City: TracFone's problems its own fault
Mayor Nutter's spokesman says it's TracFone's fault that the city won't yet allow the company to pass out free phones to collect a federal 911 access subsidy.
Doug Oliver, spokesman for Mayor Nutter, says it's TracFone's fault that Philadelphia won't let it give out federally-subsidized free cell phones in the city: (See previous PhillyDeals item.)
"We support the idea of giving lower-income Philadelphians better access to emergency services by providing free cell phones," Oliver wrote.
"However, TracFone has been unwilling to rigorously test their phones' ability to access emergency services regardless of their activation status as required by the FCC to be eligible to receive a government subsidy.
"Without that reassurance, it would be irresponsible for the City to certify these phones' ability to access emergency services. Our first responsibility is to the safety of Philadelphians. They deserve phones that can reliably reach 911 in case of emergency and TracFone has not yet proven to us that their phones can do so."
And no, Philadelphia doesn't care that TracFone is good enough for New York, Atlanta or Pittsburgh. We want to test them here.
Off the record, another city official says TracFone has lately relented and allowed the city to test its phones. Which makes it a little wierd that TracFone took this moment to take the fight public. But we're glad they did. We hate it when this stuff happens in the dark.
I didn't know: TracFone is an arm of Mexico phone monopolist Carlos Slim-Helu's investment empire. He's also a big shareholder in the New York Times, among other companies... Telecom and attempted monopoly are kind of a natural, unhealthy combination. We're glad there's mobile-phone competition, in this country, at least..