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Another North Carolina Community Passes Resolution Against Time Warner Cable Bill

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Bladenboro is yet another community to make its opposition to H129 official with a resolution. We are awaiting at least 2 more official copies of passed resolutions in other NC towns to post as well. A sample resolution is available here [rtf].

A RESOLUTION OF THE TOWN OF BLADENBORO URGING MEMBERS OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY AND GOVERNOR PERDUE TO OPPOSE H129 AND S87 (LEVEL PLAYING FIELD/LOCAL GOVERNMENT COMPETITION ACT) AND ANY LEGISLATION WHICH WOULD PROHIBIT OR LIMIT THE ABILITY OF LOCAL GOVERNMENTS TO PROVIDE BROADBAND OR ANY OTHER COMMUNICATION SERVICES OR SYSTEMS

WHEREAS, Senate Bill 87 and House Bill 129 have been introduced in the 2011-2012 Session of the General Assembly of North Carolina; and

WHEREAS, these bills do not provide a level playing field to cities, to cities, towns and counties, but greatly hinder local governments from providing needed communications services, including public safety networks, and especially advanced high-speed broadband services, in unserved and underserved areas; and

WHEREAS, these bills impose numerous obligations on cities and towns that private broadband companies do not have to meet; and

WHEREAS, while private companies declare top top-quality broadband service is cost prohibitive, the United States continues to lose ground to other nations in broadband access, user cost and growth in number of users, falling behind the United Kingdom, Korea, France, Japan, Canada, Estonia, and now China, each of which provides Internet access at speeds that are some 500 times faster than what the private providers in the United States and at less cost; and

WHEREAS, the bills would prohibit North Carolina cities and towns from using federal grant funds to deploy or operate locally-owned or operated broadband systems, thereby denying N.C. residents access to federal assistance available to the rest of the country and hindering employment opportunities; and

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WOW! No Wonder Time Warner Cable is Pushing Bill to Limit Competition in NC!

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Stacey Higginbotham at GigaOm has explained the entire reason Time Warner Cable and CenturyLink are trying to prohibit communities from building their own networks: North Carolina has some of the worst broadband in America! TWC and CenturyLink know how uncompetitive their services are! The story covers a new broadband map launched by bandwidth.com. nc-bbchart.png Look at these numbers!! North Carolina has SEVEN of the worst 10 places to get broadband in the US. And these are the places in North Carolina that actually have broadband! Imagine how bad it is in the rural areas. Stunning to see the North Carolina Legislators conspiring to limit the ability of communities to invest in themselves when the private sector has no interest in next-generation networks, choosing instead to reap profits off of systems that barely meet the FCC's definition of broadband. With such terribly uncompetitive services, of course Time Warner Cable and CenturyLink have run to the Legislature to ban the community networks that have stepped in to prevent lazy incumbents from killing the future of entire communities in the digital age. As we have been detailing (most recently here), the public is overwhelmingly opposed to Raleigh telling communities they cannot build the networks TWC and CenturyLink will not. What more proof is necessary that the Legislators pushing H129 in North Carolina have sold out the citizens for a few massive companies that just happen to make large donations to their campaigns. We previously charted the superiority of the community fiber networks in North Carolina, but this chart shows just how much the existing cable and DSL companies have left North Carolina communities behind.
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Raleigh Resolution Against Time Warner Monopoly Protection Act

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A resolution opposing H129/S87 from the city of Raleigh:

RESOLUTION NO. 2011 – 322

A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY OF RALEIGH URGING THE STATE TO RECOGNIZE THE ROLE OF MUNICIPALITIES IN THE DEPLOYMENT OF TECHNOLOGY SERVICES FOR THE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF NORTH CAROLINA AND TO EXPRESS CONCERN ABOUT POTENTIAL LEGISLATION TO LIMIT LOCAL GOVERNMENT PROVISION OF BROADBAND SERVICE

Whereas, access to high capacity, high-speed, state-of-the-art broadband networks is essential for our state to compete in the global economy and to provide citizens access to advanced applications in medicine, public safety, energy management and education;

Whereas, the United States is rapidly losing ground to other countries in broadband subscriptions per capita and North Carolina is similarly losing ground to other states;

Whereas, contrary to that trend, the City of Raleigh has made significant strides in ensuring that businesses, citizens, and visitors have access to technology services, providing free WiFi service in the center city area;

Whereas, in March of 2010 the City of Raleigh was named America's Most Wired City by Forbes, ranking higher overall than any other U.S. city in three measures—broadband penetration, broadband access, and plentiful WiFi hot spots;

Whereas, the City of Raleigh's experience demonstrates the economic development benefits of investment in the deployment of advanced networks by public and private providers;

Whereas, Senate Bill 87 and House Bill 129, companion bills entitled Level Playing Field/Local Gov't Competition, were introduced in the 2011 Regular Session of the North Carolina General Assembly; and

Whereas, if enacted the proposed legislation would not have leveled the playing field but instead would have hindered local governments from providing needed communications services, especially advanced high-speed broadband, in underserved areas and imposed burdensome obligations on local governments that private broadband providers would not have to meet;

Whereas, if enacted the proposed legislation would have denied local governments the availability of federal grants under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to assist in providing affordable access to high capacity broadband service in unserved and underserved areas; and

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With New Hope, North Carolina Broadband Struggle Continues

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On Wednesday morning, March 22, the House Finance Committee will again consider H 129, a bill from Time Warner Cable to make it all but impossible for communities to build their own broadband networks. But now, as noted by Craig Settles, the momentum is shifting. Last week, advocates had a big victory when Representatives Faison and Warren successfully amended the bill (each with his own amendment) to make it less deleterious to communities. Unlike the sham voice vote in the Public Utility Committee, Chairman Setzer of the Finance Committee had a recorded vote, allowing citizens to hold their representatives accountable. After these amendments passed, the TWC lobbyist signaled for an aide. Shortly thereafter, the committee decided to table the matter until this week -- when TWC will undoubtedly try to remove or nullify those amendments. In the meantime, AT&T has announced bandwidth caps, yet another reason the state is foolish to pin its broadband future on cable and DSL companies. Compare AT&T's movement to less-broadband with Wilson Greenlight's recent dramatic price decreases in its ridiculously fast broadband network, causing at least one couple to move there! Greenlight is owned and operated by the public power company owned by the city.
Greenlight has signed up its first residential customers with the highest Internet speed available in Wilson. Vince and Linda Worthington, former Johnston County residents, moved to Wilson after finding out that they could have access to 40 Megabits per second Internet speeds at a lower cost than what they were previously paying. "We always wanted the 100Mbps service," she said.
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Asheville Opposes Rep Avila's Attempt to Enshrine Time Warner Cable Monopoly

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The continuing saga of H129/S87 in North Carolina has proved at least one thing, Time Warner Cable knows how to pull the puppet strings. The bill was written by Time Warner Cable and pretends to be about creating a level playing field while it effectively outlaws community networks (and some public safety networks) -- much to Time Warner Cable's financial benefits. It remains unclear whether Representative Avila, who is championing this TWC power grab, truly knows what she is doing or is simply ignorant and blindly trusts the TWC lobbyists actually running the show. After Legislators received a torrent of phone calls opposing TWC's bill, Rep Avila promised to negotiate with communities to find some middle ground and ensure the legislation at least grandfathered existing community networks. Instead, she turned the meetings over to TWC to run -- rather than negotiating, they set their terms. She has made multiple public claims about being reasonable but in private, she has made it clear that this is Time Warner Cable's bill. Communities are dead set against this bill, noting the many ways in which it creates unique barriers for their networks while giving a free pass to TWC. Hardly shocking as TWC wrote the bill and is calling the shots via Rep. Avila (whose own district opposes the bill). Now Asheville has passed a resolution against the bill [pdf], fearing its passage would derail their public safety network. The staff report explains why:
The stated purpose of the bills is to protect jobs and promote investment in North Carolina. The mechanism for protection is structured as restrictions on local government on engaging in what governing boards deem to be public-purpose communication and/or broadband projects.
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Salisbury's Fibrant Making A Difference in Area Schools

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Salisbury's Fibrant network in North Carolina was recently praised in a letter to the editor of a local paper for improving the educational tools in schools. These networks can have a big impact on educational opportunities, from directly improving the connections to the schools (often at lower prices) to lowering the cost of broadband across the entire community, thereby increasing broadband adoption and giving a new educational tool to children in home.
Previously, when the computers in our lab were being used, the entire system was bogged down. We had to limit the use of video and Skype to class periods where the lab computers were not being used. With some programs, we were not able to have a full class on the computers at the same time. ... Next up, we will be able to establish full connectivity between the main building and the kindergarten building. This will enable our phones, paging system, and file sharing to work together for the first time ever, and we are very excited about that!
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Rockingham County, NC, Passes Resolution Against Bill to Limit Community Networks

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Rockingham County has joined Raleigh in officially passing a resolution against legislation to cripple community networks in the state.

 

RESOLUTION
BY THE ROCKINGHAM COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
AGAINST SENATE BILL 87 and HOUSE BILL 129

WHEREAS, Senate Bill 87 and House Bill 129 have been introduced in the 2011-2012 Session of the General Assembly of North Carolina; and

WHEREAS, these bills do not provide a level playing field to cities, towns and counties, but greatly hinder local governments from providing needed communications services, especially advanced high-speed broadband services, in unserved and underserved areas; and

WHEREAS, these bills impose numerous obligations on cities and towns that private broadband companies do not have to meet; and

WHEREAS, private companies, despite having received favorable regulatory and tax treatment to enable broadband investment, have chosen to avoid the financial commitment necessary to provide top quality services to all residents and businesses; and

WHEREAS, while private companies declare top quality service is cost-prohibitive in our country, the United States continues to lose ground to other nations in broadband access, user cost and growth in number of users, falling behind the United Kingdom, Korea, France, Japan and Canada to name a few, and Japan has Internet access that is at least 500 times faster than what is considered high-speed in the United States and at less cost; and

WHEREAS, the bills would prohibit North Carolina cities and towns from using federal grant funds to 

deploy or operate locally-owned or operated broadband systems, thereby denying N.C. residents access to federal assistance available to the rest of the country and hindering employment opportunities; and

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Bill to Limit Broadband Competition in North Carolina Heads to House Finance Committee Next Week

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On Wednesday, the bill to effectively ban community networks in North Carolina was passed out of the House Public Utilities Committee and will likely be heard by the Finance committee next week. The audio is available here from the Wednesday meeting [mp3, 45 min]. It never fails to shock me how cavalierly some Committees refuse to discuss the bill, agreeing to let another Committee fundamentally change the bill. There is practically no discussion of what this bill does and very little discussion about the actual pros and cons of different approaches to providing broadband. Listening to the discussion, one gets the distinct impression that a household either has "broadband" or doesn't. There is no discussion of the known failure of the private sector to invest in next-generation networks. If I were a Representative in North Carolina, I would be sure to ask why no private sector provider is building next-generation fiber-optic networks like those in Wilson, Salisbury, and hundreds of communities served by Verizon's FiOS outside the state. There is no discussion of the wisdom of relying on last-century cable and copper networks. Horse and buggy Those pushing this bill have no idea what they are doing. They may gut the potential for full fiber-optic networks in the state as the rest of the world charges forward building these networks. They are defending the horse-and-buggy industry in the age of automobiles. Listen for the North Carolina Chamber of Commerce weighing in against community networks, the only entities investing in the next-generation networks needed for the digital economy. The Chamber cares more about its high profile members (cable and phone companies) than the 99% of businesses in North Carolina that need the kind of broadband available in Wilson and Salisbury. These organizations should not be allowed to get away with pretending to represent business interests in the state.
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