Should a government agency be allowed to take 800 SUICIDE away from a suicide prevention organization?

You may remember the 1-800 RED CROSS case, and thought that it was a unique case and situation. I heard the slippery slope argument but didn’t honestly think that it would open the flood gates. After all, the Red Cross is the name of a specific organization with a unique roll in disaster support around the world. However in light of the way a government agency is trying to use the courts to take 800 & 888 SUICIDE away from a well respected and highly decorated nationwide suicide prevention organization is not only appalling but it clearly undermines the entire toll free system.

The Kristin Brooks Hope Center has handled over 2 million calls (about 650 per day) on these numbers and maintains round the clock staff utilizing a nationwide network of trained local crisis workers. They have received numerous awards and honors. Yet the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration which formerly provided some of the funding to KBHC, sought to take the 1-800 SUICIDE numbers away from this suicide prevention organization, and got a temporary order based mainly on allegations that KBHC, the rightful end customer of the number is or may be unable to continue it’s operations.

KBHC has more than demonstrated their viability if it was ever truly in question, but if there’s one thing that would actually destroy it, that would be taking the phone number out of the hotline. And if they can take 1-800 SUICIDE from a suicide prevention organization, who couldn’t they take a number away from?

I think this is atrocious not just because of what it would do to this suicide prevention organization, but what it does to the entire toll free industry. It’s not like they weren’t using it or that it would be somehow better for society. It’s not like KBHC was using a trademarked name, or misleading or harming the callers or doing anything at all wrong. A federal agency which used to support them simply decided that they were somehow a more appropriate use for the number, even though they ultimately intended to do the same thing.

Is this eminent domain for toll free numbers?

This kind of eminent domain IS clearly detrimental to the entire toll free industry. Toll free numbers were around for almost 30 years but didn’t take off and become what they are today until portability began in the early 90s. That’s because businesses couldn’t invest literally billions of dollars in advertising if they weren’t totally sure that they would be able to continue to use and have the ultimate control over the numbers. How many numbers do you think it will take the government to steal from the rightful owners before they will lose that confidence? Let me put it a little stronger and ask, “How many people would a serial killer have to kill before the rest of the people got scared and lost their confidence in the system.”

Is it acceptable for a powerful corporation or the federal government to kill just a couple people, that weren’t doing anything wrong? I have this vision of “big business and the government” as men in a giant office like the Capital One commercial. Except instead of asking for a loan, the tiny business owner is asking for his toll free number back as the giants flick him off the desk.

Don’t let the FCC think it’s alright to let the government or big businesses start “flicking” a few holes in the boat we’re all in. And with all of the new technologies emerging and changing, it won’t take too many holes for whole industry to lose it’s direction, lose confidence and start sinking.

Make your voice heard…

There is a point to this story and something you can do if you care about stopping the government from taking numbers from little guys and turning them over to bigger more powerful organizations. The attorneys for the Kristin Brooks Hope Center are asking anyone concerned about vanity number owner’s rights to simply write some comments to the upcoming hearing. Make your voice heard and let them know what you think about this.

Several of the original documents of the Kristin Brooks Hope Center filing are linked below if you’d like to read more directly from the case. But more importantly, there is a link to write some comments:
http://fjallfoss.fcc.gov/prod/ecfs/upload_v2.cgi
Type 07-271 for the proceeding number.

You can also post some comments about this right here as well. I obviously feel very strongly that this is wrong, but it’s going to take a lot of voices to make this get heard. I don’t push for comments on most of my articles, but I really want to hear how you feel on this one.

http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/12.10.2007-FCC-comments.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/Suicide-Prevention-Hotline-Permanent-Transfer.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/Response-to-the-FCC-order-to-take-800-SUICIDE.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/Comments-of-KBHC.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/letter1-20.1.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/letter1-20.2.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/letter1-20.3.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/letter1-20.4.pdf
http://www.tollfreenumbers.com/letter1-20.pdf

Don’t let the Federal Government take 1-800 SUICIDE from the people that have used it for years to help people who need it the most. And don’t let them kill this suicide prevention program just to give more power to the Federal Government.