Steve Mensing, Editor
♦ I like the idea of having several broadband provider choices. Salisbury is overloaded with them. Time Warner Cable, AT&T U-verse, DirecTV, Dish, and Salisbury’s municipal “utility” Fibrant. I had all these bargaining chips when it came time to face off with Time Warner Cable’s “retention specialist”. I told the retention specialist and I meant it, I’m ready to unhook today. “THEY” offered me a better deal. I’d spell out what the competitor was providing. The retention specialist would offer up a little powdered sugar, but not the cake. Okay pard do what you have to do to turn the Mensings off–we’re outta here. At that point the retention specialist would hand over the cake, plus few smiling cherries to sweeten the deal. They didn’t want to lose their “valued customer”. Can’t blame them. It’s lost revenue. TWC’s having retention specialists and Fibrant having none is one of countless consumer reasons I wouldn’t give Fibrant the time of day. Not until they make some major changes and more importantly city council and their cronies are no longer darkening the door of 217 N. Main.
Okay, Why Wouldn’t Someone Plunk Down Cash for Any of Fibrant’s Residential Services or Even Their Business Class?
(1) A HUGE reason for me is that Salisbury’s city government is the same government that (a) wrongfully terminated a boatload of city employees. (b) that covered up the “mutual termination” of its former City Manager Doug Paris and his “Golden Parachute” and remained mum on the former city Information Director’s overly sweet “Golden Parachute”. Hey gang she quit. Right? (c) The cover-up of the Customer Service Center’s Joe Elliott misappropriating funds and Michelle Hardin’s (Financial Services) helping herself to some bucks. Who engineered City Council to block the SBI inquiry on Joe Elliot? We know who. That will all come out during coming November municipal election! (d) City Hall’s refusal to answer public information requests. (e) Consistently hiding the Fibrant Debacle as being a success when Fibrant swilled 7.6 million dollars from the water and sewer funds which it has not paid back. Fibrant is millions behind the 8 ball. (f) The city has a grossly understaffed police department making low wages who can not decently patrol a crime ridden, drug infested, and sex offender bloated Salisbury. (g) Has greatly diminished city services. (h) Had their bond rating downgraded by both Moody’s and Fitch who warned the city they face future junk bonding if they didn’t pay up. (I) Has a number of city staff making great use of their city credit cards. We have names–your friends in City Hall dimed you out. And much more.
City employees have spilled much about the rogue Salisbury city government that created a city that has turned Salisbury outside of “8 block” and the “Country Club” into disconnected “have nots”. There is a “TURNAROUND” slate coming to unite all those folks who have been left out of the pie–the forcibly annexed, new majority of underserved Black, Latino, and Asian persons, the forgotten men and women dwelling outside the historic district and the country club, the city’s downtown merchant class who consistently are hoodwinked and used with the promise that they would score $5,000 per person per annum for the coming “Central Office’s administrators and staff. Many of those Central Office folks will be out in the field or gobbling the contents of their lunch bags by the microwave or crowding into Richard’s BBQ. You won’t see many uptown unless a few trickle over to Hap’s. That $5000 per person per anum ain’t happening.
As more and more people become enlightened about what city hall hid from them, there’s going to be one overwhelming block of un-apathetic and energized voters coming out to vote in November. The coming reform campaign will be big city ugly.
(2) With the soon to arrive TWC Maxx and 10 Gig X 10 Gig TWC Business Class, Fibrant, can’t match speed or price with Time Warner Cable residential services. Factor in that Salisbury residents still have to undergo a one year contract and fees for Fibrant services. Let’s not forget Fibrant’s TV and VOIP services are overpriced and non-competitive. Lest we forget if you run into problems paying for Fibrant, they can cut off your water and sewer.
TWC MAXX Internet Upgrades:
(3) The residents of Salisbury do NOT own Fibrant. Most persons dwelling in Salisbury have no illusions of ownership over something most didn’t want. We have no control over its business practices other than not buying it. It is owned by the city government and run by them at great losses to the taxpayers, utility payers, and storm water fee payers despite city hall’s wild claims about its success in “turning the corner” and showing a profit. (Hiding employee salaries doesn’t count) Fibrant has never remotely broken even and probably never will while they drown in the ocean of free market competition. Besides the 7.6 million dollars owed to the water and sewer funds, Fibrant still has a heavy debt and interest to pay back until 2029. I figure by 2021 through the air wireless speeds will be in the multiple gigs.
(4) Please also note Salisbury’s meltdown in city services as witnessed in its understaffed police and fire departments, the lackluster city response to plowing the city streets and street cleaning outside of “8 block” and the “country club”, the Amazonia like growth of weeds and grass in the spring and summer on city properties due to the understaffing of groundskeepers. By golly our alleged “3” Fibrant employees are scuffling to change city lights, stop signs, and heavens knows what else. Folks, city services are in poor shape here in the 202nd ranked city/town in North Carolina (areavibe.net).
(5) While no one I know voted to foist the Fibrant debacle on the city taxpayers–that was left up to our “visionary” city council who avoided quorum the day of the infamous vote. The mismanagement of Fibrant during the blundering soft rollout burned out all of the $33 million dollars in the certificates participation from November 2010 to June 2011. The evaporation of funds came from buying large quantities of mismatching recycled equipment. That soft rollout swamped Fibrant’s future before it got underway. Of course city hall likes to fantasize about an utter failure being a triumphant success through the use of “Magic Math”. Fibrant was covered over with puff pieces and smoke screening just like Salisbury’s soaring 25% poverty, poor city public school performances, and the FBI crime stats. Salisbury is a corpse reanimated with ludicrous publicity.
(6) All of Fibrant’s services are more expensive than their incumbent competitors: Time Warner Cable, Dish, Direct TV, Google Voice, MagicJackGo, and dozens of other VOIP phone providers. Hey big guy if you got suckered into Fibrant you are paying its stated price and fees, but you are also being DOUBLE DIPPED by the hidden costs of your water and sewer utilities being siphoned off by Fibrant. The city finds other ways of utilizing Magic Math to rob Peter and pay Paul with YOUR money. Chump they’ve turned your pockets upside down and you don’t even realize unless you start hunting through the “Magic Math”.
(7) Fibrant’s cheapest TV package, made mostly of FREE TV broadcast channels, is absolutely FREE with a cheapo indoor TV antenna. Keep in mind all the great channels available on IPTV internet enabled devices like Roku 3, Amazon Fire TV, and so forth.
(8) Fibrant’s internet services, while more stable than it once was, are still plagued by periods of instability and a few lengthy outages due to “maturing” equipment and mysterious heavy equipment accidents.
(9) Fibrant’s TV channel packages are completely outclassed by TWC, U-Verse, DirecTV, and Dish. All offer superior TV packages at cheaper prices. Everyone of the big boys offer TV aps for our PCs, Apples, IPADs, Android phones, IPHONEs, and gaming devices. Fibrant missed the boat here and its got to be killing their TV package sales. There is no reason for buying Fibrant TV. Not even the moonbat excuse of “supporting my city”. What drivel. I say “I salute my wallet above all”. I’m a consumer–please me. A corporation or a municipal government can be equally greedy and conniving. You the consumer gets the pick of the litter. What dimdot would sacrifice their economic betterment for a city that cares nothing about them and allows cronyism, coverups, and backroom deals to flourish?
(10) Time Warner Cable, AT&T U-Verse, and Dish customers can renegotiate their prices with a retention specialist. Fibrant does not renegotiate if you can no longer afford them. The big boys acknowledge that a customer retained is better than a customer lost.
(11) It’s a fact of life the big boys possess immense deep pockets for which they can keep up with the latest technological innovations and buy quantities of equipment at far cheaper prices than Salisbury can even imagine. And if you have parasites in a municipal government they can ram up your costs. The big boys do not have municipal parasites scoring on deals. Salisbury is stuck and has no real money other than the city’s reserve funds or to slash away more municipal services and more city workers with gusto.
(12) Fibrant is priced out of range of the city’s poor, many of whom lack computers. And the fact is most people don’t care about speed.
(13) Fibrant’s grossly over-priced VOIP phone ($45 a month) is non competitive with Google Voice (Free), MagicJackGO (2015) and numerous other VOIP companies in Salisbury’s crowded field. It’s a fact that many people are moving completely away from landlines and using smart phones at home. Fibrant is nowhere in this picture.
(14) It was revealed in a Salisbury City Hall email exchange uncovered through a RFP public information request that Fibrant hacked customer emails to get information for our rogue city council. For that reason alone many persons especially business owners and person who are outspoken against City Hall would NEVER want City Hall peeping through their emails. Does city hall have an enemies list? City Hall is well known for vendettas against anyone who speaks out against them. Gang these are cybercrimes your “vibrant-visionary” city council took part in. Check this out:
http://rowanfreepress.com/2014/07/26/is-fibrant-watching-you-fibrant-subscribers-beware/
