Maine Video Franchise Bill Is 'Defensible,' Says AG Official
Maine’s attorney general is “very comfortable” defending a bill calling IPTV operators utilities and raising minimum franchise fees, but that’s no guarantee the state would win, Chief Deputy AG Christopher Taub told the Maine Joint Energy, Utilities and Technologies Committee…
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at a work session streamed Thursday. The committee voted 7-4 to temporarily table the bill and consider it later. Industry opponents say the plan (LD-920) would violate the federal Cable Act, an argument they made against three previous Maine cable laws in cases that went to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. "This is definitely a defensible bill," but "there's certainly a possibility that a court would find that either some or all of this bill would be preempted,” said Taub. Such cases are “extremely complicated” and it’s “very difficult to predict on any given issue how it's going to come out,” he warned. Two issues are “thorny,” said Taub: Opponents might argue a proposed regulatory surcharge is an “end run around” the federal 5% cap on franchise fees because the bill also sets 5% as the floor for Maine franchise fees, he said. They might say the Cable Act prevents treating companies as utilities, but Maine could argue that -- other than calling them utilities and applying a regulatory surcharge -- the state wouldn’t be regulating them as utilities, said Taub. A skeptical State Sen. Trey Stewart (R) responded, “If it quacks like a duck.”