FCC Chmn. Powell said Fri. that while the Commission had seen an improvement in the role that LECs played in Enhanced 911 implementation, “I wouldn’t represent it as enough. I think we have to continue to remain vigilant to make sure that every link in the chain is tight enough so that it remains effective.” He spoke to reporters following live demonstrations by AT&T Wireless, Cingular Wireless and Nextel of E911 Phase 2 technology at the Alexandria, Va., 911 Communication Center. A report completed within the last year by Dale Hatfield, former chief of the FCC Office of Engineering & Technology, had cited issues involving LEC implementation as holding up the timing of the rollouts of some Phase 2 systems. Some public safety groups have called LEC implementation “the missing link” in E911 deployment. “As we work through the process, we come to realize the significance of a part that might not have been originally envisioned,” Powell said: “I think we've really begun to understand the significance of the local phone companies’ participation.” The Commission recently began a stronger “supervisory role” in surveying LECs to understand what their capabilities were and what facilities they had deployed, he said: “We have seen improvement but we have a lot more to go and we are going to continue to work on that.” At the demonstration, dispatchers were fielding live emergency calls while Emergency Communications Technician Supervisor Marietta Robinson vetted test calls from carriers. She used a mouse to zero in on incoming latitude and longitude coordinates for the test calls, providing details down to each building on a nearby city block. “There are 3 things that make this difficult -- its complexity, coordination and bucks,” Powell told reporters in a Q&A Fri. following the demonstration. He cited the usefulness of legislation such as that sponsored by Senate Telecom Subcommittee Chmn. Burns (R-Mont.) and Sen. Clinton (D-N.Y.) that would provide matching grant money for localities for E911 implementation and would require that state funds collected for 911 not be used elsewhere. A demonstration E911 Phase 2 call from the AT&T Wireless network hit a glitch when routing software from a 3rd-party vendor inadvertently routed the call to a neighboring Arlington County, Va., public safety answering point (PSAP). Such calls, when misdirected through such routing software, automatically and instantly are routed to the correct PSAP for emergency response, officials said. Curt Andrich, a senior consultant with Kimmel & Assoc., which has advised PSAPs in Va. on E911 implementation, said the hiccup that had mis-routed the call was the doing of a 3rd-party vendor, not AT&T Wireless. When a wireless call comes into a tower, “the database software is remote and is queried electronically,” he said.

SAN FRANCISCO -- MCI will aggressively counter Bell attacks on lease pricing of its network for voice services, Mid-Atlantic Regional Dir. Carl Giesy told a competitive carriers’ conference here Tues. Incumbents have tried pounding home to state regulators that they have been losing money on TELRIC (total element long-run incremental cost) rates for UNE-P arrangements with competitors, he said at a Competitive Telecom Assn. (CompTel) conference.

The FCC granted Sprint PCS a partial waiver and extension of an upcoming Enhanced 911 Phase 2 deadline, saying the company had met the agency’s “strict standards” for evaluating such requests. The Commission, in an order adopted June 12 and released Mon., granted a 6-month extension of its Dec. 31, 2002, deadline for Sprint to ensure that 100% of all new wireless handsets activated were location-capable. Sprint would have had to meet that requirement for all new digital handsets by June 30. On Dec. 20, Sprint requested 6 more months beyond the Dec. 31 deadline “because of a sudden and unexpected drop in the sales of new handsets,” the FCC said. That meant Sprint and its distributors hadn’t cleared their stock of non-GPS enabled handsets as quickly as forecast and still held significant inventory at the end of 2002. Sprint told the FCC that as of Dec., it wasn’t buying any new phones that weren’t outfitted with GPS capabilities and that it and its distributors needed to sell remaining non-GPS phones to reach the 100% activation requirement. The carrier projected it would sell its remaining inventory by March 31 and its distributors would sell remaining stockpiles July 1. It told the FCC its requested extension to June 30 still was less than the same deadline extension the FCC already had granted to rival carriers, which had more time to meet the requirement in the first place. The FCC said Sprint’s original Dec. 31 deadline wasn’t the result of a previous waiver. “We also conclude that Sprint has adequately demonstrated that it took concrete steps necessary to come as close as reasonably possible to meeting the deadline,” it said. It said Sprint had met other E911 benchmarks, particularly those related to handsets. It also said Sprint took steps to increase sales of GPS-enabled handsets, including subsidizing their cost and “actively” promoting their sale in order to make them competitive with the non-GPS handsets that rivals still were selling. By the end of March, the FCC said Sprint had 15 million compliant handsets for sale and had sold more than 8.8 million.

The FCC is seeking comment by Aug. 15 on a joint petition by public safety groups that asked the agency to solicit feedback on legal issues involving the release of customer-specific information to public safety answering points (PSAPs) responding to 911 calls. The petition was filed last month by the National Emergency Number Assn., the Assn. of Public Safety Communications Officials and the National Assn. of State Nine One One Administrators. The groups asked for public comment on the “legal preconditions” related to release of customer information to PSAPs under the Communications Act and the criminal code as updated by the Patriot and Homeland Security Acts. For example, Sec. 222 of the Communications Act generally protects the confidentiality of customer proprietary network information on factors such as location and destination. It makes an exception for location data that normally would be treated confidentially for emergency calls from wireless subscribers, which could be released to a PSAP or similar emergency responder answering a 911 call. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 updated certain exceptions for disclosure of communications such as to a govt. entity if a provider “reasonably believes” an emergency involving danger of death or serious physical harm to any person “requires disclosure without delay of communications relating to the emergency.” The Patriot Act has similar language on customer records. The public safety petition said such provisions didn’t exist when the Justice Dept. advised the FCC on wireless caller location in 1996 in an opinion that said a govt. entity “may” require an electronic communication service provider to disclose a record or other information relating to a subscriber only when the govt. entity had the subscriber’s consent to such disclosure. That sets up a conflict between language in newer legislation allowing the govt. to require disclosure and the earlier opinion that a service provider “may” divulge the information, the public safety petition said. The groups said wireless carriers had varying written policies on that subject, creating a dilemma on “the frequency with which emergency calls relate to endangered property rather than endangered lives.” The petition asked how to best reconcile differences in civil and criminal statutes and whether Congress meant that disclosures under certain parts of the Communications Act should be discretionary while others were mandatory. Reply comments are due Sept. 15.

A week after the U.S. Appeals Court, D.C., rejected a challenge to an FCC decision to retain wireless local number portability (LNP), both sides argued the technical details of implementation in comments to the FCC. AT&T Wireless said if the Commission couldn’t resolve issues “immediately” on porting obligations and roles, the FCC should again extend a Nov. 24 deadline to ensure operators could make changes in both wireless-to-wireless and wireline-to-wireless porting. Echoing concerns of other wireline carriers, Verizon opposed the CTIA petition, saying it marked an effort to blame LECS for the “supposed difficulties” faced by wireless operators on LNP. Some state regulators charged CTIA was undertaking a last-min. effort to delay LNP.

Cingular Wireless will pay $675,000 to the U.S. Treasury as part of a consent decree adopted by the FCC resolving “possible violations” of the enhanced 911 (E911) phase II rules, the Commission said. It said the company had also committed to a timeline for deployment of its network-based location technology within its GSM network and to making automatic payments to the Treasury should it fail to meet the deployment benchmark in the content decree. It said the company would submit quarterly reports to the Commission on its progress and compliance with the terms and conditions of the consent decree and the E911 phase II rules.

The federal govt. would devote $500 million to E-911 deployment, under legislation introduced Thurs. by Sens. Burns (R-Mont.) and Clinton (D-N.Y.). The bill would also create an NTIA task force to help coordinate E-911 deployment and require the FCC to monitor how states are spending E-911 funds.

The House overwhelmingly passed the Commercial Spectrum Enhancement Act (HR-1320), with 406 members approving the bill that would create a trust fund for govt. spectrum relocation, and only 10 members against the bill, 9 of them Republicans. The bill was widely expected to pass after appropriators dropped their concerns.

The Ohio PUC approved an SBC petition to offer 311 service to municipalities. SBC’s 311 service will function similarly to its 911 service. The 311 number will be used for calls to police and other public safety agencies that don’t involve immediate danger to life or property and for calls to other local govt. agencies. The 311 code was designated by the FCC to take pressure off 911 systems that often get bogged down by calls that aren’t emergencies. The city of Akron announced plans to procure 311 service from SBC and hopes to have the 311 number in operation within a year. SBC said it will be working with the city to ensure accurate designation of jurisdiction so customers are routed to the proper agency for assistance.

New state laws in Md. and Me. will increase state 911 phone bill surcharges. Md. Gov. Robert Eherlich (R) signed a bill (HB-780) imposing a new state-level 25-cent monthly per- line surcharge on wireline and wireless services to help pay costs of a statewide E-911 network. The new law requires the state Emergency Number Systems Board to develop a statewide E-911 implementation schedule by July 2004. The law specifies that local 911 authorities can use state funds to supplement their own local maintenance and operations spending and can’t use state dollars to replace local 911 levies. Me. Gov. John Baldacci (D) signed a bill (HB-1042) to increase the maximum state E-911 surcharge to 66 cents monthly from 50 cents. The new law ties the increase to establishment of at least 16 new public safety answering points around the state.