I Give Up

I’m not normally a quitter but even I know when to give up a losing battle (especially when I’m hit over the head about it by my wife).Since joining the Cable Advisory Council last year, at roughly this time, I have seen the group as incredibly well meaning but incredibly unable to properly represent the cable rate payers in Area 2 (from Orange to Fairfield). At the time I joined, Cablevision and Sound View, the third party provider of public access programming, were being reviewed for refranchsing. As I have lamented here before, despite the CAC, Cablevision and state attorney general begging the Department of Public Utilities Commission (DPUC) not to renew Sound View, in the fall, the DPUC ignored us all.Not only that, the CAC was somewhat defanged during this process and SV somewhat empowered. This despite clear examples of fiscal malfeasance on the part of SV.Meantime, we were asking Cablevision to consider senior discounting and the DPUC told them to improve their customer service. We were ignored and the JD Power Company just cited Cablevision for having terrific customer service.Locally, Fairfield has been inching toward town-specific public access programming on the government channel, and that has been stymied by a lack of resources from SV and the town government slow to act on the FairTV, the committee formed by citizens to bring this to life.Meantime, the amount of hours I’ve devoted to the RTM Special Committee has grown and I have my freelance obligations and this day job. Something had to give and Deb pointed out that the CAC takes a few hours every month, but has achieved nothing. When I asked our CAC chairman what we’ve accomplished in the last year, his answers were theoretical and with specificity but remained optimistic about the future. I wish I shared that optimism.After a lot of debate and delay, I just tendered my resignation to the CAC. I wish it were otherwise but suspect it’s for the best. Of course, I am also the third of the four members from Fairfield to resign the CAC, all largely out of disgust with the DPUC and SV. I just wonder if the DPUC will notice. Or question what’s going on. Or care.