Let Cities Build Better Internet-Access Networks
This article is for subscribers only.
April 18 (Bloomberg) -- Last month, a majority of theGeorgia House of Representatives voted against a proposal thatwould have barred cities from investing in their own Internet-access networks. The bill failed because Georgia municipalities,businesses and minority advocates want Internet access that’sfaster and less expensive than what commercial providers nowoffer them.
This is a turning point in what has been a multiyear,state-by-state effort by major commercial Internet-accessproviders -- AT&T Inc., Time Warner Cable Inc. and CenturyLinkInc., banded together within the American Legislative ExchangeCouncil -- to erect state barriers to competition from localpublic-private partnerships. Nineteen states have such laws inplace.