Stable FCC and other government subsidies are critical to sustaining Alaska’s General Communication Inc.'s investment in the state, General Counsel Tina Pidgeon said on C-SPAN’s The Communicators in a segment that was to have been televised Saturday. USF funding, including high-cost, E-rate and rural healthcare programs, must be predictable for GCI to spend money upgrading and extending services, she said: Alaska takes rural issues to “a different level,” with rugged terrain and low-population communities spread apart by thousands of miles. GCI uses microwave transport and LTE over satellite to serve the more difficult areas with broadband and wireless services, she said. Alaska regulators are weighing revamp of state USF (see 1805300054).

It's "extremely troubling" the FCC proposed a 15-year telco separations freeze "without any consideration of the recommendation" from federal-state joint board members, emailed Colorado Public Utilities Commissioner Wendy Moser, the state member who sponsored a NARUC-passed resolution backing a two-year freeze (see 1807180018). “Given that the majority of the Joint Board rests with the state members, and all that is needed for a recommended decision is a majority, the FCC should take the Joint Board recommended decision as submitted by the states. The FCC can then decide whether to adopt it or explain why not. ... Given the simplicity of the process, one has to wonder what the FCC is trying to accomplish in acting contrary to Congress' intent of having a Joint Board in the first place.”

The FCC cleared several RLEC deals with conditions to address cost-shifting concerns due to their combination of both model-based and cost-based high-cost USF support. The Wireline Bureau granted applications to transfer control of: Westphalia phone and broadband companies to Chapin Communications in docket 17-101; of Scott-Rice Telephone from Allstream Business US to New Ulm Telecom in docket 18-68; of Peoples Mutual phone companies to RiverStreet Management Services in docket 17-365; of Ellerbe Telephone to RiverStreet in docket 18-94; of Tri-County Telephone Membership to Wilkes Telephone Membership in docket 18-95; and of certain assets of Coon Creek phone and telecom companies to Shellsburg Cablevision in 18-177. To mitigate the potential for harmful cost shifting in mixing different types of USF support, the bureau attached conditions established in a Hargray/ComSouth order (see 1805110048), said a public notice in Thursday's Daily Digest: "The combined operating expense ... for each post-consummation company’s rate-of-return affiliates shall be capped at the averaged combined operating expense of the three calendar years preceding the transaction closing date for which operating expense data are available."

The FCC launched its urban rate survey to set "reasonable comparability" benchmarks for fixed voice and broadband services in 2019 in the USF Connect America Fund. Completed surveys are due Aug. 24, after being sent out Wednesday to a sample of fixed service providers identified through December 2017 Form 477 data, said a Wireline Bureau public notice in docket 10-90 in Wednesday's Daily Digest.

The FCC announced a $2.33 billion Lifeline budget for 2019 and updated minimum standards for fixed and mobile broadband services supported by the USF low-income subsidy program, said a Wireline Bureau public notice Wednesday in docket 11-42. Indexing for inflation, the budget for next calendar year was increased from 2018's $2.28 billion. The minimum fixed broadband standards, based on Form 477 and urban rate survey data, take effect Dec. 1. The minimum speed will be 18/2 Mbps, with an exception for providers that don't offer that capability in any generally available residential package to a subscriber's residence (they could offer the highest speed they can, and at least 4/1 Mbps). The minimum fixed broadband data usage will be 1,000 GB per month. Under a 2016 order schedule, the mobile broadband data usage standard was increased to 2 GB per month, while the minimum mobile speed remains at 3G level. Under the 2016 order, the minimum mobile voice service standard will increase to 1,000 minutes per month.

Too many Americans are falling behind on access to high-quality healthcare and the FCC’s proposed USF pilot telehealth program will help (see 1807110053), Commissioner Brendan Carr said in a speech in Jackson, Mississippi, last week, posted Tuesday. Carr noted his mother is a nurse. “If adopted, this new program would target support to connected care deployments that would benefit low-income patients, including those eligible for Medicaid or veterans receiving cost-free medical care,” Carr said. “It would support a limited number of projects over a two- or three-year period with controls in place to measure and verify the benefits, costs, and savings.” Carr noted he has visited U.S. areas where healthcare is an issue, including the Mississippi River Delta.

Congress must do more to encourage rural broadband deployment, House Communications Subcommittee members said at a hearing Tuesday. There was general bipartisan agreement on the need to promote various technological solutions and on certain ongoing legislative efforts to remove deployment barriers. Discord was heard on federal infrastructure spending and municipal broadband.

The FCC denied 21 rural telco petitions to waive a deadline for filing audited financial statements for their annual Form 481 reporting obligations. The requests failed to demonstrate "special circumstances" for waiving their duties as privately held USF eligible telecom carriers, said a Wireline Bureau order in docket 10-90 in Monday's Daily Digest. On its own motion, the bureau granted a limited waiver "such that no support will be recovered from the petitioners in this instance" but said it doesn't intend to grant such waiver petitions going forward. It said eight of the small RLEC petitioners (listed in an appendix) hadn't yet filed the required financial information, and if they don't do so within 120 days of July 13, the Universal Service Administrative Co. is directed to reduce their support pursuant to a rule 54.313(j).

Two FCC information collections will take effect Tuesday after being approved by the Office of Management and Budget for three years, under rules to be published the same day in the Federal Register. The first stems from a 2016 Connect America Fund Alaska Plan order in docket 10-90 to provide $1.5 billion in broadband-oriented USF support cumulatively over 10 years to fixed and mobile providers in high-cost areas of the state served by rate-of-return telcos and their wireless affiliates (see 1608310067). The information collection had to be revised to reflect subsequent reporting orders. The second concerns information collection under a Feb. 22 payphone compensation order to roll back audit, reporting and other rules the agency called outdated (see Notebook at end of 1802220045). An order adopted June 7 (see Notebook at end of 1806070021) in docket 17-169 to take further actions against telephone slamming and cramming practices takes effect Aug. 16 under another rule for Tuesday's FR. Also in Tuesday’s FR, ATSC 3.0 information collection requirement clearance was announced (see 1807160014).

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- Utah's revamping USF contributions and New York's convening pole-attachment talks are examples of how states continue to act as “labs of democracy,” even as many jurisdictions reduce their telecom regulation, said Monday NARUC panelists. Telecom authority varies by state and often is limited, but state commissioners said broadband remains top of mind. "I don't make a single decision in telecom" without asking if it will bring faster and more affordable internet, said New York Public Service Commissioner Gregg Sayre.