The E-rate program must recognize the “unique role of libraries in the broadband social landscape,” the Urban Libraries Council told FCC officials Monday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1i4Lf4Y). It must also recognize the “structural differences” between libraries and schools, ULC said. “Libraries play a critical role for the 90 million adult Americans not currently in the workforce. These individuals cannot access broadband at work or through schools, and many either do not have broadband at home or do not have reliable access to broadband in a home,” ULC said. More than 60 percent of libraries report they are the only free public Internet access location in their communities, it said. The FCC should “define a desired state of library access for high-speed circuits to each library building and internal wireless broadband connectivity,” ULC said, citing a goal of 4-5 Mbps downstream and 1 Mbps upstream for each Wi-Fi user during peak hours.

Nearly 200,000 customers of eligible telecom carriers receiving high-cost USF support had rates below the $14 rate floor as of Jan. 2, an FCC Wireline Bureau analysis found (http://bit.ly/1i4EkIY). Of those, about 150,000 were price cap carrier lines, and 50,000 were rate-of-return carrier lines. It’s a decrease from 220,000 lines that had rates exceeding the rate floor on July 1, the analysis showed. The change represents a monthly reduction of about $290,000 in support, the analysis said.

The FCC lawfully denied USTelecom’s “across-the-board forbearance request” regarding the Uniform System of Accounts (USOA), the agency told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in a brief filed Wednesday (http://bit.ly/1i2E6Cd). USTelecom unsuccessfully petitioned (CD Feb 17/12 p14) the agency to use its Communications Act Section 10 authority to forbear from applying the requirement that price cap carriers maintain the USOA as required by the law. The FCC asked the court to deny USTelecom’s petition for review, and not order the FCC to forbear. “The FCC reasonably determined that USTelecom failed to prove that its across-the-board USOA forbearance request satisfied the section 10 forbearance standard,” it wrote. “The central premise underlying the USOA forbearance request -- i.e., that price cap carriers’ rates are not based upon costs, and therefore Part 32 no longer is necessary to ensure that those carriers’ rates are just and reasonable -- is factually incorrect."

Large ISPs like Verizon and Comcast have an incentive to steer their broadband subscribers toward their own on-demand services, and away from unaffiliated providers like Netflix or YouTube, Cogent CEO Dave Schaeffer told FCC acting General Counsel Jon Sallet and Senior Counselor Philip Verveer Friday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1jZT4Ql). Those ISPs are “refusing to upgrade their network connections with companies like Cogent,” leading to “a degraded quality of service to end-users,” Schaeffer said. Schaeffer emphasized Cogent’s belief that broadband Internet should be reclassified as a Title II telecom service, including the common carrier obligations that accompany such a classification. “If the Commission opts not to reclassify at this time,” Cogent’s filed comments “offer ways to enhance the current transparency rule and to identify and remedy network congestion,” Schaeffer said. An FCC spokesman said Tuesday the agency would not consider regulating peering or interconnection agreements as part of its upcoming net neutrality redo (CD April 2 p2).

Comptel submitted a proposed “managerial framework” to the FCC Wednesday as a way to best handle the IP transition (http://bit.ly/1i2DzA2). The proposal emphasizes the critical role of last-mile access and interconnection policies in ensuring retail business competition, drawing on recommendations in the FCC’s National Broadband Plan. The Comptel recommendations aim to guarantee just and reasonable rates, terms and conditions for TDM- and packet-based special access services; clarify rights and obligations with regard to IP interconnection; and provide a balance in copper retirement policies. The group also proposes a detailed timeline of FCC actions: By Q2 of 2014, the agency would initiate its special access data collection and reverse prior grants of forbearance from dominant carrier regulation. By Q3 it would address ILECs’ “anti-competitive, exclusionary special access discount plans” and adopt rules addressing copper retirement. By Q4 it would clarify the “duty” of ILECs to provide IP interconnection under Section 251 of the Communications Act. By Q2 of 2015, the agency would undertake comprehensive special access changes, and address access to packet-based last-mile facilities. The Broadband Coalition released a statement supporting Comptel’s plan. NTCA Senior Vice President-Policy Michael Romano also said his association welcomed Comptel’s focus on ensuring the technological evolution doesn’t become “an excuse to cast aside” important consumer protection rules. “While the members of our organizations may not agree on every substantive policy issue raised or how certain obligations should be interpreted and implemented, we certainly agree that a well-defined regulatory backdrop that provides clear rules of the road on things like interconnection of networks is essential to the functioning of communications markets and the advancement of enduring public policy values,” he said in a statement.

The FCC Consumer Advisory Committee recommended E-rate priorities for the agency to follow in its modernization of the program, said a notice posted by the commission Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1lABbr3). E-rate funding should be distributed in a way that promotes “fair and equitable service” and speeds to schools and libraries of different sizes, the CAC said. Funding must not be tied to specific education outcomes, it said. “Funding based on educational outcomes has the potential to further the digital divide and deepen the gap in the effectiveness of our schools.” Funding predictability should be improved, and an electronic filing system should be implemented to “streamline and centralize the application process,” CAC said.

A “clarification” order released by the FCC Wireline Bureau Monday (http://fcc.us/1i8HlJw) corrects “certain rules” relating to implementation of the intercarrier compensation (ICC) transition adopted in the 2011 USF/ICC order. Language in sections 51.907 and 51.909 was clarified to “reflect ongoing rate parity in the transition process for price cap and rate-of-return” LECs, the order said. The bureau also clarified aspects of the rules relating to transition of terminating end office access rates, and the calculation of eligible recovery for price cap and rate-of-return carriers beginning in 2014. The bureau also clarified an issue “related to duplicative recovery and the true-up of regulatory fees and revenue calculations.”

ENMR Telephone Cooperative asked the FCC for a waiver of some of its rules, “to allow ENMR to correct inadvertent, administrative errors that resulted in under-reporting of billed and collected revenue for Dedicated Transport Access Service, End Office Access Service, and terminating Tandem-Switched Transport Access Service,” in a petition posted Friday (http://bit.ly/1rM5OLl). A waiver for the New Mexico company “will allow NECA to revise ENMR’s Base Period Revenue,” and if not granted, ENMR would be “impacted each year of phased down” intercarrier compensation support, it said.

The distribution of potentially funded locations changed “substantially” between Connect America Model 3.2 and 4.0, CenturyLink told FCC officials Tuesday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1pk4Bc0). “More sparsely populated locations that had been reserved for the Remote Areas Fund have replaced somewhat more populated high-cost areas in the universe of potentially-eligible CAF II locations,” the ILEC said. Its analysis “raises several questions” for agency staff to consider, it said, citing the “higher-than-expected number” of sites that cover “just a few locations,” and “more instances than expected where normal assumptions regarding the economics of sharing feeder facilities may not apply in practice because of the uneconomic nature of the areas served.” However, “it does not appear at this time that changes to the model itself are called for,” CenturyLink said.

The FCC fined Presidential Who’s Who $640,000 for faxing more than 100 advertisements to consumers who did not request them and had no business relationship with the company, said a forfeiture order released Friday (http://bit.ly/1rM44lg). “Presidential Who’s Who persisted in this conduct after Commission staff issued the company a formal citation, explained that its actions were unlawful, and warned that additional junk faxing could result in monetary forfeitures,” the order said. “Due to the large number of violations at issue, the company’s apparently intentional misconduct, and its failure to provide full and updated support for its inability to pay, we impose the total forfeiture of $640,000."