Optimum West is a division of Cablevision that operates in the Rocky Mountain area, servicing Montana

Montana

Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...

, Wyoming

Wyoming

Wyoming is a state in the mountain region of the Western United States. The western two thirds of the state is covered mostly with the mountain ranges and rangelands in the foothills of the Eastern Rocky Mountains, while the eastern third of the state is high elevation prairie known as the High...

, Utah

Utah

Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...

 and Colorado

Colorado

Colorado is a U.S. state that encompasses much of the Rocky Mountains as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the Great Plains...

. It offers digital cable, high speed internet

Internet

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...

, and digital voice services to over 300,000 subscribers.

The cable systems that operate under Optimum West were formerly owned by Bresnan Communications which Cablevision acquired on June 13, 2010 for $1.37 billion.

Bresnan Communications history

Bresnan Communications was formed by William Bresnan

William Bresnan

William J. Bresnan was an American businessman who founded Bresnan Communications in 1984. He was also the chairman of the company until his death in 2009....

 in 1984, originally operating cable systems on Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Over the next fourteen years, its operations spread to Minnesota Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

, Mississippi

Mississippi

Mississippi is a U.S. state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The name of the state derives from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, whose name comes from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi...

 and Georgia

Georgia (U.S. state)

Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...

. In 1994, the company added international operations in Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

 and Poland, with the creation of Bresnan International Partners. The company reached 400,000 subscribers after purchasing systems from TCI

Tele-Communications Inc.

Tele-Communications, Inc. or TCI was a cable television provider in the United States, for much of its history controlled by Bob Magness and John Malone....

. When AT&T

AT&T Broadband

AT&T Broadband was the name of AT&T's cable operations, which were composed of the assets of TCI and MediaOne, Prime Cable, as well as two Comcast cable systems AT&T acquired later in a system swap. Formed in 1999, AT&T Broadband was the largest provider of cable television services...

 acquired TCI, Bresnan began to consider an IPO. Before that could occur, Paul Allen's

Paul Allen

Paul Gardner Allen is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. Allen co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates...

 Charter Communications

Charter Communications

Charter Communications is an American company providing cable television, high-speed Internet, and telephone services to more than 4.7 million customers in 25 states. By revenues, it is the fourth-largest cable operator in the United States, behind Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Cox Communications...

 made an offer, and purchased Bresnan's U.S. cable systems for $3.1 billion, organizing them under Charter Communications' umbrella.

Bresnan re-entered the cable business in April 2002, with the $735 million purchase of former AT&T Broadband

AT&T Broadband

AT&T Broadband was the name of AT&T's cable operations, which were composed of the assets of TCI and MediaOne, Prime Cable, as well as two Comcast cable systems AT&T acquired later in a system swap. Formed in 1999, AT&T Broadband was the largest provider of cable television services...

 Rocky Mountain systems from Comcast. The acquisition included some 300,000 subscribers in Montana, Wyoming, Utah and Colorado.

Bresnan Communications currently has 1300 employees across its various systems. It is headquartered in Purchase, New York

Purchase, New York

Purchase, New York is a hamlet of the town of Harrison, in Westchester County. Its ZIP code is 10577. Its name is derived from Harrison's purchase, for Harrison could have as much land as he could ride in one day...

 with offices in the four states in which it operates.

Union workers

The Communications Workers of America

Communications Workers of America

Communications Workers of America is the largest communications and media labor union in the United States representing about 550,000 members in both the private and public sectors. The union has 27 locals in Canada via CWA-SCA Canada representing about 8,000 members...

 (CWA) represented several organized Bresnan units through a collective known as Bresnan Workers United. Bresnan, in keeping with current industry culture, has opposed attempts to organize unions and the majority of its employees remain unorganized with most facilities electing to decertify. Currently no employees at the Regional Operations Center [ROC] in Billings, Montana are union represented. The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers

International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers

The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers is a labor union which represents workers in the electrical industry in the United States, Canada, Panama and several Caribbean island nations; particularly electricians, or Inside Wiremen, in the construction industry and linemen and other...

(IBEW) does represent several Bresnan employees in Missoula, Montana and they remain the only Bresnan employees who have elected to remain union organized.