Thoughts on Sovereignty

Don't you just hate it when somebody steps in to thwart your plans and keep you from doing something -- especially when that something is good for you? And, what really ticks you off is when they do it because they think they can?

You hear about states getting really testy over issues where the federal government seems to want to pre-empt the states' rights. For them, it's an issue of sovereignty, "the full right and power of a governing body to govern itself without any interference from outside sources or bodies". States get pretty upset about outsiders 'interfering' in their business.

And yet, the states seem to think that counties should not have such rights -- and that thinking is proving harmful not only to their counties, it's harmful to the states themselves. 

Consider the impact that preventing local leadership from deciding issues regarding whether or not to move ahead with fiber optic broadband and high speed internet has on their counties' long-term prosperity and sustainability.

Mayors' comments, January 2016

“There's a compelling need for fiberoptic broadband in the county.” the Mayor said softly. “It's become a real issue for our citizens and for our local businesses. Two of our local businesses moved to a nearby town because it was the only way they could remain competitive. At an economic development meeting last week, we heard that a company was inquiring about land to site a new facility but they moved on to look at other sites because we don't have broadband. We didn't get so much as a phone call.

“And our schools, it's a big issue there, too. If we don't prepare our kids, they won't be able to compete in life. If we don't change with the times, there's no telling what this place will look like in ten years”

That in a nutshell is a composite of my conversations with county mayors and county executives across Tennessee, especially those whose counties border the seven cities in Tennessee that have the broadband and high

speed internet they lack.

Almost to a man, county mayors recounted the impact of business opportunities lost to the county next door. To be more specific, the city next door because the counties in which the cities exist don't have broadband either. Morristown and Chattanooga are examples: cities with broadband in a counties (Hamblen and Hamilton, respectively) that doesn't.

And, again almost to a man, it seems that the Mayors look to their state senators and representatives for a solution but hold out little hope that they'll get the help they need.

There's a story here that needs telling and I begin it from the perspective of understanding the perception of power. The details of the quandary all county mayors and county commissions face come later.

There is a misconception about local politicians' power relative to the power of their state counterparts. County Mayors look to their representatives actually represent them, to do their bidding for them and to use their perceived power and influence in that distant state house to help them with projects that will, in turn, help the Mayors' constituencies (which are also theirs, though many forget that).

I listened to a Mayor tell me that the legislation I am promoting, and that they want --to bring broadband and high speed internet to Tennessee's rural communities -- would fail. When he went on to tell me why, it was clear that he was describing a scenario in which the senator or representative was openly working against the will of his county and framing it as 'the way it's going to be'.

There's something wrong with this picture – and there's a way to change it.

First, the 'way it is'. It's the perception projected and reinforced by the the state legislators that drives the framing of the discussion. They will say, “Business should be left to the private sector. After all, they're the job creators, they're the investors. They're putting up the money. They call the tunes.” When that fallacy* (BS) goes unchallenged, it becomes accepted fact.

Sadly, county mayors and county commissioners believe it, and genuflect accordingly. In truth, it is (or can be) the local bodies that (can) call the tune – if only they recognized that they have the power – and how it works, or can.

County mayors and county commissioners working together have (or can have) the power because they are the ones closest to the people, and they are the ones who can rally the people to bring out the votes. They rarely see this is the case. This accounts for the genuflection, the collaboration with state legislators in which they assume the subordinate role.

A case in point is found in the way the expansion (or lack of) of broadband throughout the state has evolved. Here, some cities took charge of their own destinies, while others did not. The outcomes of these differing choices speak volumes.

Over the last twenty or so years, it became clear that fiber optic broadband and high speed internet are as necessary for community development and economic growth as electricity was found to be essential in the 1920s.

Deciding who gets this awesome, disruptive power has changed over the last twenty years. Prior to 1999, the deciders were the giant internet service providers, the AT&Ts, Comcasts and Charters, who used their significant power and influence in Washington as well as the states to craft a 'sharing' arrangement which led to geographic 'turfs', much like the mobs did historically. Each one gets a geographic region to exploit, free of competition from the others. They agree on pricing, service and the like in a general sense but they're quite clear on one thing: customers get little or no say.

In this model, many parts of each territory will receive short shrift because there's no economic justification to be there. Consumers can clamor all they want but the reality is all consumers the in an area have only have one provider – take it or leave it – and many of them don't get it at all.

Now, companies can't just do that – or can they? They can if the state legalizes it. And, they did. Corporate lobbyists greased the palms of legislators and told them, often explicitly, “We want to go where the business is and we don't want to go where it's too little to be profitable. And, we don't want anyone else to go there either. Make it so.”

In Tennessee in 1999, that approach was wearing thin. City folk, mainly, were tired of getting little or no service, having their prices increased at will and, more often than not, being ignored by their service providers and helpless to do anything about it. Finally, they got so mad that their combined complaints forced their legislators to let another competitor in – the public electric utility.

To be clear, fiber optics came in to use, not for internet, but to improve the performance of the electric systems themselves. Broadband and High speed internet were an 'overlay' on the electric grid – and a potentially profitable one. Potentially, because it was very expensive and there was no guarantee it would be accepted.

Accepting that they would have to concede some business, the large ISPs negotiated an agreement to wit the public electric utilities would offer competing services but limit those offerings to only their electric customers, or their 'footprint'. Electric co-operatives were excluded from participating.

This limitation was significant because it prevented many utilities from serving their own counties, many parts of which were served by electric co-ops. That's why Morristown can't offer its services to Hamblen County, Chattanooga can't serve Hamilton, etc.

Fast forward five years or so. Seven public utilities had taken on the challenges. They used bond issues, grants and lines of credit to get started and had business plans that predicted five or more years to achieve break even. Happily, many were in the black in three years or less.

And, their success made two things clear: open competition leads to better outcomes for consumers; and, broadband technology really is every bit as necessary as electricity, water, roads and bridges. In short, it is a public utility and should be considered as such. The major ISPs disagreed, and they held on to the 1999 agreement with iron fists.

Something else became clear as well. The cities that had broadband and high speed internet grew and prospered well beyond the fortunes of the rest of the state's communities – precisely due to the importance of the technology to so many aspect of society. Businesses needed it for the speed and the capacity to handle huge quantities of data and video in record time. Schools needed it because it revolutionized the ways education is delivered to students of all ages, including working adults pursuing degrees part time. The medical field suddenly found value in changing the ways care is delivered – long distance, and at far lower costs. Insurance companies salivated at how the amazing decrease in the costs of delivering care impacted their bottom lines.

Sadly, counties adjacent to the cities found themselves unattractive to new businesses and industry, all of which demanded broadband as a condition for locating new facilities. Now it was clear that the law protecting the large ISPs was harming counties, education, care delivery and more. A change was needed.

The change is still needed in some twenty states, and it is strongly resisted by the ISPs who insist that business should be left to the private sector, and that governments should not compete with private interests – the so-called 'job creators'. Not surprisingly, they won't acknowledge that by protecting their

interests, they have inhibited economic growth and the jobs that come with it, hobbled the state's public school systems, prevented the expansion of tele-medicine into rural communities, and more. Worse still, they've done this for over seventeen years – in at least twenty states.

Just as fiber optic technology has transformed so many areas of society, it is now becoming clear that local communities should themselves become the engines of transformative, disruptive change.

Looking at the old, and in many cases still 'current' political structure, power is derived from money, at the expense of voters. Counties see themselves as less the drivers than as pawns in power games.

Local communities recognize that laws passed at the state level are harmful and, that often times (some would say 'more often than not), legislators are influenced by campaign donors at their expense. But, they feel somewhat powerless to change the 'system'. They know that when legislation is introduced to free their communities to pursue their own destinies (and return sovereign rights of self determination to local leadership), it will be met with an onslaught of money and lobbyists directed at state legislators. It's a given, it's understood, and it's accepted.

Enter another advantage of the internet. The power of information. If people are elected by voters to serve the people for the common good, it follows that legislators who are serving the corporate good should be identified and called out. If they insist on doing their donor's bidding, they should be tossed out.

How does a body know for sure what their representative's motives are? By searching the internet to see who the donors to the representative are and just how much a legislator gets from them. In the case of broadband, one only has to look into each politician's pubic records, as aggregated on sites like www.followthemoney.org and compare the legislator's votes to the amount of money received.

Then, it is incumbent upon the local legislators to inform their constituents. If, say, not having broadband and high speed internet is increasingly threatening to a community's current economic viability; and if the county's future prospects are at risk for lack of an essential public utility; and if the quality of education a county's youth receive puts theirs and the county's future prospects in jeopardy, it is incumbent on the county to act to regain its sovereign rights to secure its current and future prosperity.

Further, if the threat goes beyond one county, to envelop other counties and, indeed, the state itself, it is incumbent upon the local legislators of all counties and communities to unite to undertake a class action against the state itself.

It is also incumbent upon well-informed and educated citizens to share the knowledge with their fellow citizens and to unite them, beyond county lines if necessary, to call out their legislators and to demand they do what's right.

I believe there is ample proof on the internet and elsewhere to make the case that counties from one end of Tennessee to the other are experiencing serious and grievous harm at the hands of their state legislators and that they are further threatened by the actions of their legislators in the new session of the 2016 legislature. And, should that prove to be the case, local legislators are in their rights to inform their constituents and ask them to unite to unseat their representatives statewide – and sue the state for compensatory damages.

There is ample evidence that by allowing public electric utilities to expand, those utilities that did so have prospered above and beyond expectations – and that, had the entire state done so, the state would have attracted more investment, created thousands more jobs and had the wherewithal to lift the fortunes of the majority of its citizens, which is indeed its implied mandate. Of the people, by the people, for the people.

One final thought. Tennessee is not the only state that threatens its own counties' current and future prosperity. If it takes aggressive steps to change, the result can be that the state will be viewed as more attractive than the nineteen other states that will remain entrenched and willingly put themselves behind the curve. On second thought, I believe the number should be eighteen states because Alabama is starting to take the steps necessary to expand broadband.

Citizens of Tennessee, Don't take too long to make a decision.

 Joe Malgeri

* Consider: Since implementing broadband and high speed internet in their   

   cities,

• Chattanooga has added some 2800 new jobs
• attracted bright, young creatives, many of whom are starting new ventures of their own
• attracted venture capital to fund the better ideas
• introduced new ways of educating their students via interactive lessons with universities in California
• Morristown has attracted new businesses with hundreds of new jobs
• Pulaksi has added over a thousand new jobs innate-related fields
• Clarksville attracted a $600 million investment from Google

Consider which of these awesome advances would have come about had the city mayors, county commissioners and local businesses not taken on the giants. 

Consider, too, that the reasons that ISPs still fight the bills necessary to bring much needed changes to Tennessee are the same old hackneyed claims that were proven false. 

Finally, consider that the only way that ISPs can thwart the state's advance into the 21st century is if our own state's elected officials sell us out.

They can, and they will, unless Tennesseans step us to tell them to do the right thing -- and dump them if they don't.

CITIZENS, tell your County Commissions and County executives to pass Resolutions spelling out your desires (A link to Jefferson County's Resolution, passed November 16, 2015, is included below

CITIZENS, sign petitions demanding broadband and high speed internet throughout your counties

CITIZENS, write, call, email your representatives, and the Governor, and your local newspapers, and your local talk shows, and your local TV media

Finally, CITIZENS, make sure to share this post with your friends, families, local businesses, educators and anyone who has a vested interest in making Tennessee a prospering state.

Jefferson County Resolution

https://www.dropbox.com/s/bv61t6n5prt748c/JC%20Resolution.pdf?dl=0

A Roadmap you can use to find your own legislators and advice on how to proceed
www.4adnamictn.blogspot.com
Look for the article: Marching Orders