MIAMI BEACH -- NARUC’s Telecom Committee approved policy resolutions urging Congress and all other levels of govt. to ensure enough money to maintain and improve 911 service and urging states to adopt competitively neutral policies toward BPL deployment, consistent with protecting electric ratepayers interests. At the group’s annual convention here, the telecom panel also supported a resolution passed by the Consumer Affairs Committee calling for furthering Lifeline participation through additional outreach. They advanced through the NARUC committee process with little discussion.

NARUC committees at the annual meeting in Miami Beach Sun. were scheduled to take up policy resolutions on E-911 development, BPL policy and Lifeline. The Telecom Committee’s proposed resolutions would support federal appropriations requests to finance 911 public safety answering points and encourage states to adopt competitively neutral BPL deployment policies. The federal 911 appropriations resolution deals with Congress’s failure to provide any money under a 2004 law establishing a grant program of up to $250 million for enhancing local 911 services. The draft BPL resolution would encourage states to adopt BPL policies that protect electric systems and consumer and ratepayer interests. The resolution said some aspects of BPL such as radio interference are FCC matters, but states still can craft policies affecting BPL feasibility and incentives. Meanwhile, NARUC’s Consumer Affairs Committee was to consider a Lifeline resolution encouraging state commissions to collaborate with carriers that receive universal service subsidies to ensure they support Lifeline/LinkUp outreach and education programs, put Lifeline information on their websites, update their Lifeline customer service phone scripts, and encourage other public utilities to include an annual bill insert advertising availability of Lifeline phone service.

A draft wireless E-911 bill for the 2007 Mont. legislature would establish a 50 monthly fee per wireless number. Under LD-188, the money collected would be split evenly between local 911 jurisdictions and wireless carriers. The draft would designate the state Dept. of Administration as the agency in charge of collecting wireless E-911 fees and would include administrative procedures for allocating the money to individual wireless carriers and local 911 jurisdictions.

FCC attorney Marilyn Jones becomes designated federal officer to N. American Numbering Council… CEO Louis D'Ambrosio and COO Michael Thurk join Avaya board… New E- 911 Institute board members: Brian Fontes, Cingular; Robert Gojanovich, HBF Group; Lusica Lancetti, Sprint Nextel; Timothy Lorello, TCS; Travis Manley, U. of Ky… Alexander Cohen, ex-Latham & Watkins, becomes SEC deputy gen. counsel- legal policy & administrative practice… Dave Williamson, ex-Bridgewater Systems, joins Espial IPTV as head of worldwide sales.

Paul FitzPatrick resigns as Crown Media COO… DataPath names David Helfgott, ex-SES Global, pres.-COO… Jason Barbour, 911 dir. for Johnston Co., N.C., takes over as National Emergency Number Assn. pres… Michael Dugan, EchoStar, joins Citizens Communications board… Salem Communications promotes Michael Reichert to vp- operations… Fuse names Joanne Freed, ex-Ketchum, vp- consumer public relations … Michele Solomon promoted to vp- ad sales mktg. AMC Entone picks Gerard Pearce, ex- Motorola/NextLevel, to head N. American sales… Entone picks Gerard Pearce, ex-Motorola/NextLevel, to head N. American sales…Amitabh Singhal, ex-Internet Service Providers Assn. of India, affiliates with Harris, Wiltshire & Grannis… Richard Yanowitch resigns from NDS Group board.

Phone outages afflicted AT&T in Mich. and Cal. Tues. In Mich., an unspecified network glitch knocked out 911 service in portions of Detroit for about 6 hours. Cellphone users were able to place 911 calls and 7-digit local emergency numbers still worked. The outage began around 2:30 p.m. and was corrected around 8:30 p.m. In Cal., some 4,600 AT&T customers in Santee, Cal., lost all phone service Tues. afternoon when a sewer construction crew sliced through an underground conduit carrying AT&T’s lines and ripped several yards of the conduit from the ground. AT&T said all cut off customers would be restored by Fri.

Wash. regulators set a Nov. 8 prehearing conference on a Qwest proposal to end rate-of-return regulation in favor of a price-based system capping retail residential basic service and deregulating retail rates for everything else. Qwest also wants to end Qwest-specific retail service quality standards and reporting requirements, binding it only to the same retail quality standards and reports as Verizon, CenturyTel and Embarq. Qwest has broad retail pricing flexibility for its interexchange and business telecom services, but revenues continue to count in rate-of-return calculations. Qwest in Case UT-061625 said rate-of-return constraints hinder it from pricing its services to market, and RoR is obsolete since Qwest no longer exercises monopoly market power. Under the Qwest proposal, the only rate- regulated services would be stand-alone residential basic exchange, local operator services, Lifeline and 911. All other stand-alone retail services would be priced to market, along with all service bundles. Earnings no longer be would regulated. Qwest said its proposal would give it the price flexibility it needs to counter “pervasive competition” for all services from cable, wireless and CLEC rivals. Qwest said its plan fits state goals such as promoting advanced services, ensuring reasonable rates, and facilitating competition.

The Me. PUC chose 42 sites around the state for state- subsidized public interest payphones. The phones are going into locations with substantial low-income populations, low landline penetration rates or spotty wireless service. The PUC website has a list of the locations. The phones will provide free local calls, plus 911 and interexchange access. The PUC acted under a 2005 state law that provided a $50,000 state fund to subsidize payphones in areas where they're vital to public health and safety but not profitable enough for business. The PUC is seeking bids to supply the payphone service. The first phones are expected to go into service this year. In another matter, the Me. PUC changed its process for reviewing Verizon challenges to service complaint counts that are part of its service quality metrics. Under the revised procedure, the state Consumer Advocate is automatically a party to any Verizon challenge of complaints included in the counts, with a specific comment & reply cycle for the advocate.

The Cal. PUC adopted rules for mass migration of customers to other carriers when a CLEC exits the state’s local exchange market. The rules adopted in Case R-03-06-020 require the departing CLEC to file a market exit plan with the PUC and notify interconnecting carriers at least 90 days before the termination date. The plan must include provisions for transferring exchange prefixes and unlocking 911 databases. The CLEC also must give customers at least 60 days notice of termination and another at 30 days out. To deal with customers who don’t act to choose a replacement carrier, the PUC will first ask the other carriers in the market if they'll volunteer to be the default carrier. If none volunteer, the PUC would designate either the CLEC’s underlying network service provider or the official carrier of last resort in the market to take the customers, subject to compensation if necessary.

House Commerce Committee Chmn. Barton (R-Tex.) is balking at Senate VoIP E-911 provisions in the port security bill (HR-4954) headed for conference, Hill sources and industry sources said. “Barton’s position is that the House addressed E-911 and addressed it well” in passing the telecom bill (HR-5252) in June, a spokesman for Barton said: “We hope the full Senate takes it up.”