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Nearly Half of Colorado Counties Have Rejected a Comcast-Backed Law Restricting City-Run Internet (vice.com)
bumblebaetuna shares a report from Motherboard: In Tuesday's Coordinated Election, two Colorado counties voted on ballot measures to exempt themselves from a state law prohibiting city-run internet services. Both Eagle County and Boulder County voters approved the measures, bringing the total number of Colorado counties that have rejected the state law to 31 -- nearly half of the state's 64 counties. Senate Bill 152 -- which was lobbied for by Big Telecom -- became law in Colorado in 2005, and prohibits municipalities in the state from providing city-run broadband services.
Some cities prefer to build their own broadband network, which delivers internet like a utility to residents, and is maintained through subscription costs. But ever since SB 152 was enacted, Colorado communities have to first bring forward a ballot measure asking voters to exempt the area from the state law before they can even consider starting a municipal broadband service. So that's what many of them have done. In addition to the 31 counties that have voted to overrule the state restrictions, dozens of municipalities in the state have also passed similar ballot measures. Including cities, towns, and counties, more than 100 communities in Colorado have pushed back against the 12-year-old prohibition, according to the Institute for Local Self Reliance.
Some cities prefer to build their own broadband network, which delivers internet like a utility to residents, and is maintained through subscription costs. But ever since SB 152 was enacted, Colorado communities have to first bring forward a ballot measure asking voters to exempt the area from the state law before they can even consider starting a municipal broadband service. So that's what many of them have done. In addition to the 31 counties that have voted to overrule the state restrictions, dozens of municipalities in the state have also passed similar ballot measures. Including cities, towns, and counties, more than 100 communities in Colorado have pushed back against the 12-year-old prohibition, according to the Institute for Local Self Reliance.
You're suggesting bribery, but I think a lot of state legislators are/were simply motivated by the religious belief that government cannot do anything useful beyond police and military. "Government no make jobs! GOVERNMENT NO MAKE JOBS!!!"
In some ways, that's worse. Bribery is at least logical, and can be outlawed. The cult of the free market on the other hand cannot be reasoned with, nor can you jail someone for it.
The irony of this--Colorado rejects Federal drug laws and goes rogue because the "war on drugs" has become nothing but pork for the prison-industrial complex. Now their counties reject the state's law because it's just pork for the telecoms.
My love is that there's a fight back against these things. My hate is that we even got here in the first place.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
The law itself has provisions allowing for exemption mechanisms.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The ballot initiatives that will allow the communities to build their own networks were only passed yesterday.
They're going to need more than 24 hours to build their municipal networks.
You are welcome on my lawn.
PART 2
CONDITIONS FOR PROVIDING SERVICES
29-27-201. Vote - referendum.
(1) Before a local government may engage or offer to engage in providing cable television service, telecommunications service, or advanced service, an election shall be called on wether or not the local government shall provide the proposed cable television service, telecommunications service or advanced service.
Bribery is at least logical, and can be outlawed. The cult of the free market on the other hand cannot be reasoned with, nor can you jail someone for it.
Bribery can be obfuscated, and the strongest "cult" is the one with the most money to build the biggest church on the most valuable piece of property. Politician say "GOVERNMENT NO MAKE JOBS!!!", corporation/fat-cat say "Good boy, now roll-over while Daddy pays Super-PAC to produce vicious attack-ads to run at all hours on all channels of his big cable network spanning every district."
Politician say "Big cable GOOD! Big cable GOOD!"
Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
I think people who make this argument really misunderstand what is meant when people say that government cannot make jobs, though I suspect there are plenty of people who make the statement and support it without understanding it either.
From a plain language perspective, it's pretty obvious that government can make jobs. At a minimum any government official is holding a job position that wouldn't exist without the government. Those officials will likely create a lot of other government jobs as part of a bureaucracy in service of those initial jobs, much like a company has administrative assistants, HR departments, and plenty of other staff that don't have anything to do with the core business of the company. Similarly, the FBI, IRS, and other government agencies all need staff. The Department of Homeland Security certainly created a lot of jobs in order to fulfill the purposes it was created for.
But here's the funny thing. Government doesn't create jobs, but neither do companies. Sure a company can employee people for some task just like a government does, but the company can't just create any job at its whim. I could pay a few hundred people to create sculptures of 16th century philosophers fashioned entirely out of their own shit, but I could scarcely afford to for very long. It's consumer demand that ultimately creates jobs, and not any one person's particular whims about what kind of labor should be done. Unless you have customers willing to pay for your products, any job you might create is extremely temporary at best.
The notion that governments can't create jobs isn't about whether or not they can pay people to perform some activity. It's plainly obvious that they can. What is really meant by the phrase is that governments can't hope to direct the economy because they cannot possible imagine what it is that people actually want and value most. The Soviets and many others tried and failed miserably to direct economies no matter how much effort they devoted to central planning. That is also plainly obvious from history.
The difference is that a free market system allows for participants to see the kinds of jobs created that they're willing to pay to maintain rather than have them created by government decree. Furthermore, a government ban on municipal services is against free market principles. Also long as a city municipal internet company does not have any unfair competitive advantages by law, there's no reason why that option shouldn't exist. A free market cannot possibly exist if the government has legislated a monopoly.
If it seems that so many people who are in favor of free markets are against the government getting involved in markets its because a business in a free market is able to fail, freeing up the labor it used for other uses. Government jobs tend not to go away once created, even when most people wouldn't want to buy those services in any form. Look no further than the TSA for an example of where the government is forcing something down consumers throats when you'd be hard pressed to find people who would be willing to voluntarily purchase that kind of service.
It's one thing to huff and puff, it's another to take action. Did these communities that "rejected Comcast" actually build their own networks, or are they still using the service that they supposedly rejected?
The communities did not reject Comcast - they voted in favor of allowing the city to provide Internet access (alongside all existing providers.) It's now up to the city to put together a plan to fund and provide that access, and get approval for that plan. In Longmont COs case, once the city voted to exempt itself from the ban, the city proposed floating a bond to fund the build-out, which was approved by the city in yet another vote. The city then did in fact built out a gigabit fiber service. And it's awesome.
lobbyists are just legalized bribery in Washington DC
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
And we'll call it WiMax. And we'll sell it under a name, like Clearwire. And since it isn't encumbered by that nasty last mile problem, like it's FTTH competition offering 1G speeds, it will be great.
Fooled me once.
Have gnu, will travel.
What happens when the fees don't cover the costs? And who is paying to install the infrastructure before there are any fees being collected to pay for it?
Taxpayers are always on the hook for city services. If any service doesn't collect enough fees to cover costs, taxpayers have to fill in the deficit.
First, let me say this. We won. You lost. Nana nana boo boo, stick your head in doo doo.
I know that was childish, but it actually does make me feel better and may well be the best way to address your misinformation and conspiracy theory.
OK. Here's the deal. Ft. Collins taxpayers have agreed, by vote in this election, to allow the city to issue bonds for the broadband enterprise fund, to be repaid by network subscribers. In doing so, we collectively agreed that the benefits outweigh the risks, and we implicitly accept that in the unlikely event of failure we will cover the bonds or face city bankruptcy.
Your objection has been noted, but you have been outvoted,.
If there aren't enough "enterprise fund" monies to cover the costs, the general fund is the next stop.
You are plainly wrong here. The new utility is an enterprise fund, which, in this case, has its finances separated from other city funding.
You've also forgotten, what is true today is not necessarily true tomorrow. Our Fair City has set up lots of "funds" that are intended for a special purpose, only to wind up with a change later that puts the money into the general fund for general spending, or even better, to change the "special purpose" that the fees are spent on. ("Temporary road use fee on the water bill to pay for repair of two sections of road the contractor screwed up" has morphed into "permanent general road repair fund so we can spend the general fund money on something else", for one example.)
Well... Taxation is constrained by TaBOR, so I would not be surprised to learn that some creative redirection has been enacted. But the point here is that you can choose to use other broadband providers, and if you do so you won't have to pay any of the fees charged by the Ft. Collins municipal internet.