PROVO — The iProvo project won't break even in the next five years, according to a new projection generated by the Provo City Council.

The revelation, partially contested by city staff, is one piece of a wealth of information released over the past month as the mayor and City Council have debated the best way to cover construction debt for the project that brings digital cable TV, Internet and phone services to Provo subscribers.

Other disclosures include projections that set the break-even point at more than 16,000 subscribers or even as high as nearly 18,000 subscribers, more than 50 percent of the city's residences.

The debate on the debt payments is scheduled to continue tonight at 7 at City Hall, 351 W. Center. The council is expected to vote to use surplus sales tax revenue collected this year to help make iProvo's debt payments for the next fiscal year.

Nearly 10,000 Provoans — almost one-third of residences — subscribe to iProvo phone, Internet or cable TV services. Initial projections saw 10,000 as the break-even point. A year ago, iProvo manager Kevin Garlick projected the break-even point between 13,000 and 15,000.

A number of setbacks have pushed that point higher, including subscribers who take one service instead of two (double-play) or three (triple-play.)

The fiber-optic telecommunications network does cover its operating costs and the majority of its debt payments, but iProvo is not generating enough revenue to make the full payments on the $39.5 million bond that paid for its construction.

The annual bond bill is $3.2 million. Mayor Lewis Billings asked the City Council for a $1.2 million loan in the next budget year, which begins July 1.

That request spurred the city council to request a five-year projection, which the city made public. It showed iProvo operating in the red for three more years, then turning the corner sometime in late 2010 or early 2011 with between 16,330 and 17,110 subscribers.

But the projection contained an error. It failed to include the first payments to pay back loans already made by the city's energy department to iProvo.

The energy department has loaned $3.08 million to iProvo this year and last. Those two loans will be paid back with 5.38 percent interest beginning in 2010.

City Council Chairman George Stewart created new projections that show iProvo will have deficits of more than $550,000 in 2011 and $700,000 in 2012.

Kevin Garlick, iProvo manager, said the error shouldn't be that dire.

"We did have a math error that was caught and corrected," he said. "We've gone back through and looked at some of the assumptions. We found some other offsetting issues, so we still think we'll have positive numbers in those two years. We think we can make this thing turn in (2011) and (2012)."