Qwest refiled for forbearance in the Phoenix metropolitan statistical area, again seeking relief from dominant carrier and loop and transport unbundling rules. The company said competition has intensified since last year, when the FCC rejected a Qwest petition seeking the same relief in Phoenix, Denver, Seattle and Minneapolis (CD Aug 19 p3). The petition’s success may depend on a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, said Stifel Nicolaus analyst David Kaut.
Adam Bender
Adam Bender, Senior Editor, is the state and local telecommunications reporter for Communications Daily, where he also has covered Congress and the Federal Communications Commission. He has won awards for his Warren Communications News reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists, Specialized Information Publishers Association and the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing. Bender studied print journalism at American University and is the author of dystopian science-fiction novels. You can follow Bender at WatchAdam.blog and @WatchAdam on Twitter.
The FCC ordered a long-awaited overhaul of regulatory fees for submarine cables. The 3-0 decision, released Tuesday, creates a new fee for operators of the cables to pay instead of the international bearer circuit fee that they have owed. The order doesn’t affect fees paid by terrestrial and satellite operators. Industry applauded the decision, which fell off the sonar late last year when Kevin Martin was the commission’s chairman.
The FCC may soon answer a court remand on universal service high-cost support for non-rural carriers. Last week, the commission circulated a notice of inquiry that includes a laundry list of questions asking how the FCC should respond to a 2005 remand by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, an FCC official told us. In 2005, the court called unlawful the FCC’s current non-rural rules, which address carriers like Qwest that serve high-cost areas with too many lines to be considered “rural” by the statutory definition. Earlier this year, Qwest petitioned the court for a writ of mandamus to force the FCC to make new rules (CD Jan 16 p6). Qwest wants the FCC to change the rules so it can receive more USF support for its rural territories.
The FCC received broadband availability data from most companies filing the new Form 477 report, an FCC official said Tuesday. The FCC is still processing the data submitted, but has received more than 95 percent of the roughly 7,000 filings expected, the official said. The revised form narrows broadband data collection to a census tract level from 5-digit ZIP codes, and distinguishes between residential and business connections. The collection didn’t go completely without error; some companies missed the deadline and are now pleading for extensions.
Incumbent and competitive carriers split on whether access charges should apply to virtual NXX calls, a subset issue to the intercarrier compensation debate. In comments last week on a petition by Blue Casa Communications, most incumbents said access charges should apply. Competitors defended the existing practice of applying reciprocal compensation.
State and industry officials debated possible limits to NTIA broadband grant eligibility in a Monday public hearing at the Commerce Department. In a morning roundtable, representatives of broadband providers and equipment makers urged a widely inclusive approach, while an official for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners suggested the NTIA mandate state involvement. Later in the day, officials discussed coordination between the NTIA and the Rural Utilities Service, and how to spur broadband adoption and public computer center capacity.
A small Colorado company planning to apply for broadband stimulus money started a mapping Web site to collect information on untapped markets. RidgeviewTel created WeNeedBroadband.com, a dialup-friendly Web site where users lacking broadband can enter their names and physical addresses. The site stores the information in a database and maps users’ locations. RidgeviewTel will include select information in grant and loan applications it plans to submit to the NTIA and Rural Utilities Service, CEO Vince Jordan said. The company will share the information with other service providers, and, if enough information is collected, also with the government agencies, he said. RidgeviewTel has built 54 broadband networks in Colorado, New York and Illinois. The company plans to expand in its current markets and enter new ones around the U.S., Jordan said.
CompTel President Matt Salmon resigned, the competitive local exchange carrier association said Wednesday. CEO Jerry James will take on Salmon’s regulatory duties, as he did for six months after replacing former CEO and President Earl Comstock in mid-2007. Salmon, a former congressman, will join the lobby firm Policy Impact, of which T-Mobile and Skype are clients. Salmon spent slightly more than a year as CompTel president. There was no indication of the move at the group’s conference last week in Dallas, where Salmon participated in a panel. The decision wasn’t final until Wednesday morning, a CLEC official said. CompTel’s board doesn’t yet have a successor lined up for the position, and it’s unclear whether the association will continue the two- leader approach, which was new at the time of Salmon’s appointment, the official said.
Senior AT&T executives suggested a light regulatory touch to promote U.S. broadband investment. They asked the agencies responsible for broadband stimulus to keep to a minimum the conditions on grants and loans. The telecom industry owes much of its success to the deregulatory stance of policymakers, said CEO Randall Stephenson in a speech Wednesday to the Economic Club of Washington. Afterward, Senior Vice President Jim Cicconi told reporters that the company’s participation in the government’s broadband stimulus efforts may hinge on the number of strings attached to the $7.2 billion that’s available.
Don’t reconsider a FeatureGroup IP forbearance petition on VoIP access charges, major incumbent wireline carriers urged the FCC. FeatureGroup, a competitive local exchange carrier serving VoIP providers, is challenging a January order denying the company forbearance relief (CD Feb 24 p9). The company wants a ruling that access charges don’t apply to Internet-based traffic that interconnects with carriers on the public switched telephone network. In opposition filings last week, AT&T, Verizon, Embarq and four rural carrier associations said the FCC was right to deny relief.