The Colo. PUC will hold hearings on Qwest’s petition for major rate deregulation at locations around the state Feb. 15-April 18. Qwest seeks rate deregulation for all retail services except residential basic exchange and 911, and an end to PUC oversight of retail service quality. The PUC said it wants testimony on competition in Qwest’s territory.

Chmn. Powell announced Fri. he will leave the FCC in March. With key issues pending for all communications sectors, sources agreed the next chmn. is likely to maintain Powell’s policies in the broadest sense, including an emphasis on competition and on promoting new technologies.

A myth about VoIP’s ability to handle 911 traffic may have been blown away by gunfire at the Ga. Public Safety Training Center. A Monroe County, Ga., test this month for the Assn. of Public Safety Communications Officials International (APCO) indicated to participants’ ears that -- contrary to widespread belief -- VoIP calls can transmit background sounds such as gun shots from callers’ premises well enough to give responders crucial clues about emergencies and how best to address them, CEO James Cavanagh of the Consultant Registry told us. He’s an APCO and National Emergency Numbers Assn. member who prompted the experiment. Cavanagh acknowledged the testing was preliminary and purposely unscientific, but added: “The gauntlet’s been thrown down. Initial results indicate it was not as bad a problem as we thought it was.”

As state legislatures start the new year’s sessions and start addressing issues, hot topics include anti-spam measures, wireless directory assistance, E-911 taxes, billing, regulatory authority, carphone safety and Lifeline.

A state highway contractor in Ariz. severed a Qwest fiber cable, knocking out all landline and some wireless phone service for thousands of customers and the police and fire departments. of 7 towns in central Ariz. Ironically, the contractor was trying to move the line out of harm’s way when the mishap occurred. Service was out Jan. 13 from roughly lunchtime to dinnertime. The affected towns were Maricopa, Casa Grande, Florence, Queen Creek, Higley, Coolidge and Eloy. With 911 disabled, municipal officials activated backup systems -- including posting employees with radio sets conspicuously at street corners to provide help. The employees had to summon emergency aid in several cases. Officials also arranged for 911 calls coming in from outlying areas not affected by the outage to go directly to police stations. The municipal offices in Queen Creek still had some landline service because they have cable phone connections as well as regular phone lines, officials said.

KVH Industries received 2 new orders -- valued at $911,000 and $238,000, respectively -- for its TACNAV vehicle navigation systems. The first was placed by a defense prime contractor on behalf of a foreign customer and the 2nd was issued by a repeat U.S. military customer. Due to contractual restrictions, the customers’ identities cannot be disclosed, the company said.

Nortel CEO Bill Owens struck a pessimistic tone on Capitol Hill Thurs. when he wondered if the U.S. was “up for” the task of effectively deploying broadband to rural America. “I don’t know if it is up for it as a nation. For some reason, our nation doesn’t rally around to do it,” Owens said. While other speakers at the Nortel event, including FCC Comr. Abernathy, highlighted regulatory and technology changes that could bring more broadband to rural areas, Owens questioned if American govt. leaders had the same zeal for broadband that Asian leaders have shown. “We don’t have our mind in this, at the highest levels of government,” Owens said. Owens didn’t specifically cite President Bush or any members of Congress, but he said high-level Chinese officials were taking broadband deployment very seriously. And he predicted that China and other Asian nations would continue to outpace U.S. broadband deployment. “They know what it means for society,” said Owens, referring to the Chinese. “They have a plan, a vision. They know that they're going to win.” Owens said China probably would have 3G technology implemented by next year, in time for the 2008 Summer Olympics. China is “dead serious” about broadband deployment, he said, and he wondered if senior U.S. govt. leaders “woke up thinking about bandwidth like the Chinese do.” Speakers at the event said broadband was important to help rural American communities keep jobs and slow population migration to larger cities. “Rural America is worth saving,” Owens said. Abernathy said regulatory changes could help improve rural broadband deployment, but the best possibilities for rural deployment come from new technologies like wireless broadband and broadband over power line (BPL). Abernathy said BPL could produce “phenomenal” results for rural America. She said wireless broadband -- including services riding on secondary-market and unlicensed spectrum -- was another promising technology for rural markets. She said she learned at a recent international conference that other nations are also looking closely at wireless deployment. Abernathy said the triennial review order (TRO), which dropped unbundling requirements for new “next generation technology,” was starting to bear fruit. “But we need more,” she said, emphasizing the need for more deregulatory action. She said the FCC would try to continue to move towards new regulatory frameworks that focus on social requirements, like 911 and disability assistance, rather than price regulations. But while she said she prefers free market principles, she acknowledged they won’t work to bring broadband to rural areas, where investors don’t have hopes for return on investment. “In rural areas, we have to take a different approach,” she said.

Most states seem “comfortable” with the Commission’s Nov. order preempting state regulation of VoIP services from Vonage and other providers, Chmn. Powell said as he left the FCC meeting Thurs. The National Assn. of State Utility Consumer Advocates (NASUCA) and regulators in Cal., Ohio, Minn. and N.Y. have asked federal appeals courts to overturn the decision. “My impression is the vast majority of states… understand the rightness of that decision,” he said. “A majority of states will not fight that ruling.” The arguments of the states are flawed, he asserted. “They suggest their concern is not the jurisdictional nature of the economic regulation, but somehow the 911 issue,” Powell said. “But the Commission expressly has proceedings on each and every one of those things. They're not in any way being neglected.” Powell also indicated that the Commission appeared on track for a Feb. vote on an intercarrier compensation item, including a rulemaking that asks a battery of questions exploring the issue. If the FCC votes on the intercarrier compensation proposal in a few weeks, as expected, the Wireline Bureau probably will be able to craft a draft order by the end of the year, Wireline Bureau Chief Jeffrey Carlisle said. That’s assuming comments are made and the record is completed in the May-June timeframe, said Carlisle, speaking at a news conference after the FCC’s agenda meeting. Carlisle said the bureau also plans to have a draft order on IP-Enabled Services completed by April-May and on universal service contribution methodology around April.

The VoIP industry has made a “great progress” in implementing 911 technologies in the past year, the VON Coalition said in a progress report on its agreement with NENA (CD Dec 2 p1) expected to be released today (Wed.). “Industry is already stepping into the marketplace with E911 solutions that are more technologically sophisticated than were available at the time the agreement was developed,” the report said: “With additional development, VoIP 911 services promise to be far superior to the services offered to wireline customers today.” The report is expected to be handed to policy-makers, as well as widely distributed among the VoIP industry and 911 community, officials said.

The VON Coalition urged the White House to stimulate VoIP development by supporting 6 policy “enablers” outlined in a letter dated Mon.: (1) Continue “hands-off” treatment of the Internet. (2) Refrain from applying “geographically constrained legacy fees and taxes.” (3) Reform access charges and the universal service regime rather than applying them to new technologies such as VoIP. (4) Use “forward-thinking industry led solutions” for dealing with issues such as how to provide 911 service over the Internet. (5) Make sure consumers can use “any device, application or service over the Internet.” (6) Focus on how the Internet can be used to make “talking more affordable, businesses more productive, jobs more plentiful and the Internet more valuable.” Copies of the letter were sent to Senate Commerce Committee Chmn. Stevens (R-Alaska), House Commerce Committee Chmn. Barton (R-Tex.), Commerce Dept. Secy.-Designate Carlos Gutierrez.