Becker's Letter To Council
Below is the cover-letter for a packet of information provided to the City Council on Friday. Packet for City Council members
Dear Council members,
At the last meeting, Councilwoman McVey asked for information to be provided in advance with your packet of information. Councilman Matthews echoed that sentiment as well. With that in mind, I prepared the enclosed material to be included for the upcoming meeting.
I was at the City Clerk / City Manager’s offices yesterday asking how I could get my material included; Mr. Bagby refused my information and informed me that I needed to mail it to you directly. You are welcome to confirm this information with Lori Phelps or Nevada Young who were both present in the office at the time.
Mr Bach presented to you at the last meeting that the expense to operate and maintain the Internet service for all Internet customers, not just open access, was $2.5 million dollars annual. City Cable’s Internet income of $1.44 million is dwarfed by that figure.
Only six weeks prior, Mr. Bach is on record at the June 7th meeting of the Advisory Board showing that Internet income is only $1.23 million dollars annually. Even if you add in the $210,000 in Modem Rental income, you still only get to $1.44 million dollars.
There is no way that Internet service of City Cable is being subsidized by our citizens by over $1 million dollars a year.
It certainly appears that the reported $2.5 million dollar operations and maintenance expense was exaggerated and inflated to make you think Open Access rates needed to be raised.
The month before Mr. Bach is on record stating that City Cable’s Internet service expenses are only $1.2 million dollars a year, well under the $1.44 million in revenue.
Thank you for your time to view the enclosed information and I hope that you will consider rescinding City Ordinance 7194.
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call me. My cell phone number is 573.778.6500. My email address is brian@semo.net
Thank you,
Brian Becker
Packet for City Council members
He is a typical government worker…….good luck on your endeavor!
The large cable companies such as Comcast, Charter, Boycom, etc are under no obligation to share their network infrastructure with competing companies. If for instance Comcast decides to lay down lines to serve a particular area they are the ONLY ones that you will be able to get service with.
Why should City Cable have to let a competing company use their infrastructure?
Actually, Brian is being WAY too kind. Doug Bagby’s EXACT words were:
“You can’t put anything in the council’s packets. You’re a pain in the ass and you’ve already caused my office 2 days of work. They’ve spent enough time on you. If you want something to go to the council members, you can mail them yourself.”
You asked, “Can I get that in writing, that you won’t allow me to put anything in the packets?”
He said, “No.” and walked away.