Verizon FiOS approved for city

City Council gave the green light to Verizon on Tuesday to begin rolling out its FiOS service throughout the Pittsburgh city limits. As soon as Mayor Luke Ravenstahl signs the legislation, Verizon expects to get to work. “We fully intend to be out in force in the very, very near future,” said Gale Givens, president of Verizon Pennsylvania who continued by saying lots of intitiatives and approaches are a part of the deal. The move breaks a monopoly on cable service held by Comcast.

A proposed amendment to protect funding for Pittsburgh Community TV failed. PCTV will continue getting funding from every Comcast customer in the city. Instead the funds for public, educational and government programming from potential Verizon customers will be determined by a strategic plan yet to be crafted.

Verizon has been given a time frame of six years to build FiOS in the city and make it available to all city residents.