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Anti-Muni Broadband Bills Country Wide
Ant writes "Broadband Reports says that 14 and possibly more states that have or will pass(ed) bills banning community-run broadband. Free Pass shows a map breakdown of the states while Tallahassee.com takes a look at a newly proposed bill in Florida, backed by Sprint, BellSouth, Verizon, and Comcast, designed to bog down the muni-development process."
'S truth. CATV stood not for CAble TV, but for Community Antenna TV.
"But all your emitter and collector are belong to me!"
The bill in the works for Texas would kill not only municipal internet service but could be used to shut down municipal web sites, information channels, etc. "Information" services is a large amount of stuff to block with a single piece of legislation.l
http://www.freepress.net/communityinternet/=TXbil
Under the bill, municipalities and municipal electric utilities would be prohibited from providing, directly or indirectly, alone or in partnership with other service providers, either "telecommunications" or "information" services as those terms are defined under federal law.
That would make sense. There's plenty of precedent for this sort of thing like local electric cooperatives. And even with those, there are thriving electric companies. For example, Ameren operates here and even owns a nuclear plant in the county to the east of here, but there's also the Boone Electric Cooperative.
GOD.. R... T... F... A...!!!
It's stopping local governments from doing it!
---- It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again. It does this whenever it's told.
In my small town of Spencer, IA we have a municipal provider of electricity, cable TV, phone, and broadband.
Phone costs $10.50/mo per line.
Basic Cable costs $5.00/mo
3Mbit/sec broadband costs $27.50/mo.
Not to mention some of the lowest electric rates in the state.
The reason we did this was because the local cable company had spent decades gouging on the prices on cable and having crappy service and we finally had enough of it and built our own system.
Mediacom still is around, but now charging fair prices. This municipal effort INCREASED COMPETITION, breaking the monopoly the phone and cable companies enjoyed for so many years.
I'm a firm believer in Municipal Utilities, if you have the chance to write a letter to your congresspeople by all means do it now.
My poetry site welcomes the unusual.
They do try. The Saginaw Spirit hocky team tried to buy exclusive use of our public ice rink a while back (not the rink itself, just wanted it closed to the public for the three months of the year that people occasionally go there so they can practice). Thankfully, they're even more broke than the city and couldn't afford it, since the city council just loves to sell public facilities. Dr. Shaheen (rich retired doctor who's into real estate in the area) has bought most of them. It's not always a bad thing when a businessman buys a public facility, though. All the ones Shaheen bought are still public facilities, it's just that they're clean now. That's more than can be said for the Court Theatre.
1.) This legislation is despicable.
2.) Don't take my word for it. Listen to Prof. Lessig's first podcast for a thoroughly considered explanation of why this is not in our best interest.
I said thsi last time, but I'll say it again:
I trust my local government that I can talk to anytime I feel like it more than I trust a company that most likely doesn't even have a local office let alone someone I can talk to at a whim.
& except for the case of Philly most community broadband is setup by small area not getting serviced by the big companies. Which is exactly where I am. I live in a town of 5000, 6000 if you include the farmers til halfway to the next group of towns. I can see my mayor at my local grocery store or bar... Or even a step further I can visit him at his home. Same with any of the city council members.
Want to talk to Verizon (who 'owns' the local phoen lines and 'sometimes' offers DSL)? Well that's gonna be a 30 mile drive to the biggest city in the region. Then you can talk to a peon behind the billing desk, because no one else will talk to you...
So uh yeah when I can personally smack the mayor upside the head for being a dumbass or a company where I can't even talk to anyone above a receptionist... Well I'll take the local government thanks.
we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
I'm in Illinois, on the danger list. Here's what I wrote to my State Senator. Feel free to use any part of this text if you wish.
Dear Senator Raoul:
I am writing to request that you take action on the amendment concerning municipal provision of communications services to Senate Bill 499. It is very important that this amendment be prevented from becoming law. The offensive text of the amendment reads as follows:
This amendment represents a spectacular example of public corruption, in which the public interest is sacrificed to curry favor with large telecommunications companies. These companies are determined to stamp out municipal provision of broadband services so as to preserve the near-monopolies they so notoriously abuse, and apparently are prepared to lavishly endow with campaign contributions any legislators who are willing to assist them.Note that this draconian legislative proposal would prevent municipalities from constructing their own broadband networks even in poor and rural areas that are under-served by the telecom industry, and that might obtain substantial economic benefits by investing in their own network infrastructure.
Note also that since there are currently several other states that have passed, or are in the process of passing similar legislation at the behest of the telecom industry, a competitive advantage will likely flow from those states to states that do not hog-tie their own citizens to prevent them from building their own high-tech infrastructure at the expense of their own tax dollars.
This piece of legislation is a scandal and an outrage. It is as if a waste management company had bribed legislators to forbid municipalities from building their own sewers or operating their own garbage trucks. I intend to track this issue very closely indeed, as it is a very high priority for me. I am certain that there are many other technology-savvy voters in this district who feel the same way.
Best Regards etc.
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