The winners and the losers

• Loser: iProvo, the city-sponsored network for Internet, digital cable TV and phone service, continues to demonstrate how it competes unfairly with the private sector. The iProvo system now has 9,750 subscribers, but it has run up so much debt that the revenue from those people can't cover all the costs. A private business would have real trouble with such a situation. The only option would be to raise prices. But a city can simply borrow from within — in this case a possible $1 million loan from the energy department's reserve fund (to add to $3.08 million already borrowed from there) — or it can just use taxes, which people have no choice but to pay.

The city is debating right now whether to borrow or to use an expected surplus of sales tax revenues. It ought to instead sell iProvo and let it compete with other red-blooded businesses the American way.

• Winner: Two Utah lawmakers have an intriguing idea that could help the environment while saving the state money. Reps. Carl Wimmer, R-Herriman, and Greg Hughes, R-Draper, would spend $21 million to give every Utah family a $30 voucher toward the purchase of long-lasting, energy-saving light bulbs. They believe the new bulbs would save hundreds of millions of dollars in energy costs statewide.

It would be a creative us of burgeoning state surpluses — certainly a brighter idea than a soccer stadium or some other boondoggle.