Dennis Norman Musings

Dennis Norman

By: Dennis Norman

First off, my usual disclaimer…I am not an attorney and this is not intended to be legal advice or a legal opinion.  I’m simply reporting on “news” that I think is interesting and relevant to those investors out there that own apartment buildings or may be involved with condominium developments.

Some time ago, it seems around the early 90′s, I remember hearing from a friend of mine that owned hundreds of apartment units how much money he just received from a cable company by offering them the “exclusive” right to offer it’s services to his tenants.  In other words, if you were a tenant in one of his apartments your only choice for television (other than broadcast TV that you could receive without the aid of an antenna on the building) was the cable company my friend the apartment-owner had selected.  You would not have any other choices.  While this arrangement didn’t offer much choice to the tenant it sure seemed like a windfall to the apartment owner to me.

Apparently many condominium developments went the same route.  The developer would enter into an exclusive agreement with a cable provider (or I assume a satellite provider) and then owners of units in that development would have no other choice.

I’m not exactly sure when the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)banned this type of arrangement,  but I think for “commercial multi-tenant” environments it may have been banned way back in 2001 but I believe it was just March 21, 2008 that the FCC expanded the ban of exclusive arrangements to include ”residential multi-unit buildings and condominiums.” 

In opposition to this ban by the FCC the National Cable & Telecommunications Association filed suit against the FCC challenging the ban and trying to get it reversed.  After being unsuccessful at the lower court level the plaintiff filed an appeal with the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.  This case, NATIONAL CABLE & TELECOMMUNICATIONS ASSOCIATION v FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSOIN AND UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, was heard by the appellant court in April and last week the court handed down it’s decision which was to uphold the FCC rule banning such exclusive arrangements.

FINAL DISCLAIMER: I’M NOT AN ATTORNEY AND THIS IS NOT A LEGAL OPINION, LEGAL ADVICE, NOR A LEGAL INTERPRETATION OF ANY RULES OR COURT CASES.  THIS INFORMATION IS BEING REPORTED AS “NEWS” AND FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPSOSES ONLY.  IF ANYTHING IN THIS ARTICLE HAS INFLUENCED YOU IN ANY WAY CONSULT YOUR ATTORNEY BEFORE DOING ANYTHING.