Art finds frustration, hope and that vice grips and duct tape can cure all Just awarded a bid to do 1 million feet of cable in Utah’s west desert. Labor came in at 50 cents a foot (three feet deep with a ribbon). The fiber is about 35 cents a foot. On average, the state owns a third of the lands we have to go through to get to privately owned farms and ranches. Our most recent invoice from the state for a right of way to replace cable adjacent to a paved highway is 84 cents a foot. That doubles the cost. Bureaucrats say to stick it on our subsidy from Universal Service Funds or capitalize it and make a return on the “investment.” Most state lands came by way of admission to statehood when Congress set aside sections 6 and 16 of each township to guarantee money to educate kids. A school administrator said to bill subscribers. Would the PSC allow that? Will parents vote for continued legislative inability to manage state costs as the economic system sucks away public utility enterprise? Is it proper to inquire why state owned facilities and wireless get a free ride? Yet, when legislators are asked to fix Utah law to eliminate or reduce ROW fees across state trust lands (where school kids would benefit by having Internet access by use of such lands) the answer seems to be, “We need the money.” The fun part was when Clinton created the Grand Staircase National Monument in Utah. Part of the compensation for taking school land was $750,000 to be used for communications in rural areas. The cops stole it to help build a statewide cell system. Not one dime for rural communications. First greed, now fraud We send about 36 invoices monthly to different long-distance carriers. Payment for our work to haul and deliver their calls to end numbers. May 2001, Global Crossing stopped paying. When a customer bill is past due, the administrative procedure is called “treatment.” We started treating Global. Every excuse and lie you’ve heard — we also got. They questioned how the calls could be made or if we could prove the bill. In short, our invoices were “disputed.” (All other carriers paid). Chuck even told them the process was a stalling tactic before going bankrupt. “Oh no! We’d never do that!" Near as we can tell, this was the same tactic used on all of us. Slick. Because normal bankrupt process requires disputed claims go to the end of the line. Then any small offer is always accepted. We joined with NECA to settle as a class. Something is good? We got hosed. Vice grips Jim Bull comments on a TV report about my use of Vice Grip pliers on an airplane instrument panel. (Easier to use than the knob that fell off). He was reminded of the “C-clamps” that held part of a Reno TV station together. “The first year, I built a small relay-based machine control device. When it came time to install the machine control system in the base of an RCA console, the mounting holes in the console frame didn’t line up properly. As a temporary measure, I used a pair of 4-inch C-clamps to hold the relay module frame in the console frame. 17 years later, while digging through water-soaked equipment following a studio fire, I discovered the two C-clamps still holding the machine control frame firmly in the in the RCA console frame. “The rule was if duct tape doesn’t cut it, use a C-clamp. When I left KOLO-TV, I probably left behind several dozen strategically located C-clamps. If KOLO engineers dig around the Slide Mountain transmitter they may also find a pair of Vice Grip pliers clamping a hanger bracket to one of the ceiling I-Beams.” Duct tape is mandatory in my outbuildings parts box. It’s a common emergency patch for broken airplane skins. Remember Apollo 13? The Moscow theater When the WTC towers fell and 3000 Americans died, Russian citizens literally buried the American Embassy, consulates and other U.S. offices in Russia with flowers to show their and sympathy. Their tradition. I am happy some Americans reciprocated. On the day of mourning in Russia for lost loved ones, flowers were found on the front steps of the Russian Embassy in Washington and at the Russian Consulate in San Francisco. Hopefully elsewhere. And, I am sure some Russian general is about as angry and sorry as anyone can ever be over the fact that he had to, without all the facts, make a “hard choice.” That’s war Copyright 2002 by A. W. Brothers and Americas Network magazine. All rights reserved.   © Beehive Telephone Co.