National Deregulation of Cable TV Will Only Hurt a Little in Valley Area

Deregulation of the cable television industry nationwide, which went into effect Jan. 1, is expected to have less impact on prices paid for cable service in the San Fernando Valley area than in the rest of the country.

State legislation passed in 1979 and extended in 1982 already deregulated prices for most of the Valley area’s cable TV companies.

Of seven cable companies in the area, only one, Ventura County Cablevision, said it will take advantage of the federal deregulation to raise its basic monthly charge, now $9.80 per month, about 7% to 10%.

The firm recently purchased a cable system with 60,000 customers, mostly in Agoura Hills, Camarillo and Thousand Oaks.

Five other cable operators--Valley Cable, Sammons Communications, Falcon Cable, King Video and United Cable--are already fully deregulated, and four of those are keeping prices steady, the companies said.

Valley Cable, which serves 62,000 homes in the West Valley, plans to raise prices about 7% sometime this year, a company official said.

The seventh Valley-area cable operator, CalaVision, based in Calabasas, also was not covered by the state deregulation. It recently raised its rates after getting approval from local authorities, however, and plans no more price hikes, a spokeswoman said.

The 1984 Cable Communication Policy Act passed by Congress ends the authority of state and local governments to control cable prices. Regulators will still have the power to decide which cable operator can go into business and where they can set up shop. But municipalities will no longer have the authority to revoke an operator’s license once the company is established.

Although the impact in the Valley area will be minor, the federal deregulation may lead to higher cable TV bills for many Californians.

More than half the state’s 3.8 million cable subscribers are served by companies that were not covered by the state deregulation, said Jerry Yanowitz, vice president of the California Cable Television Assn. (CCTA).

Most of the cable systems not covered by the state deregulation were constructed after the California legislation was enacted.

Los Angeles area cable operators said, however, that because there is unusually strong competition in Southern California for the consumer entertainment dollar, area cable companies deregulated on Jan. 1 won’t be able to abruptly boost rates.

In a survey of 282 cable operators across the country, the Cable Television and Marketing Society found that 75% plan rate increases, from token hikes to as much as 30%. According to the National Cable Television Assn., the average national monthly fee is $10 for a package of basic cable channels that might include MTV, Cable News Network, ESPN and other programming.

Despite some increases in basic monthly cable service, some industry analysts expect drops in the prices of premium programming services such as Home Box Office and The Movie Channel.

“Pay services haven’t gone anywhere in the last two years,” said Wes Whittaker, an analyst with Paul Kagan Associates, a communications consulting firm based in Carmel. “The premiums are trying to attract new subscribers and they’re willing to adjust costs.”