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Show MOUNTAIN STATES SEEKS INCREASE IN PHONE RATES Continued increases in the cost of doing business, emphasized empha-sized .substantially as a result of wage adjustments during the past two years, has resulted in the filing of a petition on Jan. 5 by the Mountain States Telephone Tele-phone Company with the Public Pub-lic Service Commission of Utah requesting that body to review the company's earnings situation situa-tion in Utah, Eric C. Aaberg, vice president and general man-ag-r, said today. Mr. Aaberg said some increase in-crease in rates was necessary in order that earnings would be sufficient to keep the business busi-ness financially sound. Utah's telephone requirements continue con-tinue to grow, he said, and it is important to the state .that arvice be expanded to meet demands. To finance the increasingly in-creasingly large construction programs earnings must be at a level that will encourage investors in-vestors to place their saving's in the business, he added. Current expenditures for additions ad-ditions to the company's plant throughout the state are at the rate of about 11 million dollars a year, with the 1956 requirements require-ments expected to exceed that of 1955s, Mr. Aaberg said. He pointed out that wage increases will continue to keep telephone wages in line with those of other industries in communities communi-ties where the company operates.' oper-ates.' Yearly wage contract negotiations ne-gotiations in 1954 and 1955, both since the last rate adjustment adjust-ment was made in Utah, have added $900,000 to the wage bill in the state, he said. |