,” Holman said.

Television news was at its entertaining best last week when Channel 8’s Mitch Duncan went “undercover,” pulling his convertible Mercedes up to a street corner and soliciting cocaine while a hidden camera videotaped the action. He was soon surrounded by local dealers. “You and that photographer sure are brave,” co-anchor Andrea Naversen said after the segment aired. . . . Sure, KNSD-TV (Channel 39) has shamelessly capitalized on Denise Yamada’s pregnancy by running print ads featuring a profile shot of the anchorwoman to promote a series on child birthing. But at least they resisted the temptation to set her up in a Demi Moore-style nude shot.