Local DISH retailer took advantage of Cable ONE and KXII negotiation squabble

“Those situations never work out as well for the customers in my opinion " said Cavender "We want to take care of these people They are our friends, our neighbors, our schoolmates and family I really mean that ”

The finger-pointing began to get ugly on Saturday as KXII had this statement on their Facebook page:

With the back and forth finger-pointing that went on between Cable ONE and KXII this weekend, a local Howe graduate Chris Cavender, who owns Cavender Home Theater, seemed to be one of the few winners in the deal Cavender is saw a jump in DISH Network sales since the announcement came out about Cable ONE no longer carrying the local channel.

Cavender is a local DISH Network retailer that provides the same service and same cost as the big company. The only difference is that Cavender’s customers are supporting local small business by calling him instead of an 800 number However, Cavender wants people to not get upset and just order anything

"Our company has never before had a cable operator or satellite company drop our stations. Cable One, in contrast, has a long history of taking channels off their cable systems to gain leverage in their commercial negotiations. In this case, KXII-TV offered Cable One the VERY SAME TERMS to purchase our programming that have been accepted by dozens and dozens of their larger and smaller competitors Cable One refused We then offered Cable One a routine extension of the deadline Cable One refused an extension also Instead, it chose to once again use its customers as pawns and to publicize materially false statements to the public about its conduct Incredibly, through all this, Cable One charges its customers the same fees despite providing ever fewer of the most popular channels It is time for Cable One to put their customers first and return to the negotiating table like everyone else Or its customers should find another pay-TV provider"

That statement came after a post from Cable One post on their Facebook page on Friday evening:

"For several weeks we have been in negotiations with Gray Television for the right to retransmit their stations and we have made every effort to reach a fair deal However, Gray Television is demanding a triple digit rate increase and they have refused our counter proposal to pay a rate that is consistent with what these networks are receiving in other markets As a result, Gray Television removed their channels from the Cable ONE channel line-up on January 2 Cable ONE has successfully negotiated for the carriage of hundreds of broadcast stations and we hope to do so with Gray Television very soon.

Cavender said that TV contracts and occasional outages are unfortunate but do happen to every provider in the pay TV industry. He said that Cable ONE has a recent history of giving up on trying to settle issues with programmers

"Last March they took off 15 channels from ViaCom such as TV Land, Nickelodeon, MTV, VH1, BET, and many more " said Cavender "They never put them back on It is rumored that a similar situation is brewing between Cable ONE and NBC Universal DISH has negotiated settlements this year with CBS, Turner, CNN, and many more DISH is negotiating now with Fox News, not to be confused with the Fox Broadcast Network All our local channels are intact "

The Dallas Cowboys have played a major role in the North Texas television market in the past

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Cavender Continued from Page #9

week with their playoff game yesterday versus Detroit in jeopardy of not being aired by Cable One since KXII had the game carried live on their station. That left a lot of people ready to make a switch immediately. That gave Cavender an opening to sell his local small business to thirsting customers

"I'm writing them up as quickly as I can Already two today (Saturday) Lots more coming I was able to get each of them a $150 gift card on top of the regular discounts They were stoked!" said Cavender on Saturday morning

He then went on to explain why his DISH service is different than those who have tried the service from other retailers

"The problem I usually hear about with unhappy DISH customers stems from a poor installation. The majority of ads you see are not from local dealers but from regional marketers that use contract installers to handle the installs Those guys are always in a hurry to get to the next job and are never around to answer questions or fix problems Order local from local people and get local service Sounds simple but most people do not know that it makes a difference who you order from and it is your choice "

Cavender did say that DirecTV and DISH Network will both be taking some share away from

Cable ONE through this negotiation

"DirecTv and DISH are both reputable companies. And both are very large. What we do as a DISH retailer is make sure our customers understand what they will be getting, answer any questions or concerns and supply installation with our local installers that care about their customers We have a local show room that people can come to for a face to face experience and can see how it all works Come in and grab the remote and see for yourself just how cool the DISH system is to use "

An agreement was announced in the five o'clock pm hour on Saturday from Cable ONE's Facebook page that read:

“We are pleased to announce that we have reached an agreement with Gray Television to restore Cable ONE’s carriage of Gray Television channels to our line up. We are currently in the process of restoring these channels We appreciate your patience while we worked to come to an agreement that we believe is fair for everyone ”

The ugly fight seems to be over until the next time the contract comes up for negotiation

In the end, it was a nasty battle for the mighty dollar between two giants But for a moment, the small business mom and pop had a chance to bring in business to help the local economy.

New Year Crash

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Wison N Jones Hospital, collided with a stationary vehicle that had attempted to avoid the first crash, causing that vehicle to strike a third vehicle There were no injuries in the second collision and a second ambulance was called to the scene to transport the patient who was being transported.

Multiple agencies assisted with the investigation, the arrest, and the clean-up of this crash. These agencies include, Van Alstyne Police Department, and Sherman Police Department. Both crashes are still under investigation, but it is apparent that alcohol was a factor in the first crash

$150 $150

Lady Bulldogs

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The Lady Bulldogs were finally eliminated in the tournament by Princeton on New Years Eve The Lady Wildcats won by a score of 6051 even though Harvey scored 26 of the tem's 51 points and ripped down 19 of the team's 35 rebounds Smith chipped in 10 points while Emily Sanders added five Foster and Anderson each had four points a piece

On Saturday afternoon, the Lady Bulldogs got back in the win column with a 69-48 win over the S&S Lady Rams Harvey had a seasonhigh 32 points and also pulled down 16 rebounds Foster continued her hot-hand as she was four of eight from the field and hit one of two three-point attempts to give her 11 points Smith also had eight points while Hawkins had seven

Leading rebounders other than Harvey were Kayla Anderson with five, Hawkins with four, and Hargrove with four