Pennsylvania locality groups asked the FCC to approve the state's petition for rule changes to secure $140 million in Connect American Fund Phase II broadband support that Verizon declined and is scheduled to be auctioned. The USF support was based on an "FCC cost model to be used in underserved areas of Pennsylvania" and it's "critical" the funds remain in the state "for broadband deployment in those rural areas that desperately need it," said filings posted Thursday in docket 10-90 by the Pennsylvania State Association of Boroughs (here), Pennsylvania State Association of Township Commissioners (here) and two other groups. They cited Pennsylvania's commitment to broadband deployment, and noted the FCC granted a New York request to retain CAF II funds in-state. "While the type of commitment to broadband deployment in New York is different from that of Pennsylvania, the level of commitment, not to mention the level of need, is similar," the filings said. Three asked the FCC "to modify the auction formula for bids in Pennsylvania to the extent resources are made available through the state on a non-discriminatory and technology-neutral basis." The Wireless ISP Association opposed the Pennsylvania petition (see 1706210019), while Verizon was supportive (see 1705190044).
Work of the Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee remains a top focus of FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, senior Pai adviser Nick Degani told the group Thursday as it held its second public meeting. BDAC's work “is central to the mission of the commission” and is being closely watched on the eighth floor of the FCC, Degani said. But BDAC members complained repeatedly that the group has been given an unrealistically quick timeline.
Not everyone is taking sides in the brawl over whether the FCC should undo its Title II broadband regime undergirding net neutrality rules. Some commenters seek strong protections under other statutory authority, while others are focused on targeted broadband objectives such as ensuring Lifeline USF support, rural telecom advances or privacy.
SAN DIEGO -- FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly’s visit to NARUC's meeting re-energized federal-state joint boards on Universal Service and Jurisdictional Separations, state commissioners said. But the boards established by the 1996 Telecom Act may be losing relevance, they said. O’Rielly has been federal chair of the boards since February. He participated Tuesday in separate closed-door meetings in San Diego, with each lasting about an hour, NARUC attendees said.
The Senate Commerce Committee's Wednesday confirmation hearing on FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner-nominees Brendan Carr and Jessica Rosenworcel featured plenty of grievances on policy issues and criticisms against Pai and Carr, as expected (see 1707180041). Despite some Senate Commerce Democrats' misgivings, nothing changed perceptions that all three nominees will advance easily out of the committee, although maybe not unanimously, industry lobbyists told us.
SAN DIEGO -- As states seek broadband-for-USF and funding tweaks, an FCC member was said to visit the city where state regulators are meeting, NARUC attendees told us. Commissioner Mike O’Rielly was expected to have been in San Diego on Tuesday for closed-door meetings of the federal-state joint boards on Universal Service and Jurisdictional Separations. His office didn't comment. Also at the meeting, states and electric utilities joined local governments protesting balance on FCC Chairman Ajit Pai’s Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee (BDAC).
Net neutrality appears likely to be the marquee issue at the Senate Commerce Committee's Wednesday confirmation hearing for FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner-nominees Brendan Carr and Jessica Rosenworcel, but is unlikely to derail the hearing, lawmakers and lobbyists told us. Committee Democrats are more likely to bring up net neutrality and the FCC's other recent controversial actions, lobbyists said. Committee Republicans are likely to want to downplay the net neutrality issue and instead emphasize other telecom issues, lobbyists said. Net neutrality NPRM comments were due Monday (see 1707180009).
NTCA said a funding "disconnect between the Lifeline and high-cost USF programs" left rural consumers "stuck in the 'digital divide.'" Budget constraints and other structural issues limit rural carriers' ability to make 15/2 Mbps broadband available to "large swaths of their service areas," said the RLEC group in a Friday filing in docket 10-90. The FCC provided an "inflation-based update" to the Lifeline low-income subsidy program, but "there is no realistic Lifeline discount large enough to enable a rural low-income consumer to obtain standalone broadband when the 'starting price' for all of the rural consumers in a given area is already far in excess of what is available in urban areas," NTCA said. While the FCC "took steps to remake the Lifeline program for the broadband era and also updated the High-Cost mechanism in recent years, the artificially constrained and arbitrary High-Cost budget is undermining the goals of both the High-Cost and Lifeline programs ... to the detriment" of rural users, the group said. It urged the agency "to reconsider the sufficiency of a budget for the existing High Cost program that is based upon arbitrarily time-locked support levels now more than six years old."
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai responded to letters from Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, and more than 100 House members earlier this month in response to their concerns about the USF’s stand-alone broadband problem, which prevents rate-of-return (RoR) carriers from receiving USF support for broadband customers using other providers for voice service. Pai noted ongoing FCC efforts to address a “punch list of lingering issues” with the commission’s 2016 order revamping the RoR USF support mechanisms (see 1603300065). Pai also plans to continue his push on rural broadband deployment at the FCC’s Aug. 3 meeting (see 1707130059). Despite the 2016 order, “I still hear from small carriers that offering stand-alone broadband would put them underwater; that the rates they have to charge exceed the rates for bundled services because of the different regulatory treatment,” Pai said in letters to Ernst and the House members (see here, here, here and here). “This is unfortunate but unsurprising. As I said at the time, the Order needlessly complicated our rate-of-return system and in many ways made it harder, not easier, for small providers to serve rural America.” Pai said he hopes the changes will help, but the lawmakers “may be right that something more fundamental is needed. After all, if the Order is not carrying out its stated purpose of advancing broadband deployment in rural America, we cannot ignore that problem -- for time is not on the side of rural Americans.”
The FCC set a pleading cycle on the planned transfer of prepaid wireline customers in 10 southern states from Global Connection to Tele Circuit Network. Comments are due July 27, replies Aug. 3, said a Wireline Bureau public notice in docket 17-170 in Friday's Daily Digest. Global Connection provides prepaid local and long-distance services in 26 states, and is a Lifeline USF eligible telecom carrier (ETC) in the 10 southern states plus two others. Tele Circuit is a Lifeline ETC in five of the southern states.