Qwest told the Wyoming Public Service Commission it has spent $9 million the past 12 months to make its 911 service more resistant to major outages such as an August 2006 cable cut incident that knocked out E-911 across most of the state. In a report called for by the PSC, Qwest said it invested the $9 million on six projects to upgrade routers and install redundant fiber lines and microwave backups for critical 911 fiber routes. Qwest said it spent $2.7 million on a 50-mile fiber line and microwave backups between Evanston and Kemmerer for redundancy in the most critical segments of its E-911 network. It said it also overhauled 911 routing equipment in Cody and installed microwave backup links for lines passing through there. Qwest said it’s hoping that the state Office of Homeland Security will agree to pick up some costs of the 911 improvements.

A hearing set for Sept. 11 on a long-planned E-911 bill (HR-3403) will be postponed so members can attend Rep. Paul Gillmor’s funeral, committee staffers said Friday. The House Telecom Subcommittee has tentative plans to reschedule the hearing to Sept. 19. HR-3403, introduced Aug. 3 by Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., would mandate that IP-enabled voice providers have access to 911 components needed to provide emergency services at the “same rates, terms and conditions that are provided commercial mobile services providers.” Under it, the FCC could authorize enforcement of the law by state officials. The bill would dictate that 911-related fees states impose on providers go only for 911 or other emergency communications services. The Commission would have to report a year after enactment, accounting state-by-state for how 911 fees are collected and spent. The bill would bar providers from using subscriber databases for any purpose other than emergency communications.

Silicon Valley still has cellphone coverage gaps, even as it works to blanket itself with the nation’s largest Wi-Fi network. Money and savvy are no guarantee against the risk of going incommunicado at Stanford University, along Interstate 280, even on venture capital row, as Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park is known, said Russell Hancock, CEO of Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network. His standing alliance of the region’s cities, some high-tech businesses and others is trying to change that situation. He and carriers say the main problem is residents’ opposition to new cell sites.

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin balked at requests from all the other commissioners to delay a vote set for Tuesday (CD Aug 23 p1) on an order extending a program exclusivity ban sought by Bells, small cable operators and satellite providers, agency officials said. They said retaining the program access rules is a high priority for Martin and he thinks they deserve a vote at an FCC meeting and not on circulation, as the four other commissioners proposed in separate requests. Martin seems eager to dispose of the order because of the Oct. 5 expiration of the ban on cable operators’ withholding from pay-TV competitors channels that the cable companies have investments in. It’s rare for a chairman not to grant a request to delay a vote, said an FCC official, but it’s the chairman’s prerogative to schedule votes.

AT&T is asking the FCC for five years to make changes in the way it handles wireless E-911 calls before the commission imposes tough new standards measuring success locating callers. In meetings at the FCC, AT&T said it plans to move from a network-based to a handset-based technology, which it says will be more reliable but will take years to adopt, sources said.

AT&T will offer parents control over kids’ cellphones with Web-based Smart Limits for Wireless, AT&T said Tuesday. The service lets parents limit talk time, text messaging, instant messaging and outlays for ringtones, games and other downloads. Parents also can restrict cellphone use to certain times of day, block unapproved phone numbers and filter mobile Web sites, it said. Calls to “allowed numbers” and 911 always are permitted, it said. The service works on any AT&T phone connected to the carrier’s network, AT&T said. Smart Limits for Wireless costs $4.99 monthly per line, AT&T said.

Comcast seeks authorization to stop offering its circuit-switched phone service to three more Colorado communities. It plans to replace its Comcast Digital Phone product with its VoIP service, Comcast Digital Voice, in Denver suburbs Northglenn, Thornton and Highlands Ranch. If allowed to, it will begin turning off the old service Oct. 7; customers will be able to use those lines to dial 911 for 30 days after that.

A proposal before the FCC requiring carriers to meet E- 911 accuracy standards by public safety answering point rather than based on statewide averaging, with only a year to get ready (CD Aug 27 p7), is raising red flags among wireless carriers, carrier sources said Monday. The deadline in an order circulated by FCC Chairman Kevin Martin is much tougher than carriers had expected. “I think the industry is extremely concerned, convinced the record is clear that PSAP- level accuracy is not viable, and looking at all of their options for responding to a mandate that is simply made up,” said an attorney who represents carriers.

Carriers would have a year to get into compliance with tougher location accuracy standards for wireless E- 911, under an item circulating on the 8th floor and set for a vote at the September agenda meeting, sources said Friday. The year deadline is even more aggressive than wireless carriers feared as the order was being drafted. The order largely adopts a change the Association of Public Safety Communications Officials sought. The group wanted to require carriers to meet accuracy standards at the public safety answering point level rather than based on statewide averaging.

AT&T and Cox Telecom asked the California Public Utility Commission to reconsider a July decision that fined each company $40,000 for improper ex parte contacts with PUC staff members. The charges involved a complaint case that alleged the carriers failed to fulfill their “warm line” obligation to keep 911 access alive on lines otherwise out of service. The companies (Case 05-11-011) said their contacts hadn’t sought to influence the complaint case but instead to gain approval for a generic rulemaking on warm line access. The carriers said the record didn’t prove that they tried to affect the disposition or classification of the complaint case. They said the PUC decision to penalize them was based on a new legal theory that lawful ex parte contacts to lobby for a rulemaking would be deemed an illegal ex parte contact if the rulemaking was to address issues substantially similar to the complaint case. They also said the PUC incorrectly found the contacts related to the attempt for a warm line rulemaking were an attempt to reclassify the warm line complaint case as a rulemaking matter. “These novel interpretations of the ex parte rules are erroneous and should be withdrawn on rehearing,” the carriers said.