New York moves to kick out state’s largest cable provider

New York is moving to ban Charter Communications from operating in the state, as regulators say it has failed to live up to the commitments it made when its merger with Time Warner Cable was approved in 2016.

The New York State Public Service Commission (PSC) voted to revoke its approval of the merger on Friday, calling the company’s behavior since the deal closed “brazenly disrespectful.”

“Charter’s repeated failures to serve New Yorkers and honor its commitments are well documented and are only getting worse,” PSC Chairman John Rhodes said in a statement. “After more than a year of administrative enforcement efforts to bring Charter into compliance with the Commission’s merger order, the time has come for stronger actions to protect New Yorkers and the public interest.”

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Charter, which operates under the name Spectrum, is New York’s largest cable provider. The commission on Friday ordered the company to come up with a plan to transition its 2 million customers in the state to new service providers.

“In the weeks leading up to an election, rhetoric often becomes politically charged,” Charter said in a statement Friday. “But the fact is that Spectrum has extended the reach of our advanced broadband network to more than 86,000 New York homes and businesses since our merger agreement with the PSC. Our 11,000 diverse and locally based workers, who serve millions of customers in the state every day, remain focused on delivering faster and better broadband to more New Yorkers, as we promised.”

The PSC accused Charter of repeatedly failing to meet deadlines, not filling its obligations to serve rural communities and “purposeful obfuscation of its performance.”

“These recurring failures led the Commission to the broader conclusion that the company was not interested in being a good corporate citizen and that the Commission could no longer in good faith and conscience allow it to operate in New York,” the PSC said in its announcement.