| Today's Feature To Consider a Cable Provider Change.
The City Council will consider
a resolution at tonight’s regular meeting
that would transfer the local Cable Television
Permit from Southwest Missouri Cable TV, Inc. to
TCA Cable TV of Missouri, Inc.
In a letter to the Mayor and
City Council, Southwest Missouri Cable TV CEO
Ruth Kolpin said that TCA is a company of high
quality standards with a strong commitment to
customer service. TCA also operates systems in
Bentonville and Springdale, Arkansas. She also
said the business principals subscribed to by TCA
seem to be in harmony with the way SW Missouri
Cable has done business.
The acquisition, which must be
approved by the FTC, will be a part of a larger
merger with Cox Communications Co., of Atlanta,
Georgia, which also must be FTC approved.
The net result will catapult
Cox into the number four slot among cable
providers with the infusion of TCA’s 1.2
million viewers. And although the sales price of
the Southwest Cable-TCA merger was not disclosed,
the merger between TCA and Cox is worth $4.0
billion dollars to TCA stockholders.
In a press release dated May
12, Fred Nichols, TCA Chairman, CEO and President
said, "We believe this transaction will
bring the highest ultimate value for our
shareholders and a strong base from which to
continue and enhance competitive product
offerings for the future.
"We found in Cox a company
with exactly the same philosophy, and we feel
like the master plan that we had of becoming the
integrated communications provider for the
Southwestern United States and middle markets can
be completed better by associating with
Cox."
In other business, the Council
is expected to bring back for consideration two
contracts with the Carthage Chamber of Commerce.
The Contracts fund various tourism related
activities the Chamber performs for the City of
Carthage. The Council voted during its last
regular meeting to "table" the
contracts unless the Chamber agreed to an audit.
It takes a two-thirds majority
(7) of the sitting Council to bring a tabled
issue back for consideration. Council member H.J.
Johnson has abstained from voting due to past
tourism material design work he has performed for
the Chamber. This means the contracts must be
approved by seven of the nine other Council
members.
The Chamber has notified the
City that it has contracted with Mense,
Churchwell & Mense, P.C. of Joplin to perform
a totals and transaction audit for the 1998/99
fiscal year. According to an explainatory letter
sent to the Chamber by the City, the audit will
include any public funds used by the Chamber
including the State and the City of Joplin funds.
"This will include a
detailed examination of all the transactions
using the public funds to determine the extent of
any double or erroneous billings," the City
letter states.
Finance Committee Chair Lujene
Clark told members of the Chamber Board attending
a special Committee meeting that if the audit,
and certain other conditions were met, she would
recommend contracts be brought back for
consideration.
The other requirements include:
• The audit will be
performed by a certified public account.
• The CPA shall have no
association with the Chamber of Commerce
• The audit should be
completed within 60 days
• Any management letter
recommendations from the CPA will be acted upon
by the Chamber within 30 days of submission of
the report
• Any overpayments by the
City or any entity including the State and the
City of Joplin, will be repaid by the Chamber.
• The CPA will meet with
representatives of the City to clarify its
concerns regarding the over billings and the use
of public funds the City’s work papers will
be made available to the CPA.
• For future
reimbursements to the Chamber, the City will
reimburse only on the submission of original
invoices.
Chamber President Dexter
Friesen, in a letter to the City said the Chamber
wants to continue as the Designated Marketing
Organization for the City of Carthage.
letters to the editor
In response to a letter in last
Thursday's issue.
Dear Brent,
As a mother and grandmother who
loves her children. I am thankful for the stand
the County Commissioners took. They are like
David facing Goliath. You see there are those of
us in this county who don't have and wouldn't pay
for or watch the shows you describe on T.V. or
cable.
The art shows or exhibits we
hold to would be - the art work of pre-schoolers
and Grade school carnival booths or the Carthage
Youth Fair Exhibits, A nostalgic trip through
Carthage Hardware, Bee Discount or any of the
numerous flea & antique malls in town.
People do not describe Carthage
as a good place to raise children because of the
places you would want here. They like Carthage
because of the schools, beautiful parks, trees
and a wonderful attraction we have now that is
truly for our families and too few take advantage
of - Precious Moments.
If you have children or young
people you love and care for - expose them to the
good things in life. Because our minds don't have
a garbage disposal. Whatever we think, read, see,
hear or the places we go are impressions for our
lifetime.
I'm glad when people take a
stand right or wrong because then you know what
side of the fence they're on.
You have taken a stand I
believe to be wrong and I would not want to be
standing on the side you have chosen. I think it
is Goliath's side and even though the
Commissioners probably have a trembling army
standing behind them, I'd rather be on David's
side, because I've read the back of The Book
and when the last battles over - We Win!
I will close this just as you
closed your letter with a little variation:
God Bless you and all those
that you love. You will all be in my prayers.
Sincerely,
LaVera Newman
A Citizen of Jasper County
Editor
Mornin Mail,
I would like to share my
perspective about a facet of the curbside
recycling issue.
I have pretty much always
assumed that we elect representatives to
represent us and our positions or views, whether
it be municipal, county, state,..etc.(Ergo the
term representative) With that in mind, I cannot
help but wonder why curbside recycling is even an
issue. The only legitimate opinion survey on the
subject that I am aware of indicated that
voters/residents do not want it, so why the
debate? I’m sure there’s lots of other
stuff that need considering that the residents do
want. I also think all our elected
representatives should keep in mind one thing as
they go about their duties, and that is the motto
of The State of Missouri, the gist of which is,
" The will of the People shall be the
Supreme Law of the Land."
Thank you, Ken Cole Jr.
Commentary
Martin "Bubs" Hohulin
State Representative, Cistrict 126
Hopefully by
now, most of you will gave gotten your State
income tax refund check. If it was anything like
mine, it was very, very late in coming. Many of
you called to see what the problem was so I tried
to do a little checking.
Now understand, it is hard to
get a straight answer from the bureaucracy. I was
finally able to talk to a couple folks that
didn’t want their name used and found out
that a new computer system had been put in place
to speed up the process! They said that the
department was about a month behind last year.
Believe it or not, I don’t
bring this up to run down the Department of
Revenue, but to demonstrate the flaws we have in
the budget system.
It seems like every year we get
requests from departments for new computers,
software, support, or something else that is
designed to do more or speed things up. A lot of
times we get the budget request books from the
departments the same day we are hearing from the
departments. To make matters worse, we usually
work from a booklet containing only the new
requests and the old money, known as the core, is
automatically approved.
Believe it or not, I’ve
only started. The Constitution states that all
spending originates in the House of
Representatives. However, when we are doing the
budget, we start with the Governor’s
recommendations and go from there.
The games really start now.
Almost every day that we are working on the
budget the Governor will send amendments to the
Budget Committee and they are usually approved
with little or no discussion. I could hardly
contain myself when Governor Carnahan pointed out
that the budget that was approved was bigger than
what he originally submitted. Of course it was!
He was the one that kept
sending down amendments for more spending. We are
supposed to work from figures from the budget
office as far as how much money there will be to
spend.
Just before the budget was to
go to the full House for discussion, Governor
Carnahan sent down an amendment calling for an
additional 11 Million in spending. When we
questioned where it came from, we were told that
Governor Carnahan "found" it. I guess
it was in his desk drawer!
It is safe to say that I asked
more questions and offered more amendments than
anyone else on the committee.
It is also safe to say that I
lost more votes than anyone else on the
committee! It is hard to undo the way things have
been done for more than 40 years of dominance by
one party.
Believe it or not, that is how
long the democrats have been in power in the
Missouri Legislature.
There is some hope though.
After years of being one of the few people that
consistently votes no on the budget, quite a few
of the new members are questioning the process as
well. It isn’t necessarily that we are
opposed to the budget as much as we are opposed
to the process.
As usual, I can be reached at
House Post Office, State Capitol, Jefferson City,
MO 65101, or 1-800-878-7126, or
mhohulin@services.state.mo.us for your questions,
comments, or advice.
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