Date: Wed, 14 May 1997 14:21:37 GMT
From: brettf@netcom.com (Brett Frankenberger)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Ohio Suburb Attempts to Ban Multiple Area Codes

In article <telecom17.119.4@telecom-digest.org>, Steven Colins
<sic102@york.ac.uk> wrote:

>> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That is pathetic. That is almost as
>> bad as the time the Chicago City Council passed an ordinance saying
>> that Chicago was a 'nuclear free zone' and that the manufacture
>> of nuclear weapons within the city limits was prohibited. PAT]

> Pathetic? I don't think so -- it is just the wish of a city to have a
> unifying area code, to give the place some "identity". Afeter all,
> someone has to top this proliferation of area codes ... or the term
> will simply lose it's meaning.

The desire is not what is pathetic.  The legislation is what is
pathetic.  It's as if they tried to outlaw rain.  They have no control
over either.  If the state PUC approves a split right through town,
they'll have a split right through town.  City governments don't get
to overrule state governments, even if they might like to.

In fact, I'd suggest that this particular law *increases* the chances
that there will be an area code split within the city limits, just so
some power-hungry ego-driven PUC commissioner can show them who the
boss is.  Then when the split happens, they'll spend a gazillion
dollars fighting and losing in one court after another.  (I grew up in
St. Louis County, not too far from Ladue, MO, where they tried to
defend a law banning political signs but allowing some other signs all
the way to the Supreme Court.  They lost.  Then they reworded the law
and tried again, and again lost all the way to the Supreme Court.
fortunatley, it wan't my Tax Dollars being wasted on it.)


Brett  (brettf@netcom.com)
               ... Coming soon to a      | Brett Frankenberger
 .sig near you ... a Humorous Quote ...  | brettf@netcom.com
 

[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: And in Chicago, the city has tried for
years to enforce a ban on 'for sale' signs placed in front of houses.
Let's face it, they are starting to get frantic. Everyone with money
or the ability to live elsewhere is leaving town as rapidly as they
can. So what do you do when large numbers of citizens move out and
leave fewer and fewer behind? Just ask the Chicago City Council: you
become more oppressive and dictatorial than ever with those who 
remain. On three different occassions now, the Supreme Court has 
struck down ordinances in Chicago banning 'for sale' signs as an
infringment on the free speech rights of the property owners. So the
city makes slight revisions in the ordinance and starts over again.
They get sued, they drag it out for years, eventually lose and proceed
to write a similar ordinance.   PAT]