To directly answer your question "Why", :
because they have a monopoly on the wired ( as opposed to wireless ) signal distribution system in the municipalities in which they are authorized by local government to provide service.
This is a legacy of cable television, which was the only programming service in the era of its inception which required a bandwidth capacity remotely akin to what is now offered routinely by ISPs.
Government did not want / could not afford the cost of cable TV infrastructure construction.
Rather than encourage competition among service providers using an industry consortium financed infrastructure,
local government, in accord with federal regulatory impetus, pitted service providers in competition against one another to offer the greatest range of service in exchange for exclusive service provider rights.
Because that provider ( eg Cox ) owned the physical distribution network, the wires & amps on the utility poles, they paid to build, they de facto own the provider rights in perpetuity.
Municipal authority sunsetting that exclusive right or reclaiming the power to sell it portends so much uproar of protest regarding service disruption among the voting customer base that the sleeping dog of monopoly was let lay even until now, when that infrastructure, since heavily upgraded for the purpose, remains the only distribution network capable of the volume of users, bandwidth capacity, comparative reliability and economy of scale to support the existing service levels expected by ISP customers, however spotty service may be at a minority of service addresses.
There remains the question of the cost in a very high cost of living economy like Southern California
of the labor force necessary to sustain, let alone grow, such a complex physical infrastructure,
business data the private ISP corporation is unlikely to make available for public scrutiny or analysis,
which local officials are regardless unlikely capable of assessing for sake of regulatory administration.
5G may possibly disrupt this paradigm in an atomizing fashion,
putting service administration decisions back on the customer in lieu of now centralized service admin,
but I prefer that ultrahigh frequency signal remain on a wire rather than my body be bombarded by it any & every place I am.
Likely next step is for Cox to load its corporate assets with debt, securitize that debt, then sell the delivery system & service billing base whole or piecemeal at a price that guarantees the buyer(s) will fail financially, sending the entire delivery infrastructure into escalating decline & collapse. The corporate tax write-down for that cascade of losses becomes an additional cost to the taxpayer base that is the customers for the service.
Actual profits from that set of transactions will be booked to offshore accounts to isolate them from taxation, for which process we can thank the magic circle favored by UK financial regulation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Offshore_magic_circle
I suggest you return to whence you came to resolve the underlying issue.
WOW! Thank you for taking the time to write that explanation. I now understand why AT&T Uverse for TV is not, and will not be made, available in Orleans Parish. I need to delve into this to see if there’s any legal action, such as filing a class action lawsuit, that could possibly cause a change in the status quo.
Until a few years ago, I was basically content with my 3 bundled Cox services. But, then prices increased as the quality and reliability decreased. Calling Cox and/or chatting with an agent thru the app has become a weekly necessity in order to report a problem or get a refund for service outages. Which should be automatically credited since Cox is certainly aware of those outages that are billed and paid for by customers who don’t call to request a credit. There are several other issues, such as the forced rental of equipment rather than buying it from Cox or even Best Buy. And, unresolved “repair ticket” items lasting more than a year (or 2 years in my particular case).
Something needs to be done, or at least attempted, in order to incentivize Cox to do more for its customers.
