Broadcasters’ proposals that pay-TV providers give subscribers more notice of carriage disputes won’t fix the broken retransmission-consent system, cable and telco-TV providers told the FCC. Replies from them were posted Friday in docket 10-71 on a petition by 14 providers and public interest groups (CD May 20 p4). Mediacom, Suddenlink, Verizon and other multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs) said such notification would have little effect. Disney and Time Warner Cable, the lead petitioner, debated whether economic analyses show that increases in what TV stations are paid for access to their programming and threatened disputes account for rising cable subscription fees.

The FCC plans to decide the fate of unbundling obligations for Qwest in the Phoenix area by June 15 to ensure that a June 22 deadline isn’t missed, agency officials said. The decision will be based on a market power analysis outlined in the FTC-Department of Justice Horizontal Merger Guidelines, they said. The officials predicted that forbearance is likely to be denied.

Alpine PCS asked federal appeals judges to reverse the denial by the FCC of a waiver of its license-cancellation rule and overturn the commission’s later finding that the company was in default of its payment obligations from a 1996 auction. Alpine questioned why it was treated differently from NextWave, a huge player in the auction that was allowed to sell its licenses at a profit. Alpine said unless the FCC order is reversed, the company might owe the government $39 million. The FCC countered that it had followed its rules and asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to reject the challenge. Oral argument hasn’t been scheduled.

Communications should be treated as critical infrastructure and security access should be allowed during disasters and emergencies, citing lessons learned from disasters like the Haiti earthquake, speakers said during a Federal Communications Bar Association panel. Ken Moran, senior deputy chief of the FCC Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau, identified the National Response Framework as the legal framework for all levels of domestic incident response.

FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn defended the broadband reclassification approach of Chairman Julius Genachowski, contending fears that it would create regulatory uncertainty are vastly overblown. Forbearance has worked in wireless, with companies including AT&T and Verizon supporting that approach, and it can work for broadband transport, Clyburn said. The agency can act on Genachowski’s plan to apply some sections of Title II to broadband transport while forbearing on the other parts, even as Congress looks to rewrite the Telecom Act, she told a Media Institute luncheon audience Thursday. She took some pot-shots at spending on lobbying, the relationship between FCC and industry and some carriers’ complaints about regulatory uncertainty.

Public Knowledge proposed Thursday that the federal government “zero base” the federal “spectrum budget,” requiring every agency to reapply for the spectrum it needs, “including specific details with regard to spectrum utilization.” The group proposed government rules allowing agencies to offer on the secondary market spectrum they don’t use. Both proposals were debated at a Public Knowledge forum in Washington.

The NTIA has determined that pairing the 1755-1780 MHz band with AWS-3 spectrum for a mobile broadband auction won’t be possible, at least in a quick timeframe, based on its preliminary review, Administrator Lawrence Strickling told a Public Knowledge spectrum conference Thursday. He said the nearby 1675-1710 MHz band offers more hope (CD June 3 p1), but more must be known about how that spectrum is being used before the agency can make any recommendations.

The FCC will seek comment on reallocation of the 1675-1710 MHz band, which could be paired with the AWS-3 band for wireless broadband, commission officials said Wednesday. An Office of Engineering and Technology public notice is circulating on the eighth floor and is expected to be published Friday.

AT&T is eliminating its unlimited-pricing plans for new wireless subscribers to e-mail and Internet services on smartphones, signaling a shift in the way carriers bill their customers. Similar moves from other carriers are expected, said analysts, who generally favored the action. But Free Press called AT&T’s tiered pricing anti-consumer.

The FCC is partway through trimming a backlog of requests from cable operators to be freed of local rate and equipment regulation, said commission and industry officials. The Media Bureau in recent months has stepped up approvals of petitions seeking findings of effective video competition, our research found. The bureau granted 31 orders May 7-28, after having granted none during the corresponding three weeks in April.