Save Our Neighborhoods

Tour many of the neighborhoods in my district and throughout the City and you see the ugly utility lines that have been moved underground. While we still have a ways to go for the entire City, in the neighborhoods where the work has been done, it looks wonderful. No more overhead wires. No more ugly poles. Everything looks great - except for one thing. There still are ugly, chopped off utility poles on streets where the City's undergrounding program has been completed. Residents ask why. Sometimes the work has been done for a year or two and yet the lines and chopped-off poles remain. The lines you see belong to the phone company - SBC (now known as AT&T).

The good news is that the City has an undergrounding program. We should have been moving those overhead utility wires underground a long time ago. The bad news is that AT&T/SBC is behind in working with the City in undergrounding their lines.

In many areas such as on Twain Avenue in Allied Gardens, the City, SDG&E, Cox Cable and Time Warner have finished their work. The lines are underground and the conduits have operational wires in place. But the hacked off poles strung with wires are still there and the phone company's conduits are empty because AT&T/SBC won't complete the job.

Who wants to look at ugly poles and lines? There is no doubt that it takes away from all that I and my colleagues on the City Council have been doing to improve our communities. New medians, traffic improvements, community entrance signs, street lights, landscaping - these wonderful additions will be enhanced even more once all the lines and poles are removed.

The City and phone company reached an agreement last January. AT&T/SBC is waiting for the state Public Utilities Commission to approve their application for a rate increase sometime this spring. It seems that the phone company doesn't want to do any work until they have a rate increase approved. That means you, the customer, will have a surcharge to pay for the work. What's been frustrating for me is you'd think AT&T/SBC has enough money to pay for the cost to finish these projects until the time the Public Utilities Commission makes their decision. It's very frustrating for residents, community leaders, the City and for me as an elected official.

I may not be very popular with the folks at AT&T/SBC but I have to stand up for my constituents. SBC/AT&T should make plans now to finish these projects that have become blights in our neighborhoods. And San Diego is not the only place this is happening. Throughout the State of California, it's time we move from the overhead wires of the 1800's to the modern era of the 21st century and underground all the utilities in our residential neighborhoods.