LETTERS: SATELLITE VIEWS WANT NETWORK FEEDS

To the editor:

I am enclosing a copy of a letter we sent to the Senate and House conference-committee members to produce a revised Satellite Home Viewers Act. Over 2.2 million direct-to-home satellite television subscribers all over America are losing distant signals of network television.

We urge everyone affected by this to write also. We feel that as citizens of the United States we should have the right to purchase distant network signals for viewing in our home. This is a basic freedom of choice. To deny this defies the Constitution. Here is our letter:Dear Senate and House committee members,I am writing to you complaining about passage of the Satellite Home Viewers Act.

As of this month, we have lost our satellite feeds of three major networks from the East Coast and West Coast because a federal judge in Florida has ruled that it is illegal for us to receive these signals if we can receive our local network signals via an antenna. Rather than purchase a $200 antenna and have it installed, we opted for local basic cable TV, which costs us $22 a month.

We have had satellite for 11 years and have found it to be totally reliable compared to our local cable company. This was why we chose to go with satellite. We enjoyed the options allowed. By having feeds from both coasts, we could enjoy one show on the East Coast and another on the West Coast at a later time.

The local networks complained they were losing local sales of advertising to those who advertised with the networks on the coasts. Do they really think were going to jump in our car and drive to Seattle or New York to purchase something we saw advertised on that satellite station? The irony of the situation is that we watched our local CBS station most of the time for CBS shows and local news and weather.

We cannot believe that in a country that boasts freedom for its citizens we are being told what we can and cannot watch in our own home. Do we not have the right in a free country to select what stations we can purchase via satellite? This is as absurd as our local newspaper saying we cannot have the St. Louis paper delivered to our home.

Our local affiliates advertise themselves as free TV. Well, their free TV is costing us $22 a month. Perhaps we should all say "Enough!" and boycott the networks. If the little Mom-and-Pop networks cannot compete against the big ones, so be it. Major companies drive out the small businesses every day. It is the same in the television industry.

The SHVA ruling is a violation of our civil rights and should be repealed immediately. This is the United States of America. Maybe its time we start treating our citizens as people who really do have freedom of choice. Will the next step be to tell us when we can and cannot leave our home.

Please help us in any way you can. We await your reply.

OMER and MARLENE CREECHScott City