Aereo coming to Utah

Online TV streaming service Aereo is coming to Utah. The service is set to launch statewide on Aug. 19, just ahead of its September debut in Chicago. More than 2.8 million Utahns will have access to Aereo’s innovative antenna/DVR technology to record and watch live television online. Utah service will be statewide as opposed to the localized service as with previous rollouts.

“We’re excited to be launching our technology in Utah, or what is fast becoming known as the Silicon Slopes,” said Aereo CEO and founder Chet Kanojia…When it comes to how you watch television, Aereo’s technology will bring more choice and flexibility to Utahns across the state, whether you live in Salt Lake City, St. George or Ogden…”

Utahns who pre-register at Aereo.com will receive priority access to sign up. Aereo’s technology will be available to all consumers across all 29 counties on Aug. 19.


In Utah, consumers will be able to use Aereo’s unique antenna/DVR technology, to record and watch major networks such as KSTU-HD (FOX), KSL-DT (NBC), KUTV-HD (CBS), KTVX-HD (ABC) and KUED-HD (PBS), as well as other over-the-air special interest and foreign language channels, including BYU-TV, AntennaTV, ION, Qubo, Estrella TV and others. In addition, consumers will also have the ability to add Bloomberg Television.

Aereo membership costs begins at $8 per month, for access to Aereo and 20 hours of DVR storage. For an additional $4, consumers can upgrade their subscription and receive 60 hours of DVR storage for a total of $12 per month. Consumers who join Aereo will get their first of month of access for free.

Aereo’s technology works on "smart" devices from tablets to phones to laptop computers. Aereo is currently supported on iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch, Chrome, Internet Explorer 9, Firefox, Safari, Opera, AppleTV (via airplay) and Roku devices. Android support is expected later this summer. The Enterprise

The impacts of public transit on traffic

Average highway congestion delays increased 47 percent when public transit service was not available.

While some have questioned the benefits of mass transit systems, which are used by only a small fraction of commuters, research by Michael Anderson suggests that transit riders likely would otherwise commute along already heavily congested roadways and that congestion along those roadways would increase if mass transit were scaled back. In Subways, Strikes, and Slowdowns: The Impacts of Public Transit on Traffic (NBER Working Paper No. 18757), he studies traffic-congestion data from before, during, and after an October-November 2003 transit-worker strike in Los Angeles. He estimates that average highway congestion delays increased 47 percent when public transit service was not available.

Public transit receives 23 percent of all federal highway dollars but represents only 1 percent of all U.S. passenger miles traveled. Federal, state, and local government subsidies for public transit exceed $40 billion a year, and cover 100 percent of capital costs. There has been relatively little research, however, on the effects of mass transit availability on the peak hour congestion experienced by commuters on different roadways within the same metropolitan area. This is because the counterfactual -- the absence of mass transit access in cities with mass transit systems -- is not often observed.

Not surprisingly, Anderson finds that while average roadway delays increased during peak hours of the transit strike, the effects were largest on freeways running parallel with transit lines with heavy ridership. His estimates suggest a total "congestion relief benefit" of the Los Angeles public-transit system of between $1.2 billion and $4.1 billion per year. National Bureau of Economic Research

The rise of the intangible economy: U.S. GDP counts R&D, artistic creation

On July 31, the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis will rewrite history on a grand scale by restating the size and composition of the gross domestic product, all the way back to the first year it was recorded, 1929. The biggest change will be the reclassification—nay, the elevation—of research and development. R&D will no longer be treated as a mere expense, like the electricity bill or food for the company cafeteria. It will be categorized on the government’s books as an investment, akin to constructing a factory or digging a mine. In another victory for intellectual property, original works of art such as films, music, and books will be treated for the first time as long-lived assets.

The BEA has the 20th century economy down cold. It can tell you about personal income trends in Anchorage, Alaska, or America’s annual output of rubber products and plastics. Now the agency is putting more attention on R&D—the lifeblood of the 21st century economy—by moving it from an experimental “satellite” account into the heart of measured GDP.



GDP is the main yardstick of macroeconomics—the sum total of all goods and services produced in the country. Business R&D was never counted in that total. It was considered an expense, an “intermediate input,” that ate into profit. Intangible investments such as R&D and the creation of artistic originals have been like physicists’ dark matter: influential but invisible. As Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said in a 2011 speech, “We will be more likely to promote innovative activity if we are able to measure it more effectively and document its role in economic growth.”

The effect of the revision will be immediate. Measured GDP will get a one-time boost of about 2.7 percent when the government starts counting R&D and artistic creation as investments. (New Mexico and Maryland will get the biggest lifts.) The future growth rate will probably be fractionally higher, too. With R&D treated as an investment, measured economic growth from 1959 to 2007 would have been 3.39 percent annually instead of 3.32 percent, the BEA estimates. Bloomberg Businessweek

Senate immigration bill would remake economy

Landmark immigration legislation passed by the Senate would remake America’s workforce from the highest rungs to the lowest, bringing more immigrants into numerous sectors of the economy, from elite technology companies to restaurant kitchens and rural fields.

In place of the unauthorized workers now commonly found laboring in lower-skilled jobs in the agriculture or service industries, many of these workers would be legal, some of them permanent resident green card holders or even citizens. Salt Lake Tribune

Utah program helps small businesses with hiring, training costs

Hiring qualified people is a challenge facing virtually every company in Utah. Being able to afford to train them can be especially difficult, particularly for a recently launched startup, given today’s prevailing economic conditions.

Nate Johns, chief financial officer for Arches Health Plan — a nonprofit, member-run health insurance provider located in Salt Lake City — has learned that lesson firsthand. For years, he was his own boss as an entrepreneur operating a payroll company and had also been an accounting executive in his previous career.

When the chance came to move into the expanding health care industry last November, he felt it was too good to pass up.

Johns was one of the first people in his company to participate in the Utah Department of Workforce Services’ Small Business Bridge Program when he received training on new federal health care accounting regulations. He said the training helped him to better understand the rules pertaining to his position as CFO of a health insurance company under the Affordable Care Act.

The program is funded by the Unemployment Insurance Special Administrative Fund. During 2012, applications from 133 small businesses were approved, which are scheduled to create 659 new jobs, Hart said. This year, 51 applications have been approved, creating 250 jobs. The 2013 program year will continue until Feb. 28, 2014, or until all funding has been obligated. Deseret News

New Design Streamlines Services and Features

Job seeking Utahns will find a new online interface at jobs.utah.gov following a redesign of the Department of Workforce Services’ website.

The new web design creates a more user-friendly experience, increases efficiency with a more targeted approach to job-seeking, and is entirely compatible with mobile devices. Whether users are on a desktop, tablet, or smartphone, jobs.utah.gov will run smoothly to connect them with job information.

Customers will be able to seamlessly search and apply for jobs, find an employment center nearby, and access extensive labor market information and other services more easily than before. The new site is also more interactive, highlighting improved integration with social media outlets.

Jobs.utah.gov receives an average of 1.2 million total visits per month from 500,000 unique visitors. Over the past year, the site facilitated 11.7 million job referrals. The number of people accessing the site with mobile devices grew from 12 percent in January 2012 to 23 percent in April 2013.

See the new design and learn more about the Department of Workforce Services at jobs.utah.gov.

Buyer Beware List

The Buyer Beware List is maintained by the Division of Consumer Protection (a division in the Utah Department of Commerce) to:

(1) protect consumers from individuals and businesses who have engaged in deceptive practices;
(2) supply consumers with pertinent information so as to aid them in their decision making; and
(3) encourage the development of fair consumer sales practices.

This list is comprised of those individuals and businesses that have been found by the Division to have committed deceptive practices or other violations and have failed to comply with the Division's order to pay a fine or other order. Consumer Protection

Click here to view a list of current scams that the Division has investigated or been made aware.

Consumer spending up, income drop largest in 20 years

The Commerce Department said on Friday consumer spending increased 0.2 percent in January after a revised 0.1 percent rise the prior month. Spending had previously been estimated to have increased 0.2 percent in December.

January's increase was in line with economists' expectations. Consumer spending accounts for about 70 percent of U.S. economic activity and when adjusted for inflation, it gained 0.1 percent after a similar increase in December.

Though spending rose in January, it was supported by a rise in services, probably related to utilities consumption after a cold snap during the month.

Spending on goods fell, suggesting some hit from the expiration at the end of 2012 of a 2 percent payroll tax cut. Tax rates for wealthy Americans also increased.

The impact is expected to be larger in February's spending data and possibly extend through the first half of the year as households adjust to smaller paychecks, which are also being strained by rising gasoline prices.

GDP advanced at a 0.1 percent rate in the last three months of 2012, with consumer spending rising at a healthy 2.1 percent annual pace.

Income tumbled 3.6 percent, the largest drop since January 1993. Part of the decline was payback for a 2.6 percent surge in December as businesses, anxious about higher taxes, rushed to pay dividends and bonuses before the new year.

Taking into account the higher taxes that went into effect at the start of the year, the squeeze on households was even greater. The income at the disposal of households after inflation and taxes plunged a 4.0 percent in January after advancing 2.7 percent in December.


Excluding the unwinding of the dividend and bonus boost, disposable income increased 0.3 percent in January.

With income dropping sharply and spending rising, the saving rate - the percentage of disposable income households are socking away - fell to 2.4 percent, the lowest level since November 2007. The rate had jumped to 6.4 percent in December.

Savings were the smallest since December 2007.

Inflation was largely contained, even though gasoline prices pushed higher. A price index for consumer spending was flat for a second straight month.

That left its increase over the past 12 months at 1.2 percent, the smallest since October 2009. It increased 1.4 percent in December.

So-called core prices, which strip out food and energy costs, edged up 0.1 percent after being flat the prior month. The year-on-year gain was 1.3 percent, the smallest since April 2011 and well below the Federal Reserve's 2 percent target.

The U.S. central bank last year embarked on an open-ended bond buying program and said it would keep it up until it saw a substantial improvement in the outlook for the labor market. It hopes the purchases will drive down borrowing costs.

Weak growth and benign inflation could compel the Fed to maintain it's very easy monetary policy stance. Reuters

Postal Service hiring assistant carriers throughout Utah

The U.S. Postal Service plans to hire approximately 200 city carrier assistant to deliver mail at post offices in Utah.

Starting pay for the non-career positions begins at $15 an hour. Benefits include vacation days, salary increases and the eventual opportunity to enroll in a health benefit plan. The position may also lead to possible future employment as a full-time city carrier with career status.

Appoints are for 360 consecutive days and applicants must be able to work a flexible schedule Monday through Saturday. The number of hours worked will depend upon mail volume.

Current openings are now being posted and those who would like to apply for a position must do so online at the Postal Service’s website.

All applicants must be at least age 18 at the time of hire and be a U.S. citizen or have permanent alien status. Carrier positions require a valid driver’s license and a minimum of two years documented driving experience. Salt Lake Tribune

Utah: The Brightest Star

DWS NEWS: Response to Audit

Utah’s state auditor recently issued a press release summarizing Dept. of Workforce Services (DWS) audit results in key compliance areas. DWS administrators acknowledge room for improvement, but feel the report ignores the agency’s record of consistently more accurate and streamlined processes. “DWS fosters an environment of constant improvement for both our employees and our outcomes,” said Executive Director Jon Pierpont. “Our operational excellence strategies target areas where we know we can do better, but our record of improvement and quality outcomes should not be minimized or overlooked.”

Pierpont added, “The auditor’s unusual statement ignores significant trends of improvement in virtually every program audited, fails to distinguish between internal procedural errors and customer compliance accuracy, and fails to acknowledge the extraordinary performance in the other programs audited. Perhaps most disappointing is the auditor’s refusal to acknowledge the department’s remarkable performance for one of its largest and most astoundingly complex eligibility programs: Medicaid.”

DWS accuracy rates for Medicaid were 96.7 percent with no questioned costs. Other programs audited showed similarly impressive results. Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) had an accuracy rate of 97.5 percent. Third Party Liability had an accuracy rate of 98.3 percent and zero questioned costs.

Additionally, the auditor inexplicably made no mention that the Department improved its questioned costs in every program but one from the previous year, TANF being the only exception with just over $100 more in questioned costs than the previous year. In most cases, these programs demonstrate long-term improvement in questioned costs since 2010.

“DWS values the opportunity any audit provides for improvement,” said Pierpont. “We will continue to work with the State Auditor’s Office and welcome all recommendations.”

The press release specifically addressed two programs: CHIP and WIA. Click here to read the responses.

Post Office hours scaling back in smaller towns

Budget concerns are driving a reduction in hours at Post Offices serving smaller towns nationwide in order for the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) to cover its operating expenses. Changes will keep the existing Post Office in place, but with modified retail window hours to match customer use. Access to the retail lobby and to PO Boxes will remain unchanged, and the town’s ZIP Code and community identity will be kept.

“Meeting the needs of postal customers is, and will always be, a top priority. We continue to balance that by better aligning service options with customer demand and reducing the cost to serve,” said Postmaster General and CEO Patrick R. Donahoe in a press release issued in May 2012. “With that said, we’ve listened to our customers in rural America and we’ve heard them loud and clear – they want to keep their Post Office open.”

Residents of Meadow and Oak City were invited to separate meetings with John Barclay, manager of Post office Operations for southern Utah, on Wed., January 23. Barclay was there to explain changes in postal deliveries in their communities and answer questions.


Hours at the Meadow and Oak City Post Offices will be cut back to four hours a day at the retail service desk. Retail service desk hours will be 8 a.m. to noon Monday through Friday. Saturday hours will remain the same. This change will take place in late February or early March. The buildings will continue to be open to the public to pick up mail and drop off letters or packages that do not require assistance as before.

Barclay said it would not, only service at the post offices would change. “Rural delivery is grandfathered in,” he said. Barclay said a need for more lockers Barclay said about one year ago the USPS identified about 3000 smaller offices. The USPS had a mandate to match costs with revenues. It was suggested some smaller post offices be closed and/ or consolidated with larger offices—having people from a smaller town drive to a larger town to get their mail. “Meetings to discuss these actions started. It was not popular. People met with their congressmen and the proposal was stopped. Congress came up with a plan that will be constant nationwide,” Barclay said.

In Postal Service jargon, Post Offices are called “retail outlets/units.” The new plan is called referred to as the Post Plan. It called for an evaluation of the work load at the retail units. Smaller units have workloads varying between two hours, four hours six hours and eight hours per day to get their work done. Using data from the surveys and the unit evaluations the USPS determined the new operating to handle parcels from the USPS, FedEx and UPS at the retail units was anticipated. More will be installed if necessary.

The post office in Oak City will become a remote managed site overseen by the Delta postmaster. Meadow will report to the Fillmore postmaster.

The final decisions regarding the operating hours of these two post offices will be posted along with implementation dates in the near future. Millard County Chronicle

Fix Utah’s disorganized approach to helping veterans

Veterans unaware of — or bewildered by — an array of services offered by state agencies would have an easier go of it under proposed legislation.

The Senate has approved SB126 and the House Government Operations Committee on Tuesday unanimously endorsed the bill. It next goes to the full House, where it likely will pass.

The legislation would create a new veterans’ services coordinator position in the Utah Department of Veterans Affairs and mandate that certain state agencies pick an employee to zero in on veterans’ issues.

The bill originated in the Veterans Reintegration Task Force, a panel the Legislature created last year, said Sen. Peter Knudson, R-Brigham City, co-chairman of the task force and SB126 sponsor.

The bill stops short of what the task force suggested in its final report: that all state resources for veterans be consolidated under the department.

But it does mandate that state agencies serving veterans start working better together. Salt Lake Tribune

UTA adds more trains, makes other changes to commuter rail schedule

Riders on commuter rail will see some changes to their travel schedule this month.

The Utah Transit Authority announced Tuesday that implementation of adjusted FrontRunner and bus schedules will begin Feb. 19.

The changes come in the wake of extended FrontRunner service between Provo and Salt Lake City, which presented some challenges for riders trying to make connections with buses along the route, said UTA spokesman Gerry Carpenter. Service between Salt Lake City and Ogden had already been established with connection schedules on the northern route of the commuter rail line working reasonably well, but problems arose after UTA officially launched FrontRunner South between downtown Salt Lake City and Provo in December.

The agency heralded the new $850 million commuter rail line as a better, more efficient alternative to driving. But numerous delays and extended commutes resulted in less-than-stellar reviews by some riders. In response, the agency is revamping the schedules —mostly in Salt Lake and Utah counties —to improve overall system reliability, Carpenter explained.

After criticism from riders and community input, UTA developed a new timetable for its commuter rail line and connecting buses. Carpenter said the new schedule will add a bit more time to individual commutes, but should alleviate the timing issues and delays that have plagued the system for several weeks.

The new schedule will add nine minutes to the one-way trip from the downtown Salt Lake Central station to Provo and 11 minutes on the FrontRunner North route from downtown to Ogden. Bus routes have also been adjusted accordingly to make connections more convenient for passengers, he said.

UTA will also add more departures throughout the day and extend peak commuting times by two to three hours to accommodate increased passenger travel.

Long-term, the changes should provide a better commuting experience for all FrontRunner riders, he said. Deseret News

Postal Service to cut Saturday mail to trim costs

The U.S. Postal Service will stop delivering mail on Saturdays but continue to deliver packages six days a week under a plan aimed at saving about $2 billion annually, the financially struggling agency says.

In an announcement scheduled for later Wednesday, the service is expected to say the Saturday mail cutback would begin in August.

The move accentuates one of the agency’s strong points — package delivery has increased by 14 percent since 2010, officials say, while the delivery of letters and other mail has declined with the increasing use of email and other Internet services.

Under the new plan, mail would be delivered to homes and businesses only from Monday through Friday, but would still be delivered to post office boxes on Saturdays. Post offices now open on Saturdays would remain open on Saturdays.

The Postal Service say that while the change in the delivery schedule announced Wednesday is one of the actions needed to restore the financial health of the service, they still urgently need lawmakers to act. Officials say they continue to press for legislation that will give them greater flexibility to control costs and make new revenues. Salt Lake Tribune

Bill to create commission to study intergenerational poverty advances to Senate

A bill to create a state commission to develop policy recommendations to end intergenerational poverty has been forwarded to the Utah Senate.

The Senate Economic Development and Workforce Development Committee voted unanimously Monday to give the bill a favorable recommendation.

The proposed commission would be made up of the executive directors of the state departments of health, human services and workforce services, as well as the state superintendent of instruction and the juvenile court administrator.

The commission would collaborate on policy recommendations to "help children escape the consequences of intergenerational poverty," said Sen. Stuart Reid, R-Ogden, sponsor of SB53.

The bill also would create an advisory committee of representatives of faith organizations, child advocacy groups and nonprofit organizations to assist the commission. Deseret News

How to get the long-term unemployed back to work

Although things seem to be looking up on the jobs front (claims for state unemployment benefits just fell to their lowest level since January 2008), the same can't be said for America's long-term unemployed, especially those over 50.

Consider:

• Nearly 40 percent of unemployed Americans — roughly 4.8 million people — have been jobless for six months or longer. About half of them are over age 50.
• Some 3.25 million Americans, CNN says, are “hopelessly unemployed.” They haven’t looked for work in more than a year because they’ve simply given up the search. They’re not even counted for the official unemployment rate.
• Roughly 1.5 million of the unemployed are “99ers,” out of work for 99 weeks or longer.
• The average time someone stays unemployed is now about 10 months, twice as long as six years ago, according to NPR.

The first is the national rollout of the successful Platform to Employment program created by Joe Carbone at The WorkPlace in western Connecticut.

Platform to Employment gives jobless people five weeks of training to restore their confidence, freshen their interviewing and tech skills and reduce their stress. Then the program places them as interns for eight weeks at a local employer.

At the end of the internships, the employers decide whether to offer the interns paid positions.

Most of them do.

Platform to Employment is about to start replicating the program in 10 cities, specifically for unemployed residents over 50 and military veterans. AARP Foundation and Citi Community Development are partners for the “over 50” offerings; the Walmart Foundation is the force behind veterans’ assistance. Together, the three groups have committed more than $1.5 million to the effort.


Carbone concedes that all the Platform to Employment participants who’ve been hired earn less than they did before they lost their jobs. “Yet they’re all very happy because they’re working,” he says. Susan Sipprelle, creator of the Over 50 and Out of Work multimedia project and writer/producer of the award-winning unemployment documentary, Set for Life, echoes Carbone.

“Most of the 100 unemployed Americans over 50 we initially interviewed have been able to find jobs over the past year or so," she says, "but they’re part-time or for much less money than they earned prior to the Great Recession.”

JobRaising Challenge is a new crowd-funding competition from the Skoll Foundation, CrowdRise,The Huffington Post and McKinsey & Company. The Skoll Foundation will award a total of $250,000 to nonprofits who demonstrate “the most promising, scalable employment solutions.”

Here’s how it works: Between now and March 1, members of the public go to the JobRaising Challenge’s website, Jobraising.com, and donate money (from $10 to $10,000 per donor) to any of the 74 competing nonprofits they think would be best at fighting the jobs crisis. The groups raising the most money will win the prize money. Next Avenue

Can the poverty cycle be halted in Utah?

Sen. Stuart Reid, R-Ogden, is sponsoring legislation to establish a commission to study recently released data on intergenerational poverty in Utah and to develop policy recommendations to break the cycle of kids in poverty becoming adults in poverty.

Last year, Utah lawmakers passed a bill that requires the state Department of Workforce Services to create a system to track intergenerational poverty data to identify at-risk children.

The report found that 364,822 people live in poverty in Utah, about 13.2 percent of the state's population. Children in poverty number 136,751 or almost 16 percent of the state's child population.

A newly established commission would include the executive directors of the state departments of Workforce Services, Health, Human Services, the state superintendent of public instruction, the state juvenile court administrator or their designees, and a nonvoting chairman.

Initially, some lawmakers were skeptical of Reid's vision for addressing intergenerational poverty. But as the data have become available, Reid's focus on children has garnered greater support among his legislative colleagues, he said. Deseret News

Volunteers working to count Utah’s homeless

Volunteers across the state are hitting the streets, looking to count the number of homeless in Utah.

In 2012, the Department of Workforce Services estimated 16,522 people experienced homelessness in Utah. Dozens of volunteers throughout the state will try and see if those numbers have decreased.

Weber Housing Authority Director Andi Watkins coordinates the Point-In-Time Count in Weber County. The survey is conducted on the same day, January 30, every year. Watkins says the date is significant because it’s marked as the coldest day of the year.

The majority of homeless individuals are in shelters, but volunteers go anywhere they think homeless individuals may stay. The numbers they collect go to the state and help determine how much state and federal funds communities get for housing programs.

Watkins says most of the homeless individuals are glad to participate, knowing that the agencies are looking for ways to help them get a roof over their heads. Fox13 News

Statewide Homeless Point-in-Time Count to be conducted today

Public, private and non-profit homeless service providers will conduct an annual Point-In-Time Count of the homeless population in Utah today, January, 31. Additional surveys will be conducted February 1-2 in Salt Lake County.

Every year the State of Utah through the State Community Services Office participates in a physical count of all homeless individuals across the state to determine how many people were homeless on a single night, or Point-In-Time. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) requires that states complete a physical count of both sheltered and unsheltered homeless persons in 2013. During the three day count, homeless Utahns will be asked where they spent the night of Wednesday, January 30. Department of Workforce Services