Cable TV treats Albert Lea differently than Rochester

Staff

Published Saturday, July 5, 2008

I’m just checking to make sure I have this straight. The fancy long article by the Important Charter Guy says we can’t pay $37.22 a month, $20 less than we do now because we are not in the same district as Blue Earth, Bricelyn, Frost and Kiester. The Blue Earth area also receives WCCO-4, KSTP-5, KMSP-9 and KARE-11, plus all the local stations. They get a very good deal for their money.

He also states we are in the same region or district as Rochester and other cities. Rochester gets all the good Twin Cities stations plus all the local ones. It is nice to have both. Albert Lea cannot receive the Minneapolis/St. Paul stations because they just will let us have Austin, Mason City, and Rochester news and TV programming.

He says they are providing us the very best service, he realizes our frustrations and says thank you for not checking out his competition. This Arne “Tucker” Carlson guy is stating: “Either way you lose.”

He must not give much credit to our city manager, mayor and city council for being very sharp if they think our citizens will all be satisfied now.

Remember in the older days there was only one telephone company that served each town and area. However, that had to change over time because that was a monopoly.

Now every town has several companies to choose from depending on one’s needs and price range, etc. Competition is healthy, competition is good for economy, and competition is fair for subscribers. This is not the Dark Ages with one choice or nothing. This is 2008! We deserve better, we are feeling short-changed.

We are very anxious to see how our mayor, city council and manager will work out solving this problem for our Albert Lea citizens. We’ll thank them from the bottom of our hearts for listening after many years of cable service with no Minneapolis/St. Paul stations.

This is my third letter on cable TV because this matters. We’d be thrilled and grateful if Charter will just give us one or two good channels from the Cities. Richard Nixon always said, “Let me make this perfectly clear.” We are getting the short end of the stick. We are trusting that this is not a “wink-wink” situation or arrangement.

Judy Menssen

Albert Lea

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