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US West brought some of its ranking brass to town a few days ago to explain that, come Nov. 30, Salida will get a modern digital telephone exchange.
We'll have to abandon our improper dialing
habits.
As in most little towns, you don't need to dial
all seven digits here: 9-2068 will connect you with the
chamber of commerce just as well as 539-2068. But progress
will require all seven digits -- in phone company parlance,
proper dialing habits.
But that's not why US West has been in the news elsewhere lately. US West would like to offer information services. Rep. Dan Schaeffer, along with Compuserve and similar computer information networks, opposes this. They've been fighting with ads, press releases, and a stupid US West ploy to clog the phone lines to Schaeffer's office.
In general, I'd prefer that US West was a common carrier, and no more. But here, it isn't as though US West will enter an unfair competition with Compuserve. Compuserve doesn't think Salida is worth serving. US West does. The choice here is between having no information service with a local call, and having at least one information service. That's an easy decision.
Telecommunications in general should be an important part of public policy.
It's important because it determines what kind of state we will live in. If you can stay in touch with the rest of the world through modems, faxes, etc., then you can do business just about anywhere. Economic activity can be dispersed throughout the state. People will use phones a lot, and U.S. West will prosper.
But if you've got to be in the metro area to stay in touch, then economic activity is concentrated. That drives up metro real estate prices, and it results in expensive freeways, extravagant water projects and the like. That makes metro real-estate speculators prosperous.
It should be the job of the governor and legislature to determine whether we live in a state with a dispersed economy, or in a state with a concentrated economy. Either will be a direct result of our state government's telecommunications policy.
Alas, there isn't a policy. The legislature delegates such matters to the Public Utilities Commission, which mostly worries about rates, and the governor speaks eloquently of the need for infrastructure, but stops there.
Without any decisions by the people we pay to make such decisions, then US West ends up making public policy. That's a tremendous responsibility for one corporation which also has its own interests to pursue; it shouldn't be any surprise that US West stumbles from time to time. At least the phone company is trying, which is more than you can say for anybody in the statehouse.
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