Act Now! Support a Bold National Elevator Plan

by on February 12, 2010 · 42 comments

Last week I received Public Knowledge’s press release and letter urging support of a “Bold National Broadband Plan.” I admire PK a great deal on several issues, but remain struck by the arbitrariness of demanding “national plans” for this-or-that technology. It occurred to me that if anybody were to actually ask me (so, don’t), I think I favor a National Elevator Plan instead.
Too many Americans live in two-story homes, and/or have basements, yet have no easy access to the upstairs bathroom and Halloween decorations in the attic, or to the aunt living up there. They are forced to rely on outdated “stairs” technology. (And stairs are dangerous! So this is far more urgent than broadband! Show your outrage! Etc.!) So I ever-so-slightly tweaked the letter; this bold new campaign is meant to rectify this injustice and I hope you’ll sign on and spread the word.

Dear Friends:

On March 17, the Federal Conveyance Commission (FCC) will deliver its “National Elevator Plan for America” to Congress. The purpose of the plan is to ensure that every American home has affordable access to fast and reliable elevators, which large companies and office buildings have unfairly and exclusively enjoyed for decades. Access to the second floor and basement is critical to ensuring that all Americans are able to fully participate in vertical rather than merely diagonal movement at home, not just in the workplace.

We have been working for many months to ensure that our National Elevator Plan is a bold one. We have filed extensive comments, testified at three FCC workshops and met with FCC officials on numerous occasions during that time. Among other things, we urged the Commission to:

1) Promote policies that would give consumers more choice among elevators and escalators.

2) Ensure that universal service funds are used to increase access to elevators in rural areas. Not many of them asked for the elevators, but truly, what difference does that really make.

3) Refrain from using the plan to enforce intellectual property claims in digital button and display technology. Ensure that elevators are neutral and do not discriminate unfairly between floors.

With just a month to go before the National Elevator Plan is delivered to Congress, we need your help to continue to advocate for affordable and robust vertical conveyance. Please sign on.

Middle-Name Wayne
President
Public Conveyance, Inc.

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Wayne Crews / Wayne Crews is vice president for policy and director of technology studies at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, and an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute. He started the Dysfunction Network as a side project. He is a dad of four. Wayne's work explores the impact of government regulation of private activity: Areas of interest include antitrust and competition policy, safety and environmental issues, and information age concerns like privacy, online security, broadband policy, and intellectual property. Wayne is the author of the yearly report, Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal Regulatory State, and he co-authored the recent reports This Liberal Congress Went to Market? a Bipartisan Policy Agenda for the 110th Congress and Communications without Commissions: A National Plan for Reforming Telecom Regulation. Prior to the assorted government bailouts now taking place, he wrote the report Still Stimulating Like It’s 1999: Time to Rethink Bipartisan Collusion on Economic Stimulus Packages. Wayne is co-editor of the books Who Rules the Net: Internet Governance and Jurisdiction (2003) and Copy Fights: The Future of Intellectual Property In the Information Age (2002). He is co-author of What’s Yours Is Mine: Open Access and the Rise of Infrastructure Socialism (2003), and a contributing author to others. He has published in the Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, Communications Lawyer, the International Herald Tribune and others. He has made various TV appearances on Fox, CNN, ABC, CNBC and the Lehrer NewsHour, and his regulatory reform ideas have been featured prominently in such publications as the Washington Post, Forbes and Investor’s Business Daily. He is frequently invited to speak, and has testified before congressional committees on various issues. Earlier Wayne was a legislative aide in the United States Senate to Sen. Phil Gramm, covering regulatory and welfare reform issues. He was an Economist and Policy Analyst at Citizens for a Sound Economy Foundation, and has worked as an economist at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and as a Research Assistant at the Center for the Study of Public Choice at George Mason University. He holds an M.B.A. from William and Mary and a B.S. from Lander College in Greenwood, South Carolina. He was a candidate for state senate as a libertarian while at Lander.

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