Privacy is a Right-Not a Privilege for Sale:

[DBS.US]

ACTION ALERT!

Privacy is a Right-Not a Privilege for Sale:
Tell Senate Appropriations Committee to End Fees for Unlisted Numbers!

Thanks to your emails, faxes, and calls, the bill to protect your right to privacy by ending fees for unlisted numbers, SB 1423 was approved by the Senate Energy, Utilities, and Communications Committee (5-0) on April 1!

Speak Up to protect your right to privacy and tell members of the Senate Appropriations Committee to vote YES for Senate Bill 1423, authored by Senator Sheila Kuehl, stopping phone companies from charging any fee for an unlisted number.

Your Voice can make a difference now because SB 1423 is scheduled to be heard by the Senate Appropriations Committee on April 21, and if it passes the committee it will be voted upon by the entire State Senate in early May.

Please forward this message and ask your friends to add their voices.

AT&T already raised its rates from 28¢ to $1.25 per month for an unlisted phone number, and on April 1, Verizon is raising its rate to $1.75 per month. As far as TURN knows, it actually costs the phone company less to unlist a number than it does to list one. But rates are skyrocketing, with no justification. The reason the phone companies can do this is simple-since Governor Schwarzenegger's Public Utilities Commission deregulated the big phone companies, rates that were once cost-based are now greed-based.

The law already requires cell phone companies to provide unlisted numbers for free. But landline customers are paying a penalty for asserting their constitutional right to privacy. TURN estimates that this "privacy penalty" imposed on the 10 million Californians who choose unpublished phone numbers will net the phone companies over $150 million in pure profits every year.

If you don't think the right to privacy should costs Californians millions, Take Action to tell your State Senator to vote YES on SB 1423. Ban the privacy penalty!

Sincerely,

Mark W. Toney, Ph.D.
Executive Director
TURN-The Utility Reform Network