The District of Columbia Council voted unanimously to confirm Richard Beverly to the Public Service Commission. Beverly currently is general counsel for the commission and has worked there since 1997. He will replace Commissioner Joanne Doddy Fort, whose term expired June 30. Beverly “possesses both the public service and the experience to properly serve on the commission,” Councilmember Charles Allen (D) said at the Tuesday confirmation.

Still waiting for FirstNet to choose a vendor, Arizona delayed by three months the deadline for a request for proposals seeking alternate plans for the national public safety network if the governor opts out of the federal proposal. The state extended the deadline to March 30 from Dec. 29, said a Friday update to the Arizona procurement website. FirstNet delays in choosing a vendor have now forced Arizona to postpone its RFP deadline three times; the original due date was Oct. 31. Some state officials raised concerns last week that the FirstNet delay may negatively affect funding and momentum (see 1612150057).

The Minnesota Office of Broadband Development sought proposals to collect and map broadband deployment data by technology and speed from about 120 providers in the state. Bids are due Jan. 9 under the request for proposal announced in an email Monday. “It is the goal of this project that Minnesota policy makers will be able to document progress towards achieving the state’s broadband goals in Minn. Stat. 237.012 and that Minnesota residents and businesses will have the ability to determine their options by provider, technology and speed, for subscribing to broadband services at their location,” the RFP said.

The California Public Utilities Commission revised its conditional OK of Charter Communications' $90 billion buys of Bright House Networks and Time Warner Cable. Commissioners unanimously gave the deal the green light last May (see 1605120040), but afterward received applications for rehearing from the Office of Ratepayer Advocates (ORA) and Center for Accessible Technology (CAT), plus Entertainment Studios Networks and the National Association of African American Owned Media. In a Monday order, the commission approved part of the ORA/CAT petition asking CPUC to add conditions that Charter agreed to in a reply brief but that didn’t appear in the May order. The conditions involved service quality, semiannual reports to ORA, a customer service survey and communications with customers with disabilities, it said. But CPUC refused to add another requested condition, which was adopted in the FCC approval, banning Charter from imposing data caps or charging usage-based pricing for residential broadband service for seven years. California wasn't required to adopt the same conditions as the FCC on data caps and usage-based billing, and in any case, the issue is moot because Charter must comply with the federal conditions, the state commission said Monday. It disagreed with the Entertainment Studios application’s claim the company’s due process rights were violated because the CPUC OK didn’t mention its opening comments. "That the Commission did not adopt Entertainment Studios' proposals, which were never presented until they filed comments on the [proposed decision], does not demonstrate that they were denied due process,” the CPUC said. But the agency added a statement acknowledging Entertainment Studios filed opening comments and that Media Alliance and Stop the Cap filed replies, it said.

The California Public Utilities Commission urged a federal court to dismiss as moot a complaint by ISPs about disclosing FCC Form 477 and other confidential subscriber information to third parties. The CPUC earlier this month closed the proceeding about which the ISPs complained, while ordering staff to probe telecom market competition, so the U.S. District Court in San Francisco case shouldn’t continue, the commission argued in a response (in Pacer) dated Thursday. After the proceeding closed, AT&T, Comcast, CTIA, Verizon and other industry plaintiffs said the court could still provide relief to the companies because the CPUC refused to agree that ISPs should receive advance notice before public disclosure of the Form 477 data (see 1612090027). The agency disagreed. "This case is not, and never has been, about a release of confidential information in response to a California Public Record Act request,” it said. “Yet, now the Plaintiffs are trying to set this Court up to micromanage future CPUC proceedings, and are inviting the Court to promulgate general standards and make advisory rulings that would directly implicate a separate ongoing regulatory proceeding before the Commission.” The regulator said it never "even contemplated releasing this data publicly.” The commission has an open rulemaking to update processes for submitting and disclosing potentially confidential information, it said. “The Commission has expressed a desire not to address this issue on a piecemeal basis, which is exactly what the Plaintiffs are trying to accomplish here.” The Utilities Reform Network (TURN) supported the commission, in a response (in Pacer). "Here, the challenged government activity has indeed evaporated as the case is now closed,” said TURN, an intervenor in the case. “None of the companies’ data at issue here was disclosed to any of the intervenors to the case and, except for what must amount to a significant bill for legal fees, there is no ongoing ‘substantial adverse effect’ to the Plaintiffs from the CPUC’s actions.”

The California Public Utilities Commission may vote Jan. 19 on updating state LifeLine rules to align them with changes to the federal low-income program, the CPUC said in a proposed decision posted Thursday. Also, the draft implements AB-2570, a bill signed into law in September requiring the CPUC to adopt a 60-day portability freeze rule for the state LifeLine program (see 1609010058). The proposed decision doesn't tackle all issues raised by the federal Lifeline changes, but the state agency plans to address more in the future, it said. “Given that the FCC’s readjustments to federal Lifeline remain in a state of development at this writing, the conclusions we reach in this decision are made in a context of some uncertainty. We expect the adjustments ordered today, along with the changes we anticipate, to take several months, if not years, to fully implement because of the time needed to develop and test new process technologies.” While she wrote the proposed decision, Commissioner Catherine Sandoval won’t return to the CPUC next year. Sandoval’s term expires at the end of this year, and she said at Thursday’s commissioners' meeting she plans to return to full-time work as a law professor at Santa Clara University in January. Commissioner Mike Florio also is leaving (see 1612150062). With Florio and Sandoval departing, the California body lost its “most consistently activist” commissioners, said Tellus Venture Associates President Steve Blum in a blog post Friday. Blum is a consultant for local governments. “Florio and Sandoval advocated for greater competition in California’s telecoms market and supported efforts to extend broadband connectivity into rural and low income communities," he wrote. "They’ve been more willing than most to buck pressure from AT&T, Verizon and cable lobbyists and, among other things, push for investigations into service and infrastructure issues that the incumbents would prefer to sweep under the carpet, and resist Comcast’s attempts to turn California into its own walled garden.”

San Francisco landlords of multi-dwelling units may not interfere with tenants’ choice of ISPs, under an ordinance adopted Tuesday by the Board of Supervisors. The board voted 11-0 to pass the measure, which got support from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (see 1612080013). In a blog post Wednesday, EFF said such local measures may become increasingly important if the Trump administration reverses net neutrality rules. “In absence of rules protecting users, fair competition can go a long way to deter practices like site blocking and censorship,” wrote EFF activist Elliot Harmon. “If the FCC’s Open Internet Order doesn’t survive the transition -- or if it simply goes unenforced -- then one way that cities can help mitigate the damage is through local laws like this one. Similarly, if the FCC fails to adequately protect Internet users’ privacy, then subscribers will be able to choose ISPs that stand up for their rights.”

State and local governments should consider broadband access as they assess affordable housing and community development needs, said the Department of Housing and Urban Development. HUD added the broadband requirement to its Consolidated Plan with a rule to be in Friday's Federal Register. The plan outlines priorities for funding by HUD’s formula block grant programs. “States and localities that submit a Consolidated Plan [must] describe the broadband access in housing occupied by low- and moderate-income households,” said the notice. If low-income residents in the communities lack such access, it said, "States and jurisdictions must consider providing broadband access to these residents in their decisions on how to invest HUD funds.” The digital divide remains a problem, many say (see 1612130066).

New York State officials said their broadband program is "technology neutral and open to wireline, fixed wireless, and satellite broadband providers." They continued to push for an expedited FCC waiver to augment a New York broadband reverse auction with money from federal Connect America Fund Phase II subsidy support slated for use in a commission auction (see 1610130047). Rules for the next phase of the New York broadband auction "will specifically allow satellite providers to participate," said a filing posted Thursday by Empire State Development (ESD) in docket 10-90 on a meeting with Wireline Bureau officials. ViaSat and the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association last week voiced concern the New York eligibility rules could exclude "cost-effective" technologies from the state program (see 1612080058). "Broadband services providing 100 Mbps or greater download speeds are preferred in the auction, but only if bids for such services are cost reasonable," said ESD. "Broadband services providing 25 Mbps or greater are eligible for the auction in areas where cost-reasonable 100 Mbps services are unavailable. In such cases, New York will award funding to the bidder with the lowest cost of service in the State regardless of technology." The filing said New York officials also discussed with satellite providers their possible participation in the state program. ViaSat and WISPA made their arguments this week, this time to an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel.

Government agencies should partner with tech companies and nonprofits to create online tools connecting low-income people to public and philanthropic programs to which they're eligible, the Progressive Policy Institute said. PPI and Hunger Free America released a report proposing what it called Health, Opportunity and Personal Empowerment (Hope) accounts at a Tuesday event in New York City. “The only thing low-income people have less of than money, is time," Hunger Free America CEO Joel Berg said in a news release. "The new HOPE technology partnership would streamline multiple government and nonprofit safety net programs all into one user-friendly device, allowing low income individuals to fill out one application, rather than wait in line for hours at up multiple government and nonprofit assistance offices.” NYC Department of Social Services Commissioner Steven Banks supported the report at Tuesday’s event, PPI said.