The Texas Public Utility Commission quietly approved a whopping increase to the Texas USF surcharge Thursday. Texas will raise the TUSF revenue-based surcharge to 24% from 3.3% on Aug. 1, commissioners decided on unanimous consent, without discussion, at a livestreamed meeting. Legislators could provide relief soon, said state Sen. Drew Springer (R) in an interview. Industry and a consumer advocate supported broad TUSF contribution changes.
Texas commissioners will weigh increasing the state USF surcharge to 24% from 3.3% at Thursday's meeting, the Texas Public Utility Commission said Wednesday. The Texas USF (TUSF) revenue-based surcharge would increase effective Aug. 1, said a memo in docket 50796-58. The PUC attributed the increase to reduction of intrastate voice revenue. “Currently, the fund is losing $10 to $11 million per month and the fund currently is in arrears $192 million,” it said. “Additionally, this fiscal year the commission is completing rate of return adjustments for some small and rural ILECs to increase their support payments, which could add an additional $18 million in expenditures per year.” A state court said last month the Texas PUC violated the state’s constitution and utility and administrative procedure laws when in June 2020 it chose not to increase the surcharge to fully fund TUSF (see 2207120028).
Making one monthly Texas USF payment to AMA TechTel Communications doesn’t satisfy a court order to pay full amounts owed from Dec. 1, 2021, the CLEC said Monday at the 3rd District Texas Court of Appeals in Austin. Texas disagreed last week it must pay retroactively to make up the difference of reduced payments (see 2207080032). Texas tries to “preempt an inquiry into what this Court’s order commands,” responded AMA in case 03-21-00597-CV. “They have failed on the facts and the law.” The Texas Public Utility Commission paid $1.34 million, but the full amount owed, dating back to December, is about $8.59 million, said AMA. The PUC is scheduled to consider a TUSF assessment item at its Thursday meeting.
Texas doesn’t have to retroactively pay Texas USF (TUSF) support it kept from AMA TechTel Communications due to insufficient available funding, Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) said Thursday. The 3rd District Texas Court of Appeals in Austin ordered the PUC June 30 to pay full amounts owed (see 2206300045). Paxton told the appeals court AMA on July 5 received a full monthly payment for June of about $1.34 million but now is asking a lower court to order the PUC to pay all support owed since Dec. 1. The court didn’t “unlawfully require retroactive payments,” the AG said. It could take until at least mid-September before the PUC can make full payments to all TUSF recipients, Paxton said. “The TUSF presently lacks sufficient money to pay all amounts owed from the fund,” so the PUC would first have to raise the assessment rate and wait until enough revenue accrued before it could pay, said Paxton. He noted the PUC has an item on TUSF assessment on this Thursday’s meeting agenda. AMA didn’t comment Friday. In a separate, similar case, the appeals court ruled June 30 that the PUC violated the state’s constitution and utility and administrative procedure laws when it chose not to fully fund TUSF (see 2207010045).
NARUC should press states and the federal government to lower barriers, including through increased funding and awareness campaigns, to enrollment in the affordable connectivity program, Telecom Committee member Crystal Rhoades said in an interview Thursday. The Nebraska Public Service Commission’s lone Democrat said she doesn’t expect controversy over her proposed resolution, which is up for vote at NARUC’s July 17-20 policy summit in San Diego (see 2207060037). However, Next Century Cities Senior Policy Counsel Ryan Johnston raised concerns that the draft omits local governments’ key role in raising awareness.
T-Mobile asked the FCC to pause new high-cost USF programs until programs funded through the American Rescue Plan Act and Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act have been implemented, in a meeting with Wireline Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics staff (see 2203180062). The carrier also met with an aide to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel, said an ex parte filing posted Wednesday in docket 21-476. The new funding "largely overlaps" with the goals of the high-cost programs and is "equivalent to more than two decades' worth of support, T-Mobile said. There's also "no need for immediate contributions reform" if new support is paused, T-Mobile said, noting "recurring appropriations" for programs like the affordable connectivity program would "more efficiently distribute the burdens of the USF to different stakeholders and appropriately account for the shared benefits to society of expanded connectivity." Absent direct appropriations, the carrier said it backed assessing "network capacity usage" or "revenues generated over USF-funded networks."
The biggest apparent policy cut in the FCC’s wireless resiliency rules released Wednesday (see 2207060070) overrules objections by the Competitive Carriers Association and NTCA that the rules shouldn’t apply to small providers. The order creates the mandatory disaster response initiative (MDRI), replacing the industry’s wireless voluntary network resiliency cooperative framework.
Alaska’s attorney general disagreed with CTIA seeking no major changes to Alaska USF. The AG’s Regulatory Affairs and Public Advocacy Section (RAPA) supported -- while CTIA opposed -- switching to a connections-based contribution method, in comments last month at the Regulatory Commission of Alaska (see 2206140074). CTIA’s suggestion that the RCA sunset AUSF rather than repurpose it for broadband “is counter to the long-standing federal and state communications policy goals of universal service,” RAPA replied Tuesday in docket R-21-001. RCA hasn’t found “that preservation of universal service is no longer accomplished through the AUSF” or that the fund “no longer promotes the efficiency, availability, and affordability of universal telephone service in Alaska,” it said. CTIA sees “broad opposition” to repurposing AUSF for broadband, said the wireless association. Incoming federal funding from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is “extremely relevant” to RCA’s consideration and “weighs strongly against taking action at this time.” GCI supports continuing a limited state fund, it said. “AUSF support for broadband is illegal under Alaska law and not supported by good policy,” as would be including broadband in the contribution base, said the carrier: GCI would be OK with shifting to a connections-based method or keeping the current revenue-based surcharge. Alaska Communications supported “many aspects of RAPA’s proposal, in that it would refocus support to areas with the greatest need.” The company doesn’t agree “the RCA should require AUSF recipients serving both high and low density areas to meet generalized service metrics to show they have used support for the purposes intended,” it said. Adopting RAPA’s plan to assess broadband connections “would be inviting possible future invalidation of part or all of the AUSF program either through a direct legal challenge to the Commission’s regulations or indirectly through other state or federal litigation,” warned the Matanuska Telecom Association. The Alaska Remote Carrier Coalition urged the RCA to adopt connections-based contribution and focus subsidies on remote areas not connected by roads.
Broadcasters, MVPDs, ISPs and other entities argued over the state of competition in the broadband and video marketplaces and how to address it, in comments posted by Friday’s deadline in docket 22-203 for the agency’s biannual State of Competition in the Communications Marketplace report to Congress, due in Q4. Regulations premised on lack of competition “should be repealed,” said NCTA. The FCC “must consider the real-world consequences of imposing, in a highly competitive marketplace, a burdensome and outdated regulatory regime,” said NAB.
The Texas Public Utility Commission violated the state’s constitution and utility and administrative procedure laws when it chose not to fully fund Texas USF (TUSF), a state appeals court ruled Thursday. The 3rd District Texas Court of Appeals in Austin partly reversed the Travis County District Court in Austin dismissal of rural telcos’ complaint against the PUC. The trial court must issue a writ of mandamus ordering Texas commissioners “to take immediate action to fulfill their duties imposed by law to fully fund all TUSF programs and to make all disbursements required by” the Texas Public Utility Regulatory Act (PURA) and the PUC’s “existing TUSF orders and commitments,” wrote Justice Gisela Triana in Thursday’s opinion with Chief Justice Darlene Byrne and Justice Chari Kelly (case 03-21-00294-CV).