Provo lashes iProvo critics

PROVO — Provo officials fired back Thursday at the author of a report that called iProvo a perpetual black hole, saying the author had a conflict of interest because he did consulting work in 2003 for Qwest Communications, an iProvo competitor and critic.

Steven Titch said the 40 hours of work he did for Qwest didn't color his faultfinding analysis of iProvo, a fiber-optic telecommunications network that provides phone, Internet and digital cable TV services to Provo residents who subscribe.

Provo Mayor Lewis Billings vigorously attacked the report's objectivity on Thursday, when the city also released a 24-page "white paper" that called the report's research "fatally flawed" and based on "erroneous and unsubstantiated conclusions."

The white paper said the Reason Foundation's report was premature because it was based on financial numbers from June 2005, a year before construction of iProvo was completed. It also said Titch compared apples to oranges in the report's financial data.

The city's zealous response came three weeks after the Reason Foundation released Titch's 26-page critique of iProvo. Titch, a policy analyst at Reason, ripped iProvo, saying the city would never be able to pay off the project's $39.5 million bond.

"There is no conflict," Titch said. "Qwest had nothing to do with the report. I have not worked with Qwest since 2003. My work with Qwest predates any work I've done for Reason Foundation," where Titch started in late 2005.

Titch said a Chicago company called HLB Communications hired him to consult for Qwest "following a series of management and accounting scandals in 2000 and 2001." Titch reviewed materials for Qwest's Web site, customer letters, executive speeches and media and employee communications.

"In that job, I never worked with any Qwest officer or employee," Titch said.

Provo's white paper questioned Titch's objectivity after city employees read on a Web site that Titch's company worked "on a day-to-day basis with Qwest." Titch said the phrase was a mistake, and it was removed from the Web site Thursday afternoon.

Titch said the report was intended to take a side. Reason Foundation is a libertarian think tank that advocates privatization and smaller government.

"There's no denying we had a point of view and chose to highlight things so they'd stand out more than you'd get from someone who supports municipal broadband projects. My report stands out there as a part of the public policy debate."

That bothered Provo's chief administrative officer Wayne Parker.

"It is so fascinating to me this organization brags about objective, peer-reviewed research," Parker said. "This is the farthest thing from it that I've seen."