The Region : Cable Transfer in Works
Crown Cable, the San Gabriel Valley’s largest cable operator, is negotiating to buy one of the region’s oldest and tiniest.
Last week Crown Cable, which serves 16 cities and communities in the area, entered negotiations to purchase Pasadena-based Kinneloa Television Systems. Kinneloa, a family-run business that in 1968 became one of the first cable companies to operate in Southern California, serves 1,665 customers in portions of Pasadena and Altadena.
The company also operates as Duarte Cable Communications, serving about 2,566 customers in that city.
Melvin Matthews, Kinneloa’s president and principal stockholder, said he wants to sell the company for two reasons. First, he said, recently released federal regulations that will end nearly nine years of deregulation in the U.S. cable industry will make it increasingly difficult for small cable operators to turn a profit. Also, he said, he hopes to pay off an undisclosed amount of debt.
Matthews also attributed his desire to sell the family business to the state’s sour economy and what he called an “anti-business” climate here.
Craig Watson, Crown Cable’s general manager, said, “These systems are excellent ones and are immediately adjacent to our systems. They certainly hold some interest for us.”
Officials in Duarte, Pasadena and Los Angeles County must approve the transfer of ownership of Kinneloa’s cable system in their communities.
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