Securus Opposes FCC Bid to Put Hold on ICS Case; Pay Tel Seeks to Alter Draft Order
Securus opposed an FCC court motion to suspend review of an inmate calling service case while the agency considers proposed rate cap increases that could affect core challenges in the litigation. Instead, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C.…
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Circuit should extend briefing deadlines by 30 days while the commission decides whether to approve an ICS draft order tentatively scheduled for an Aug. 4 vote, said a Securus filing (in Pacer) to the court (Global Tel*Link, Securus Technologies, et al., v. FCC, No. 15-1461, 15-1498 and consolidated cases). The FCC is proposing to issue its third ICS order in less than three years (see 1607140087), even though petitioners challenging the two previous orders have yet to obtain court decisions on their merits, Securus said. "At some point, this game of moving the goal posts and forcing Petitioners to start over must end and the Court must ensure that its jurisdiction to review the Commission's final orders is not frustrated," it wrote. The FCC motion (see 1607200053) said the draft order could revise ICS rate caps "that are the central focus of this litigation," Securus wrote. "This is a vast overstatement. In fact, the new calling rate caps adopted in the Second Report and Order are only one of several key issues in this appeal. It said petitioners have challenged several FCC rules and conclusions, including that site commission payments aren't ICS "costs" and its intrastate rate jurisdiction, among others. Assuming the FCC issues a new order, parties should have a week to file motions to govern future proceedings, it said. Separately, Pay Tel Communications urged the FCC to modify its draft order (described in a fact sheet) to make clear "that a per-minute fee, not to exceed the additive, may be collected by ICS providers and remitted to facilities in lieu of other payments." The revisions "could be implemented through a regulatory directive or through a rebuttable presumption, but in either case the Commission has authority to regulate the payments made by ICS providers to confinement facilities," it said in a filing on one of two meetings with FCC officials posted Tuesday in docket 12-375 (other one here). "Pay Tel further emphasized the need to clarify whether and how site commission payments may be made by ICS providers to confinement facilities, especially in light of the differing interpretations of the applicable legal requirements." Attorney Michael Hamden, whose petition the FCC cited in proposing the draft order, this week called on the commission to ban or strictly limit site commissions (see 1607250027).