Chicago PassionsSport News and Entertainment Updates

WTVT-Channel 13 and other Fox channels are broadcasting as usual on Bright House Networks after the two companies extended a midnight deadline for reaching a rebroadcasting agreement.

Fox Entertainment Group Inc., a division of News Corp. (NYSE: NWSA), had threatened to pull the signal of its various channels, including the Tampa affiliate, FX, Speed, Sun Sports and Fox Sports, in the final seconds of 2009 if Bright House Networks and Time Warner Cable didn’t agree to its terms in a new agreement.

Bright House Networks shares common corporate ownership with the Tampa Bay Business Journal.

Joe Durkin, a spokesman for Bright House Networks, said agreements like the one trying to be reached with Fox happen all the time and it’s become far too common for these broadcast companies to use the public as leverage.

“This deal has created so much attention, but it’s going to get worked out,” he said Thursday. “The only question is if an agreement is reached after the expiration date, is Fox going to pull their signal? Bright House Networks must have their permission to carry their signal, and we’ve urged them to keep the signal on and not to penalize the viewers by putting them in the middle of a business negotiation.”

The rebroadcast agreement is key to WTVT, which is asking to receive compensation from Bright House Networks to carry its signal. Calls to WTVT were not returned late Thursday, but local general manager Bill Schneider posted a video the same day providing his station’s position on the negotiations.

Schneider said this deal is about providing balance for broadcast affiliates who don’t get some of the same style monetary compensation as other cable properties. While broadcast stations were the first to attach themselves to cable in the early days of the industry, new cable-only channels were formed, and carriers chose to start compensating them to stay on their system, providing both advertising and rebroadcast revenues to channels like ESPN, TNT and TBS, Schneider said.

“We need to be able to compete,” Schneider said in the video. “What we’re asking for, compared to what we delivered, is nowhere near what we’re really worth.”

The dynamics of running a broadcast affiliate have changed over the last 10 years, he said. Fox is now asking Bright House Networks to provide a “reasonable agreement that will allow us to continue investing in the local programming and the local news and coverage that you expect from us.”

Durkin, however, described the Fox demands as a way to compensate for lower ad revenues at affiliates. “They shouldn’t make up for that on the backs of cable subscribers,” he said.

The dispute involves some of Fox’s major cable offerings, but not Fox News Network or Fox Business, Durkin said.

Because stations like WTVT are available for free over the air, cable companies like Bright House have not paid rebroadcast fees to individual affiliates. They benefit from having a clearer picture and a wider audience, Durkin said.

However, if Bright House pays WTVT for its signal, it could open the door for other local affiliates to demand similar payouts when those rebroadcast agreements come up. If efforts aren’t made now to keep those fees reasonable with WTVT, the flood of extra payments could mean higher cable bills for customers in the future, Durkin said.

Fox could keep its signal on Bright House Networks come Jan. 1 without an agreement, Durkin said, but the ball is in Fox’s court. A similar contract dispute occurred with Viacom Inc. (NYSE: VIA) last year over cable offerings such as MTV and Comedy Central. Similar to the current Fox battle, Viacom published advertisements locally that featured some of the characters and stars of its channels with warnings to subscribers that they could be gone if a deal with Bright House Networks wasn’t reached.

A removal of the signal on that New Year’s Eve was averted through a temporary agreement, although a full rebroadcast contract wasn’t signed until months later, Durkin said.

That might not be so easy for Bright House Networks this time around, WTVT’s Schneider warned. He said Fox has negotiated in a fair manner over the last several months but feels such talks have been hindered by the involvement of Time Warner, “who’s agenda may or may not sync up with what Bright House wants to accomplish in Tampa.”

Although Schneider described Time Warner and Bright House Networks as being different companies, Time Warner once owned a stake in Bright House Networks and continues to work with the cable company through an operational agreement. However, operational control of Bright House Networks belongs to Advance/Newhouse, the parent company of TBBJ.