Spectrum questioned at Pineville City Council meeting
Published 2:18 pm Monday, June 4, 2018
Spectrum government liaison Carla Combs attended the previous Pineville City Council meeting on May 21 to discuss further business regarding the franchise agreement with the city.
During the meeting, Combs asked if the city would be renewing the franchise agreement. Issues of service within the community were also discussed. The franchise agreement expired in September.
During her opening statement to the council, Combs relayed the benefits and future advancements Spectrum would offer. The council had received the franchise agreement proposal in their packets before the meeting.
The major question from the agreement proposal focused on whether the city should collect a franchise fee from Spectrum or remain with the collection of the state distribution of telecommunication taxes. Pineville Mayor Scott Madon, along with the rest of the council, spoke to a unanimous desire to balance savings for customers with the most revenue for the city.
Combs said she would produce more information for the council that would demonstrated what a customer’s bill would look like if the city opted to collect a franchise fee of five percent — which means the bill would feature the franchise fee passed to the customer but would omit the current gross revenue tax and franchise fee tax that couple together.
Combs stated this information would be given to the council before the next meeting.
Madon then questioned Combs about rumors of the Pineville Spectrum office closing. Combs said she had no knowledge of the rumors and doubted their validity.
Brian O’Brien of The Big One 106.3 FM, who has had previous issues with Spectrum, then asked Combs about the service issues. Combs replied that Spectrum records show there have been a reduction in service issues in the area. Combs then offered to investigate any area of service experiencing issues that O’Brien could provide addresses for.
Combs ended the discussion by urging everyone to contact Spectrum if they were experiencing any kind of service issues.