Alaska Remote Broadband Order Said Likely To Circulate; Undersea Cable Item Looms
A draft FCC order to promote broadband in remote Alaska served by rate-of-return carriers likely will circulate Friday at the commission, an informed source told us Thursday. It's unclear if the item will be on the tentative agenda for the…
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June 24 meeting due out Friday, the source said. But if the item circulates Friday, Chairman Tom Wheeler could still place it on the meeting's "Sunshine" agenda, which is to be released June 17. Christine O'Connor, executive director of the Alaska Telephone Association, told us she also didn't know if the item would be considered at the meeting, but said she believes the FCC will vote on an "Alaska Plan" by the end of the month. She noted Wheeler and other commissioners told Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, at a hearing in March they would address Alaska rate-of-return remote broadband issues by the end of Q2. "I don't think the second quarter target date will be delayed," she said. The FCC also could consider an undersea cable outage reporting order at its June or July meetings, said another informed source. An FCC spokesman didn't comment.