RC CitizenView

Rancho Cucamonga City Council causes citizens to pay tens of millions of dollars more for internet and television service with its failure to work with Verizon.

Don’t hold your breath for Verizon FIOS service in Rancho Cucamonga or TV service in Fontana.  Verizon was ready to install the fiber overlay needed to support FIOS service for Rancho in beginning in March of 2007.  As a result of the councils failure to act in a timely manner, the resources Verizon allocated to the project have been deployed in other locations.  This will delay the deployment of FIOS for at least another year.

Council members often state their concern for the tax burden of Rancho citizens, this failure may amount to the largest tax increase in the history of the city.  The availability of FIOS, competing with the existing cable companies would have resulted in lower costs for tens of thousands of residents.  A conservative estimate of 20% in reduced service fees could be realized. This amounts to nearly 20 million dollars in lost savings per year.  Every month the project is delayed, we pay 1.65 million in additional service fees.  The actual savings may well be more than stated here.

Fontana is also affected by the failure to act with TV service dependant on the Etiwanda Verizon facility upgrade.  The council members were more concerned with limiting potential complaints to their offices, than providing state of the art services to their residents at lower costs.

Verizon’s FIOS project was authorized by Public Utility Commission, because it knew a better product at a lower price would be provided.  The council should have made the effort to understand the technology and its real impact on the aesthetics of the city.

So we keep paying for their ineffectiveness.

Click here to read here about the FIOS products we cannot get!