I guess it could be called the “Charter Bungle” instead. For the second time in six weeks or so, local business lost their phones Friday Night and the ability to process credit card transactions. When one local restaurant owner called for help, Charter said they could be out in the morning. For the new guys in town, open for night six, on a football weekend, it added some added stress to opening a new place. Word in today’s OA News about the city’s deal with Knology will be good news for many. Local restaurants just need to make the move to AT&T and the service they have. Hey, you get what you pay for. Pay a little for Charter and get a little.

I’m not sure what all the confusion is about regarding the plan Opelika has for a competive system to Charter Cable.  It’s a vote of whether you would like the service from Charter or a system provided by the City of Opelika.  Sure, it would use the Smart Grid to deliver service, but a Smart Grid can also make your home more efficient. Is the city going to use it to cut off your power, well folks, they can do that now.  It’s a smiple vote, want the city to compete with Charter and maybe Knowledgy in the future, vote yes. Here’s some comments from the Mayor.

The referendum Opelika citizens will have the opportunity to vote on August 10th is about cable competition for Charter Communications.  Here is the exact wording that will be on the ballot: “Shall the City of Opelika, Alabama, be authorized to acquire, establish, purchase, construct, maintain, lease and operate a cable television system for the purpose of furnishing cable service to subscribers?”  That will be the only question on the ballot.  Every Opelika mayor the past 20 years has heard numerous complaints about Charter; mostly about their high price and poor service.  In markets where Charter has competition their prices are much lower.  We’ll offer, if our citizens approve, much more at less cost and we’ll offer access to every home and citizen in the corporate limits of Opelika.  There are a number of areas in Opelika today that have no access to cable TV.  We’ll also have local customer service….no more calling an 800 number and having to wait 20 minutes to speak to a real person.  Our proposed system will use fiber optics which means we will offer more HD TV channels and true high speed internet.  If you need 25, 50 or even 100 Mbps upload and download, we can provide that.  If you want just the regular up and down speed for internet, it will still be faster than Charter.
 
There has been a deliberate attempt by our opponents to create confusion regarding the smart grid aspect of our project.  We began installing an automated meter reading system back in 2002 when the Opelika City Council approved the purchase of that system and the majority of our customers have those meters at their home today.  The mission of Opelika Light & Power is to deliver reliable electrical service to our customers at the lowest possible price.  Fiber will allow us to improve our existing smart grid which means we’ll know instantly when power outages occur, rather than relying on customers to report them.  The faster we know there is an outage, the faster we can get it fixed, which means customer inconveniences or loss of production is reduced.  We’ll be able to react automatically to some types of power outages, re-routing power and reducing outage restoration time to seconds for many customers rather than minutes or hours.  We will be able to offer customers options to choose to pay lower electric rates when it is less expensive to generate power and higher rates when it is more expensive to generate power.  With near real-time data available through smart meters, customers will be able to make choices about when to use electricity and better manage their electric use and budgets without sacrificing comfort and convenience.  But this will be your choice and the City will not make that decision for you. 

A “yes” vote on August 10th is a game changer for future economic development projects, too.  Many high tech companies will not consider a community that doesn’t have fiber optics available.  The citizens of our community own Opelika Light & Power and our citizens will also own the cable company.  A “yes” vote on August 10th means, finally, competition for Charter Communications! ~ Mayor Gary Fuller

City Council Chamber will be packed Tuesday Night for discussion.  Councilman Smith wanted to move to a larger venue, after the announced meeting, which would be against procedures, after announcing a meeting at City Hall.  Get their early for the 7PM meeting, as the Fire Marshall will stritly enforce the allowable number of folks in the room, just like they do for bars and restuants in the area.