NCTA, ACA Share Concerns on USF Agreement Now Before FCC
NCTA and the American Cable Association jointly raised concerns about a USTelecom-brokered compromise proposal on Universal Service Fund and intercarrier compensation reform, in a letter to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski sent Tuesday. Cable operators, as key competitors to telecom carriers for voice and data, are expected to be key players as the commission looks at changing its rules for USF and intercarrier comp. Comments are due Wednesday at the FCC on the so called “consensus” agreement.
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"It’s a good start. It certainly doesn’t go far enough,” Ross Lieberman, ACA vice president of government affairs, said in an interview Tuesday. “On its face, it’s mired in the past. It seems to only contemplate the universe as being telcos providing service. That harkens back to a time when telcos were the only ones offering phones service, on a monopoly basis, but that’s not the case anymore."
"As competitors to incumbent local exchange carriers (LECs) in urban and rural areas throughout the country, cable operators are directly and significantly affected by the Commission’s universal service and intercarrier compensation rules,” the letter said (http://xrl.us/bma8em). “A modern set of universal service and intercarrier compensation rules should transition away from today’s incumbent LEC-centric approach and move toward a regime where there is no artificial advantage associated with incumbency and no disadvantage associated with using a particular technology or network architecture."
The plan proposed by the major phone companies falls short in at least four respects, the letter said. It doesn’t meet the FCC’s goals of modernizing USF and intercarrier comp for broadband, of fiscal responsibility, of accountability and of offering market driven policies, the letter said. “For example, the proposal to provide price cap LECs a right of first refusal, rather than distributing support through competitive bidding, is an unwarranted departure from market-driven policies,” the letter said. “We also have concerns regarding the ... proposal to prematurely deregulate tandem switching and transport services that the largest incumbent LECs currently provide to all competitive providers pursuant to regulated tariffs and agreements. The provision of those services on a regulated basis is a critical component of the Section 251 interconnection and traffic exchange regime that has served as the foundation for a competitive voice market."
In another filing of note, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour (R) said the FCC should take its time to craft reform, and any plan should not work against wireless. “In my state, Universal Service support has provided Mississippians’ near ubiquitous access to wireless technology and served to catalyze innovation and efficiencies that grow new businesses, increase access to educational tools and healthcare technologies, and otherwise strengthen Mississippians’ ability to compete and thrive at home and in the global economy,” Barbour said (http://xrl.us/bma8d3).