Skip to main content
The largest online newspaper archive
A Publisher Extra® Newspaper

The Morning News from Wilmington, Delaware • Page 8

Publication:
The Morning Newsi
Location:
Wilmington, Delaware
Issue Date:
Page:
8
Extracted Article Text (OCR)

1 opinion The Morning News, Wilmington, Tuesday, August 23, 1977' Page 8 Dig deeply on cable Jt All of this comes to light because Rollins Cablevue is asking for a rate increase over the ceiling set forth in the franchise agreement. (The company has. made previous rate increases, but they required no action from the city because they were under the ceiling.) It's typical of the whole arrangement that the argument thus far is not whether the rate increase should be granted, but whether the city council should hold a hearing on the application. The franchise would seem to provide for that kind of a hearing. And then again, maybe it doesn't.

The answer is hidden in the bowels of a 121-word sentence in the franchise agreement. The city's lawyers admit that they don't know what the sentence means. To a layman, it might as well be written in Sanskrit. Mayor William McLaughlin has promised to look into some of these matters. Whether or not Rollins Cableview gets its rate increase or the city gets its hearing, the mayor and the councilmen ought to look a bit deeper.

They could start out by deciding whether Wilmington really wants to franchise cable television and establish a monopoly. Recent FCC regulations do not require a franchise, and competition might serve the customers better than regulation. If the city decides to continue the monopoly franchise, it is certainly obligated to take its responsibility for regulation more seriously. There's a third option: The state Public Service Commission now regulates cable television in the unincorporated areas of Delaware, including the suburbs assumed to have the largest number of cable connections. It doesn't make much sense to have two regulatory agencies in the rather confined area now served by a single Cable TV operation.

The PSC doesn't have a great track record, but it has more experience and know-how in utility regulation than the Wilmington city government. It would be the logical agency to take on the whole of the regulatory authority. Either the city of Wilmington wants to franchise and regulate cable television or it doesn't, and it had better make up its mind. Its present relationships with Rollins Cablevue Inc. are in the order of low comedy.

Rollins Cablevue obtained a franchise to operate in Wilmington in 1964, and it was renewed in 1974. The franchise gives the company an exclusive right to deliver television service within the city limits; in exchange, the city charges Rollins a fee based on its gross revenues within the city and sets dewn rules under which the company must operate. In short and in theory the cable television service is a regulated monoply, very much like a public utility. In practice, the cable TV service is a monopoly all right. Regulated, it's not.

What went on between 1964 and 1974, the period of the original franchise is lost in the mists of municipal bureaucracy. If there are any records, nobody seems to know where they are. Some records are available under the new franchise. But the city accepts its annual franchise fee from Rollins on faith. Rollins hasn't told the city how many subscribers it has within its limits since 1974 because it isn't required to.

It reports gross revenues, but nobody audits that figure because nobody is required to. The question of who does the regulating, if any, is equally fuzzy. The franchise agreement provides that the placement of cables, lines and similar installations should be regulated by the city Department of Public Works. Beyond that, nobody seems to have been in charge until early this year, when the Federal Communications Commission required that the franchising agency designate an official to take complaints about cable television service. What could be more logical than designating the city complaints officer to take those complaints? perhaps except for a couple of details: The city complaints officer doesn't know anything about cable TV, and nobody bothered to tell him he was officer-in-charge until last week.

"ft 'It IS one of ours, you know I' Moving out of the city art buchwald Restless in the summertime bill frank States, that if we get into the war, we will win. And if we don't win, then I assure you we will all go under. You, me', and your bank. However, I am confident about the future of this country and this city. I am sure you are, too." Well, Nathan Miller got his loan.

How could anyone have denied it to him after that bit of salesmanship? So Miller Bros, became a prominent part of the downtown Wilmington business scene. And the store developed into one of the most important business enterprises of Wilmington. Not only that but the kernel of a business nurtured by Nathan Miller has now grown to vast proportions with a huge show room in the University Plaza near Newark and the carpet warehouse showroom in the New Castle area on Basin Road, south of Wilmington. Here we are now: 1977 and the cornerstone of the Miller enterprises begins its special sale prior to departing from downtown Wilmington. I for one, am truly sorry to see and hear of the move toward the north which seems now to have become quite a magnet for other old Wilmington business houses.

What would Nathan Miller have said? I'm sure his verdict would have been: "What has to be done must be done." All three men. laughed and one said, "That's why we're here. You renters think you can get a free ride in the summertime and have a quiet vacation because you don't own a house. Well, you're living In a dream world. We'd rather start a house next to a renter than an owner any day.

An owner will put up with a certain amount of hammering and'sawing because he'll be there forever. But a renter has only three weeks or a month and we can really ruin his time. "I've never done anything to you," I protested. "Why do you want to build a house next to me at this time? Can't you wait until September?" "It's no fun In September," one of them replied. "The only enjoyment workmen get in the construction business is waking up everyone on vacation in the mornings.

My men would just sit on their duffs if they didn't have the incentive of keeping the guy next door from enjoying the few weeks he has off. "As soon as they see someone In a hammock takintr a snnma nr cit. MARTHA'S VINEYARD, Mass. If President Carter really wants to get the housing business on its feet I think he should talk to me. No matter where I seem to go on vacation, they start building a house on the next lot.

I don't know where they get the informatioRrbut I suspect the contractors have a nationwide computer that tells them where I'm going to rent a house for the summer. As soon as the word is out, they buy the lot next to the house and start constructing a home, a garage or if that fails, a new sewer. This year was no different. I rented a house in the woods. There wasn't another human being within three miles, when I signed the lease.

The next morning two bulldozers arrived and started smashing down all the trees. Three men were studying blueprints. "How did you me?" I asked. "It wasn't easy," one of the men said. "We were told you rented the Fainsod House and we started building across the street.

We had the home half finished when we realized we made a mistake. So we dropped everything and came out here to build this house first." "Why me?" I asked desperately, "I only get a month off. Do you have to.build a house in August?" "It's nothing personal," one of the other men said. "We always build houses when people are on vacation. It's the best time of year to hammer." "But nobody can get any sleep." "Look, Mister.

Everyone dreams of having his little vacation home by a rippling brook or next to a lagoon or on the side of a mountain. But somebody has to build it. When it's built another person comes along and says, 'I'd like one just like So he buys the next lot and starts building his dream house. The guy in the first house goes bonkers while the house next to him is being built. It's happening all over the country.

The hills are alive with the sound of wood saws, electric drills and dump trucks full of bricks. Do you think you're special? "But I rent," I protested. "I should get special consideration." opened a store at 607 West Second St. under the name of "Miller Brothers. 'L Then, Nathan Miller on his own leased the store at 213 Market St.

The major decision came in 1915. Nathan Miller decided it was time for the big jump. He had the chance of buying the furniture store of James Meharg at the northeast corner of 9th and King but he needed money. This is one of the best stories Nathan Miller told me: He approached the Wilmington Trust Co. This was in 1915.

A huge war was escalating in Europe. The U.S., was developing an anti-German, pro-Ally stance. The officials of Wilmington Trust hesitated about lending money at that particular time. But Nathan Miller, who had recently been naturalized, straightened up to every inch of his five feet 4, and said to them "Gentlemen: I can assure you as a new citizen of the United Nathan Miller, philanthropist, businessman, entrepreneur and humanitarian, died Sept. 7, 1967.

And here we are 10 years later, reading that the business he founded in Wilmington because he had faith in the city, is going to move into the nearby suburbs. Mr. Miller's grandson, Andrew L. Miller, president of the company, tells me, "We're not really moving out of Wilmington but into another section of the Wilmington area." I can understand Andrew Miller's reluctance to admit that the Miller furniture store, which has been part of Wilmington proper for almost 75 years, is leaving the corporate bounds of the city which his grandfather loved so much. "Well, why move?" I asked Andrew Miller.

He was very forthright. The downtown Wilmington store, which has been at 9th and King Sts. since about 1915, has become too small for the zooming business of what is now Miller's Furniture Industries, but once was known as Miller Bros. "Right now we have 25,000 square feet, at 9th and King Andrew Miller said. "Where we are going up on the Concord Pike, opposite B.randywine Raceway, has about 45,000 square feet and all on one floor.

That's terrific for us." Interestingly, Nathan Miller was one of a group of Wilmingto-nians who established Brandy-wine Raceway in the 1950s. Could the Miller firm have expanded in Wilmington itself, somewhere near its present city quarters? That's a question for the firm itself to answer. Sentiment is one thing; loyalty to a city something else; but survival in a keenly competitive world and getting ahead in a business world are even more important. I'm not in the position to judge the decision of the Miller firm to move from a familiar site, although Andrew Miller tells me his firm is not actually abandoning 9th and King Sts. One particular fact remains: The general tone and appearance of 9th and King are changing very rapidly.

This applies to the whole downtown area of Wilmington. But what grabs me this morning is the memory I have of the store's founder, Nathan Miller. He came to Wilmington at an age of about 16 or 17 and decided to stay here. With a few dollars in his pocket and a pack on his back, filled with what he called "notions," Nathan Miller took the Wilmington market on by himself as a peddler. Business became brisk.

He persuaded two brothers in Philadelphia to come to Wilmington. They sroRissaPTo. USSEN, WE 0T THS THE rW AND "WE DML QM' ting on his porch enjoying a beer, they go ape with their When they know they aren't disturbing anyone, all they do is sit around and talk about the Red Sox." "Then what you're saying is that no matter where I rent a house you'll follow me?" "Those are our orders," one of the men said. "When a man goes on vacation we have to start building a house next to him. You'll have to excuse us now.

We're bringing in the chain saws to cut up the trees." "How many trees" are you going to cut up?" "How long are you staying?" hot Angelea Ttroei I PUN SONOrmON mm? HEIAWERWITHHC lOOKUKE The Morning News 1 President end Publisher Andrew Fisher Frederick W. Hartmann Vice President end vrutlu PHitn. J. Donald Brandt, J. Taylor Buckley and Harry F.Themal Associate Editors William G.Tudor James E.

O'Brien News Editor Editor of the Editorial Page Executive Vice President and General Manager Advertising Director Frederick Walter LvnnR. Bryan Julian J. Eberle Joseph J. Haraburda Production Director Circulation Director.

Get access to Newspapers.com

  • The largest online newspaper archive
  • 300+ newspapers from the 1700's - 2000's
  • Millions of additional pages added every month

Publisher Extra® Newspapers

  • Exclusive licensed content from premium publishers like the The Morning News
  • Archives through last month
  • Continually updated

About The Morning News Archive

Pages Available:
988,976
Years Available:
1880-1988