Pole Attachment Item Seen Likely Getting Tweaks
The pole attachment item on the FCC's agenda Thursday is likely to be rewritten concerning the 60-day advance notice that attachers must provide utilities regarding midsize pole attachment orders, broadband infrastructure officials and experts tell us. In addition, we're told the draft order language about a 30-day timeline for utilities to approve attacher-proposed contractors could be moved to the item's Further NPRM. The pole attachment item -- a key part of FCC Chairman Brendan Carr's Build America Agenda, unveiled in June (see 2507020036) -- has seen heavy lobbying from attacher and electric utility interests (see 2507160024 and 507180026).
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The FCC has seemed fairly resistant to any changes to the item, a broadband industry official told us.
Another broadband industry official told us the contractor onboarding issue is likely being moved to the Further NPRM, so the FCC can get more information about the process before acting. He said the pole attachment item's focus was on quickening large orders for thousands of poles, not adjusting the process for midsize orders, and the 60-day advance notice for mid-sized orders adds steps and days to deployment.
A lawyer with broadband infrastructure expertise involved in the proceeding told us there's hope among broadband interests the FCC tweaks language that would penalize attachers that don't provide advance notice but doesn't penalize utilities that miss particular notification deadlines. The lawyer added that since utilities can remove a contractor from the approved list for safety reasons and contractors have to go through a utility's onboarding process before they can do an attacher's work, broadband interests also hope the agency doesn't change course on the approved contractors requirements.
The 60-day advance notice and meet-and-confer requirement for midsize pole orders isn't practical and will slow routine deployments, Incompas and Crown Castle representatives told the offices of the three commissioners and Wireline Bureau staff, according to a filing in docket 17-84 this week. If it doesn't eliminate the 60-day requirement, the FCC should at least make clear the advance notice and meet-and-confer requirement applies only when the 300-pole threshold is exceeded as part of a single project, the Incompas group said. It also urged that the commission halve to seven days the deadline a utility has to accept a make-ready estimate.
The Utilities Technology Council, Xcel Energy and Dominion Energy, meeting with Commissioner Anna Gomez's office, continued the electric utility industry's push to limit the approved contractors list addition requirements to contractors in the communications space, according to a docket filing this week. The utilities also opposed a proposal requiring attachers be refunded for prepaid, uncompleted survey or make-ready work with interest.