Signal Mountain’s insistence on a new franchise agreement featuring a “level playing field” for all Comcast and EPB customers means the town won’t be included in EPB’s fiber optics network, at least for the time being, according to a recent letter from EPB president and CEO Harold DePriest.

The utility official had set a Dec. 14 deadline for the town to renew the franchise agreement under which it has operated for the past 17 years, which the town declined to meet.

“We would be crazy to sign a 16-year contract now in the vague hope that, when we sign a new agreement with Comcast next month, EPB will ‘take that into consideration’ and renegotiate,” council member Susan Robertson said.

Signal’s new agreement with Comcast is set to be finalized in January, and the town had asked EPB to agree to the same terms. But the power company refused, saying it would pull its crews off the mountain if the town did not enter into a new agreement with the same terms as the existing agreement – now.

Mayor Bill Lusk said the town’s proposed new contract with Comcast mandates that if and when the cable company offers better terms to another community, those same terms also will apply to Signal.

“If Lookout Mountain gets a better agreement with Comcast, then we want that same agreement,” he explained.

Monday evening, speaking during the town council’s regular meeting, EPB officials said they had never heard of such an agreement.

In his letter, Mr. DePriest noted that the town has “been unwilling to provide a franchise to EPB because you are negotiating with Comcast,” but did not address the town’s insistence on a level playing field for all Comcast and EPB customers.

“Our original plans were to have Signal Mountain designed and built by late winter . . . but because of the lengthy delay in obtaining a franchise . . . we now have to schedule our designers and workforce to other areas that want our services,” Mr. DePriest wrote.

“If EPB doesn’t have a franchise by your December 14 council meeting, we will simply have to move our workforce on to areas actively seeking our services.

“We look forward to working with Signal Mountain to offer our services, whenever the time is right for Signal Mountain , and when our crews are again available,” he concluded.

EPB is pushing hard to extend its fiber optics network, which it will use as the communications backbone of its so-called Smart Grid, throughout Hamilton County by the summer of 2010.

“Our design crews have completed the cities of Chattanooga, East Ridge, Ridgeside, Red Bank and Lookout Mountain , Tn.,” Mr. DePriest said in his letter to Signal officials.

“We are now working in Rossville, and will soon move into Hamilton County .
“Where our design crews go, our work crews must follow . . . If EPB doesn’t have a franchise by your December 14 council meeting, we will simply have to move our workforce on to areas actively seeking our services. We regret this, and ask that you make it clear to the residents of Signal Mountain that EPB has not caused this delay and does not want it.”