Net Neutrality Transparency Exemption Disappears as Clyburn Voices Strong Concerns
Rules requiring all carriers comply with the transparency provisions of the 2015 net neutrality rules formally took effect Tuesday, with expiration of the small-business exemption. Commissioner Mignon Clyburn released a statement expressing disappointment. Commissioners Ajit Pai and Mike O’Rielly, who will form the FCC’s 2-1 Republican majority starting Friday, already have assured small ISPs that the commission won't clamp down on companies not in compliance with the rules after they take control (see 1612190059). O’Rielly repeated Tuesday the agency is soon likely to address the issue.
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“A broad consensus has developed both on the Hill and elsewhere that these rules are simply much too burdensome for small businesses, but the solution proposed by current FCC leadership was entirely inadequate,” O’Rielly said in a statement. “I look forward to revisiting both the small business exemption and the Net Neutrality proceeding overall in the coming weeks and months. I certainly believe that providing clarity through an extensive exemption should be given priority consideration early in 2017.” A Pai spokesman declined to comment.
“Nearly two years ago, in the lead up to the Commission’s adoption of the 2015 Open Internet Order, I fought hard to ensure that our nation’s smallest broadband service providers would be free from undue burden when it comes to enhancements to the FCC’s transparency rule,” Clyburn said Tuesday in a statement. “It pains me to report today, that not only have those enhancements gone into effect for all providers, but the Order which would have protected small providers from this enhanced requirement, failed to get adopted by this body. This means that now, even providers with just a handful of customers, must comply with every one of the enhancements to our transparency rules.”
Clyburn said she was “extremely disappointed” the FCC was unable to reach consensus on extending the exemption pending resolution of a rulemaking. “Over a month ago, I voted to establish commonsense protections for small service providers from these enhanced requirements: the only FCC Commissioner to do so,” Clyburn said. “I acted then, and still today feel, that while increased transparency is desirable, we should never abandon our duty to ensure that regulatory benefits outweigh regulatory burdens, particularly when it comes to small businesses.”
“Commissioner Clyburn has hit the nail on the head,” said Tom Power, CTIA general counsel. “We applaud Commissioner Clyburn’s leadership in championing common sense regulatory relief. We join her call for prompt bipartisan commission action.”
Clyburn is “exactly right -- the FCC has failed to protect small businesses across the country from the enhanced transparency rules that officially went into effect today,” emailed Steve Berry, president of the Competitive Carriers Association. “The vast majority of CCA members are small providers that want to focus on serving their customers, rather than spending valuable time, resources and energy trying to comply with additional unnecessary requirements. I share Commissioner Clyburn’s disappointment in the commission’s inability to reach a consensus on this important issue and thank her for standing up for ‘the little guys’ who depend on commonsense policy to protect them from undue burdens.” This is a tough time for small businesses everywhere, Berry said. “I hope the FCC will heed Commissioner Clyburn’s call, previously advanced by Commissioners Pai and O’Rielly, and fix the mistake of letting the exemption expire.”
“It’s too bad that the commissioners didn’t reach a consensus to extend the agreement,” said Randolph May, president of the Free State Foundation. “But I wouldn’t fret too much about it, and I don’t think the pain Commissioner Clyburn says she feels will be long-lasting. I bet she agrees. I’m pretty confident the newly reconstituted commission will address the lapse not too long after Jan. 20.”
The House last week approved by voice vote the Small Business Broadband Deployment Act (HR-288), which exempts ISPs with 250,000 or fewer subscribers from the net neutrality order’s enhanced transparency requirements (see 1701100080). The House cleared the same bill last year, but it stalled in the Senate. CTIA and CCA recently filed a petition at the FCC asking for an administrative stay of the rule. They said each filed in June challenging a staff notice on the rule. “CTIA and CCA are likely to succeed on the merits of their Applications for Review that the 2016 Guidance Public Notice created new, unlawful obligations for mobile broadband providers to comply with the enhanced transparency rule, and the arguments there present, at a minimum, ‘serious, legal issues warranting a stay,” the groups said in the petition in docket 14-28.