Consumer Advocate Urges New York PSC to Clear USF Settlement
The New York Public Service Commission should renew state USF for two years under a settlement that the New York Department of Public Service reached with Verizon, small ILECs, the Public Utility Law Project (PULP) and others, PULP said Friday…
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in docket 15-M-0742. After “protracted negotiations,” the “normally adversarial” parties reached agreement on the joint proposal, which “represents a measured response to the problems identified in the record, and advances the public interest,” the consumer advocate said. State USF will expire Dec. 31, so the proposal would renew it for two more years from Jan. 1. Contributors would pay $6.25 million in 2021 and $6 million in 2022, with any unused funds from the previous term to be carried over, the proposal said. Parties agreed not to seek to expand the contribution base until after Dec. 31, 2022, and the contribution method will be the same revenue-based method from 2019, it said. PULP Executive Director Richard Berkley expects the New York PSC to take up the item at its December meeting, he said.