Home / News & Publications / Michigan Catholic News / 2008 / Greater access to CTND on Comcast is a welcome move
Greater access to CTND on Comcast is a welcome move
by Robert Delaney of The Michigan Catholic
Published August 15, 2008
Detroit – The prospect of greater access to the CTND Catholic cable channel was welcomed Monday by a woman who has worked to bring the channel within reach of senior citizen viewers.
"This is really good news about Comcast. Not having CTND for almost nine months has been a real deprivation for many retirees or other people living on Social Security," said Belle Deaver, a member of St. Mary Parish in St. Clair.
The channel is now available throughout the six counties of the Archdiocese of Detroit as part of Comcast's Digital Basic Package B-1 for $14.95 a month (plus $4.20 a month if a digital converter box is needed), said Patrick Paterno, director of communication for Comcast's Michigan region.
Ever since CTND was dropped from basic cable packages back in January, Deaver has written letters, circulated petitions and urged others to write Comcast to again make the archdiocese's cable station more available to older people of limited means.
CTND had been a part of basic cable packages that included the standard broadcast TV stations plus only a few others, but it fell out of such packages when Comcast reassigned it to Channel 296 as part of its switchover to digital broadcasting (even over-the-air TV stations will have to switch to digital in 2009).
That change meant cable subscribers had to upgrade to a higher level of service to continue receiving CTND, which meant having to pay a higher price, depending on the community. "I heard people had to pay as much as $55 a month if they wanted to continue receiving it," Deaver said.
Not only was the increase too much for most individual senior citizen subscribers, but it also deprived many people in nursing homes of access, because the management was unwilling to pay the higher price to maintain CTND access for its residents.
The inclusion of CTND in a new and more affordable package was also welcomed by Ken Kolb, director of the archdiocesan Office of Television.
"We at CTND are always happy to hear of an arrangement that makes our programming available to more viewers," Kolb said. Paterno said Comcast realigns station offerings from time to time based on viewer surveys and feedback.
Deaver said she knows many people wrote letters or signed petitions urging Comcast to make CTND again available at an affordable price: "I think it's the working of the Holy Spirit."
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