PORTLAND – A federal court ruling that allows Naples to pass an ordinance listing the services it would require from a cable operator looking to serve the town has been hailed as a victory for dozens of other Maine communities.

U.S. Magistrate Judge David Cohen issued the ruling last week in a lawsuit by Adelphia Communications Corp., a Pennsylvania-based cable giant that serves more than 100 cities and towns and 200,000 households in the state.

Patrick J. Scully, the lawyer who represented Naples, said the ruling may empower other communities to demand that Adelphia live up to promises to upgrade its system and provide free Internet access to schools and municipal buildings.

“All those communities know now Adelphia will have to negotiate in good faith on franchise renewals,” Scully said. “They’ve seen a court say ‘No’ to the bully, basically.”

A spokesman for Adelphia said Scully is misrepresenting the company’s stance and that the company has made the town a great offer in negotiations.

“The folks on our operations side were scratching our heads,” said Gerald Buckley, Adelphia’s New England director of government relations. “We thought we had given them an exceptional offer – not a good offer, an exceptional offer.”

The town said Adelphia was refusing to follow through on commitments it made two years ago, when it completed a $2.1 billion purchase of Denver-based FrontierVision Operating Partners.

To win approval of the sale, Adelphia negotiated and signed an agreement with a coalition of 56 cities and towns, including Naples.

The deal called for the company to convert cable systems in any town that renewed its franchise with Adelphia for 10 years to modern fiber-optic systems. Under the agreement the company also would provide free high-speed Web access to schools, libraries and local government buildings.

Meanwhile, Naples’ 15-year franchise agreement with FrontierVision was due to expire in March 2000. After months of negotiations, the town was unable to reach an agreement for a renewal.

Scully said the town demanded that the promises Adelphia made in the transfer agreement be part of the new franchise agreement and the company refused.

Buckley said the company still intends to build the fiber-optic system and will provide Internet access to all schools and public libraries. The company believes the part of the agreement that called for it to provide the access to other public buildings is “no longer relevant” because of court decisions that have said Internet access is not a cable service.

When the selectmen signaled their intention to adopt a cable ordinance, the company sued. But Cohen, in an 11-page ruling, said the court could not block the ordinance before it was passed.