This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2008, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Residents of the 11 cities that pledged their tax revenues for the next 20 years to cover the shortfall of the ill-conceived UTOPIA fiber-optic telecommunications system should be furious with their elected officials ("Could high-speed fiber optic end up a cyber-paradise lost?" Tribune, Dec. 31).
Proposals that appear too good to be true usually are and should be viewed with great suspicion. The UTOPIA assurance that the $202 million in city money would "never be at risk because UTOPIA would almost certainly succeed" now looks terribly hollow and false.
The elected officials should have been suspicious and asked themselves why both Comcast and Qwest were reluctant to install the fiber for their cities. Both of these companies are in the business of making money and, if the projects were feasible and profitable, they would have jumped at the opportunity. Further, the fact that the UTOPIA proposal needed the cities' guarantee of their debt to get lower financing costs than normally available for such a risky project should have raised serious red flags.
Elected officials should focus their attention on those areas where they have expertise and not get involved in areas where they have no experience.
Robert Fuehr
Holladay