Verizon New England senior vice president and general manager Ellen Corcoran talks about the company’s new cable TV service — available to about 80,000 customers in seven West Bay communities — at a news conference yesterday in Warwick.

The Providence Journal / Bill Murphy Bill Murphy

WARWICK — Verizon Communications launched its cable television service in the West Bay area yesterday, becoming the first new provider of cable TV in Rhode Island in more than 20 years.

The company held a launch ceremony at a new Verizon dispatch facility in Warwick that included a ribbon “cutting” — a convoy of 10 Verizon service trucks rolled off the lot to begin the first installations, with the lead truck breaking through a red ribbon stretched between two poles. Almost at the same time, a small plane flew overhead, towing a banner heralding the new service.

Verizon began taking orders for its fiber-optic FiOS service June 5 — the date on which state regulators said the company could begin its service. The company said it is booking about 200 installations per day.

Attending the ceremony were Lt. Gov. Elizabeth Roberts and Warwick Mayor Scott Avedesian, as well as other elected officials and Verizon executives.

The company has permission from the state to offer the FiOS TV feature in Service Area 6, which includes 79,600 households in Coventry, East Greenwich, Exeter, North Kingstown, Warwick, West Warwick and West Greenwich.

It is seeking permission to offer it in Service Areas 2, 3 and 8, which include 158,000 households in Charlestown, Cranston, Foster, Hopkinton, Johnston, Narragansett, North Providence, Providence, Richmond, Scituate, South Kingstown and Westerly. The company could get final approval for those three areas as soon as this fall, according to a state official.

Getting regulatory approval has been a key challenge for Verizon in some of the 11 states where it now offers the TV service. In Massachusetts, for example, the company must negotiate a separate franchise agreement with each municipality where it wants to offer service.

Verizon has supported a bill there — the Massachusetts Cable Choice and Competition Act — which would allow cable operators to negotiate with a single state agency. The company has said that negotiating town-by-town is time-consuming and expensive.

Local officials have decried that bill, saying it takes communities out of the franchise process, where some believe it should stay.

Cable franchises in Rhode Island are granted at the state level by the Division of Public Utilities and Carriers. The state is divided into nine regions, known as cable television “service areas.” Companies that want to provide cable service have to apply for a license to do so in each of the service areas in which they want to compete. Applications for multiple service areas can be submitted at the same time.

It took about 15 months for Verizon’s application to pass through a three-phase process in which potential cable providers get approval. The company’s second application, filed in March, is expected to take about 7 to 8 months, or about half as much time as the first application.

Donna Cupelo, Verizon’s president for Rhode Island and Massachusetts, said Rhode Island’s application process is much more streamlined than that of other states.

“Rhode Island has been a very easy state to do business with,” she said.

Two states — New Jersey and Florida — are even easier to navigate, she said, because a company can seek permission to offer service statewide with one proceeding in each.

Cupelo said that, beyond the company’s applications for Service Areas 2, 3 and 8, she could not say which if any of the other service areas Verizon is targeting for FiOS expansion.

As to whether Verizon plans to offer the service statewide, she said it depends on how well the launch goes.“We have high expectations that the service will be very successful,” Cupelo said. There is a lot of in-company competition for capital investment money, she said. A successful launch would increase the chances that Verizon will continue to expand FiOS, she said.

“While I can’t announce specific plans, Verizon is very committed to Rhode Island,” Cupelo said. The company’s investment in its new fiber-optic network, which is the backbone of the new FiOS, is in the “hundreds of millions” of dollars, she said.

Verizon has slightly undercut the rates of Cox Communications for the “expanded basic” tier of service. Verizon’s FiOS TV Premier is $42.99 plus $4.99 for the required set-top box rental for a total of $47.98 monthly. Verizon said that comes with more than 200 channels of programming, including 22 high-definition channels. (For those with high-definition TVs, rental of an HD set-top box is $9.99, for a monthly total of $52.98.)

A similar offering by Cox would be its Standard Service combined with Digital Gateway at $56.05, including set-top box rental. That comes with 115 channels, including 15 high-definition channels. (HD set-top box rental does not cost extra.)

Both companies are offering a three-package deal that includes television, telephone and Internet service at a single price. Verizon’s package is $94.99 while Cox’s is $99. Verizon’s rate is good for two years, while Cox says its $99 rate is not a temporary promotional deal.

tbarmann@projo.com