Phone Companies’ Redlining not Good for Digital Divide

[SOURCE: Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, AUTHOR: James Bertram, Mayor of Lockhart, Texas]
[Commentary] First-of-its-kind video franchise legislation written on behalf of the big phone companies made dubious history when the Texas legislature enacted it this year. But before Congress, Indiana and other states consider mimicking this legislation, they should look under the hood. For if they do, they will realize that what was sold as a plan for competition is really just a road map for the Bells to systematically redline minority and low-income communities by bypassing them in the deployment of their high-speed fiber networks. The big phone companies’ attempt to balkanize their rollout of high-speed facilities, and to systematically exclude low-income and minority communities, runs contrary to federal law, local franchise agreements and sound public policy. For decades, the Supreme Court has recognized that “separate is inherently unequal.” By pushing a policy that will deepen an already cavernous digital divide, the big phone companies seem bent on keeping us separate -- and therefore unequal -- a bit longer.
http://www.fortwayne.com/mld/journalgazette/news/editorial/13931726.htm