Shine a Light

It was Sunshine Week across the nation. The idea behind this initiative is to showcase the importance of open government and freedom of information. Spearheaded by newspaper editors, many media and civic groups now use the week to target action that enlightens and empowers people to uncover information that can make their lives better and communities stronger.

One affiliated group, Sunshine Review, cheekily awards a Troublemaker of the Week, recognizing people who shine a light on shenanigans some would prefer kept in the dark. Take the New Jersey woman kicked out of a public meeting for questioning a county official about his family members on the public payroll, and a Texas man who spent thousands of dollars to obtain thousands of pages of e-mails from nearly a dozen public bodies from over two years which revealed an uncomfortably cozy relationship between city government staff and developers in his small community.

These days, it can be just as difficult getting a straight answer out of corporations as government, and just as critical to our wellbeing. And in this vein, the Gazette last week did some troublemaking of its own for the telecommunications giant Comcast. Just as the Obama administration was promising billions to help providers bring broadband access to hard-to-reach areas, the Gazette told the story of how Comcast had pulled the plug on a Yankee-rigged system to bring the Internet to Cuttyhunk and its small population of year-round and seasonal residents.

Cuttyhunkers couldn’t get Comcast service to their island, so they bought a Comcast business connection to the Outermost Inn and piggybacked the service in a convoluted but effective way. It worked nicely, and Comcast kept billing the pointman, until Comcast realized what was going on and stopped it, despite the pleas of residents, the Dukes County manager and state senator Tim Madden. When questioned by the Gazette last week, the company called the Cuttyhunk arrangement “theft” and said it could not possibly restore service — indeed the official line was that it would be illegal to do so.

Funny what a bit of public pressure can do. The story quoted the local doctor saying he used the connection to organize the summer clinics he arranges with visiting medical staffs, with all the credentialling and malpractice arrangements that entails. Comments on the Gazette Web site told of other ways the lost service had made an impact: “This connection also helped the Cuttyhunk School children a great deal. They were able to communicate through video with other classrooms, watch video feeds of current happenings and stay connected to the ever changing world outside of them. The satellite system they currently have does is not able to keep up with their needs,” wrote Lexi Lynch of Cuttyhunk. “This network was also the only form of communication during two blizzards in the past three years,” wrote Mark Storek, also of Cuttyhunk.

Apparently news of the Cuttyhunkers’ David and Goliath struggle prompted some mainland media to inquire on their behalf too. And, what do you know, by Gazette presstime this week, Comcast had reversed its position, damn the obstacles, legal or otherwise, they cited last week.

The whole thing stank, but it turns out the late Supreme Court justice Louis Brandeis was right when he said, “Sunshine is the best disinfectant.”