Syracuse Mayor Supports New York Probe of Verizon
With his city stuck with aging copper and no Fios, Syracuse Mayor Stephanie Miner supported a New York state investigation into Verizon service quality and is considering municipal broadband options for her city. Last month, the New York Public Service Commission said it will examine the quality of Verizon’s legacy copper services and Verizon’s willingness to make upgrades to copper in areas where it hasn’t rolled out fiber (see 1603230044). The Democratic mayor also supported union workers in the East Coast strike against Verizon.
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Verizon copper “has been systematically underfunded and not maintained, and there’s been breakdowns in the system,” Miner said in an interview Friday. “We invest over a billion dollars annually in New York on our wireline networks whether that’s over fiber or copper,” a Verizon spokesman emailed. “Despite the continued decline in landline phone customers, Verizon spends more, per copper-based phone line in New York today, than it has in any year dating back to 2008.”
Miner is a member of the Connect New York Coalition, which also includes mayors of Albany, Kingston, Newburgh and Rochester, many members of the New York State Assembly, and consumer and workers’ union groups including AARP, Consumers Union and the Communications Workers of America. The coalition formed in 2014 to urge the New York PSC to do an analysis of the telecom market in New York, which it hasn’t done since the 70's, said Miner. “In the intervening time period, there has been a ton of revolution in technology and service, and we think the people of New York have been left behind.”
The city of Syracuse and the Connect New York Coalition requested party status in the New York PSC investigation of copper service quality, which was originally requested by CWA. The Miner office will soon file a letter asking that Verizon break down its service data into smaller geographic areas to provide a more fine-grained picture of copper status, she said. The poor state of copper hurts many New Yorkers -- particularly older residents -- who still rely on landlines for 911 and other critical services, she said. The copper issue is a small subset of a larger problem -- inadequate broadband in upstate New York, she said.
Verizon refuses to deploy fiber broadband in Syracuse, Miner said. “Verizon has brought Fios to the wealthy suburbs around the city of Syracuse and around other cities, but has not brought it into the city.” This has widened the digital divide and encouraged Syracuse businesses to move away, she said. Since becoming mayor in 2010, Miner said she has urged Verizon to deploy Fios, and tried writing the FCC and New York PSC to require the company to do it, but to no avail. “This has been a vision quest for me for a number of years,” she said.
No Fios means Time Warner Cable provides the only high-speed broadband option for Syracuse residents. The lack of competition has led to unacceptable service, said Miner. TWC is “cornering the market, [and] there’s no one else to call if you have poor service,” she said, saying she personally experienced problems with TWC home service. “There’s just no incentive for Time Warner [Cable] to meet a standard of service, and then it is very expensive and it’s poor service on top of that.” A TWC spokesman responded by email, “Time Warner Cable has committed to Syracuse and Central New York and shown more than interest in delivering superfast speeds and excellent service in a way our competitors have not: we’ve increased Internet speeds and introduced a low-priced broadband option across our entire [Central New York] service area, not just select neighborhoods.” The company plans to roll out 300 Mbps service in Syracuse by this fall, and businesses can get multiple-gigabit speeds through custom fiber services, he added.
The mayor said she's considering alternative ways to get gigabit broadband speeds for Syracuse, including the possibility of a municipal broadband deployment. New York state has a proposal to fund partnerships between municipalities and private sector providers, but has been slow in releasing details, said Miner. Whether the city accepts the state plan will depend on what broadband speeds are proposed, she said. New York state is unlikely to forbid cities from doing their own muni broadband projects, as some other states have legislated, she said. “The real obstacle, of course, is cost.”
Miner supported the union workers who are striking against Verizon in New York state and the East Coast, and urged Verizon to work out a deal. “I don’t think it behooves anyone to have people out of work. It doesn’t behoove the consumers who are utilizing Verizon services. It doesn’t behoove the workers who are skilled in doing this kind of stuff. And it doesn’t behoove the company.” The Verizon spokesman responded, “We’re committed to reaching an agreement that’s good for our employees, our customers, and positions our company for success.”