The FCC moved forcefully to light a fire under carriers on wireless E-911 but didn’t do as well on public safety answering point (PSAP) readiness, Vp Michael Amarosa of technology vendor TruePosition told a VON [voice on the Net] conference in San Jose late Tues. “They're fining people like I've never seen before,” he said, referring to companies such as AT&T and T-Mobile: “They've decided there will be no more waivers” on benchmark deadlines. But Commission left monitoring of PSAPs to state regulators, Amarosa said: “It’s probably a federal issue that’s going to have to be addressed.” Homeland security initiatives can jump-start E- 911 as well as commercial opportunities that come with it, he said. “If you don’t know where you are, it becomes very difficult” for anyone to help in an emergency, as is often the case with people in unfamiliar surroundings, Amarosa said. The FCC’s Homeland Security Policy Council will play a major role, he said. The House Telecom Subcommittee is expected to hold hearings early in May on how the FCC was moving E-911 deployment and how much should be appropriated, Amarosa said.

Mont. Gov. Judy Martz (R) signed a bill allowing use of electronic signatures for carrier change verifications, even as the legislature sent 2 more telecom bills to her desk. The new law (HB-562) eliminates a former legal requirement that carriers must have a customer’s handwritten signature on a letter of authorization for a carrier switch. The new law allowing use of electronic signatures was requested by the state PSC to facilitate carrier changes while maintaining protection against slamming. Meanwhile, the legislature passed and sent to Martz SB-132 that would give the Mont. Dept. of Administration jurisdiction over state 911 systems. It would authorize the dept. to set up rules and procedures for evaluating local 911 and E-911 plans, regulate facilities used for 911 service and establish requirements for 911 program participation and reporting. Finally, the legislature sent Martz a bill (SB-173) that would allow the PSC to alter the definition of “service area” for determining rural universal service support. The bill would require that the PSC consult with the Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service and take its recommendations into account before altering a universal service area. Currently, the PSC must follow the service areas established by the FCC.

Stakeholders in E-911 implementation are preparing to form an advisory committee that would examine legislative possibilities to advance the rollout of wireless 911 systems, a staffer for a House Commerce Committee member told us. The advisory committee is to include lawmakers, industry and other “stakeholders,” the staffer said. The staffer said it was hoped that legislation might be ready by summer. However, it wasn’t known what language would be needed or whether the bill would require funding, the source said. The bill would enhance provisions in the 1999 Wireless Communications & Public Safety Law, which implemented the E- 911 transition, the staffer said. Congressional members formed an E-911 Caucus last month after concerns increased on the slow pace of implementation, including the potential diversion of funds by state legislators to projects not related to E-911. Senate Communications Subcommittee Chmn. Burns (R-Mont.), the caucus co-chmn., has said he was considering a bill to prevent such diversions (CD March 6 p1). Other caucus members include Sen. Clinton (D-N.Y.), Reps. Shimkus (R-Ill.), Eshoo (D-Cal.). Caucus members have said more study of E-911 implementation problems is needed to determine whether legislation is warranted.

The National Emergency Number Assn. (NENA) and National Assn. of State Nine One One Administrators (NASNA) urged the FCC to “look ahead” and ensure that new services built 911 calling capabilities early in their development cycle. The Commission in Dec. adopted a further notice to study whether mobile satellite service operators, multiline phone systems, IP telephony providers, telematics operators and others should have to meet Enhanced 911 mandates. Several filings in the initial round of comments urged the FCC to exercise care before expanding basic and E911 rules beyond the wireless operators now covered. NENA and NASNA acknowledged in reply comments filed this week that the rollout of E911 Phase 1 and 2 was a “complex task.” They said: “If we fail to look ahead to new services and products offering the promise or expectation of emergency calling and response, we risk discrediting 911 and inhibiting its use in conventional and wireless telephony.” The threshold question for whether a service is covered under 1999 legislation on 911 is whether it meets the law’s application of 911 obligations to wireless and wireline service, the groups said. “We must be forward- looking and address telematics as an E911 issue before it becomes a crisis for the 911 community,” NENA and NASNA said. “Assuring a well-designed interface of telematics with E911 should be a Commission priority.” In earlier comments, some automakers told the FCC that privately run call centers associated with services such as OnStar were well equipped for emergency communications. NENA and NASNA said there were “cost-effective” ways to further integrate telematics call center operations with public safety networks for handing off emergency calls initially received by private call centers. The groups said the record before the FCC was “mixed” on who should bear responsibility for ensuring E911 access vis resale, prepaid calling and disposable phones. “We apply to these and to other new and emerging services the fundamental principle that any reasonable facsimile of basic wire or wireless calling should be presumed capable of Enhanced 911 access, with the provider bearing the burden of showing why that presumption cannot or should not be met,” the groups said.

The Assn. of Public Safety Communications Officials (APCO) criticized what it called “an apparent effort by Nextel” to urge the FCC to remove a final deadline of Dec. 31, 2005, for subscribers to have Enhanced 911 Phase 2 capable handsets. Nextel officials, speaking last week on the sideline of the CTIA Wireless 2003 show in New Orleans, called for removal of the FCC’s deadline of wireless handsets to be Phase 2-capable by year-end 2005. They said that as long as interim benchmark dates were being met, an end date was needed for wireless handsets, and if one were set, it should coincide with the industry’s growth rate, which would push the date out another 3 years. “It is clear that this is not an easy task. The point is PSAPs [public safety answering points] are working hard to implement the technology because this is a matter of life and death,” APCO Acting Pres. Vincent Stile said. APCO said national carriers had received waivers increasing the time they had to meet interim Phase 2 deadlines, relief that was based on no change in the ultimate 2005 date. “The public safety community has clearly expressed its displeasure with any action that would lead to further implementation delays,” Stiles said. “The fact that this technology saves lives should be reason enough for our communications centers, wireless carriers and the FCC to deny Nextel’s request,” he said.

Applying E911 requirements to mobile satellite services (MSS) using the Inmarsat system is inappropriate, “the classic equivalent of trying to fit a square peg into a round hole,” Telenor Satellite Services said in reply comments to the FCC. MSS providers don’t meet E911 requirements, especially if the providers are using the Inmarsat system, Telenor said. Inmarsat customers generally use their terminals in maritime or aeronautical environments and the majority of those that use terminals over land are outside the U.S., the firm said. Domestic land mobile customers are a small percentage of total customers, Telenor said, and they generally use the service “where not even a cellular customer would have expectations of 911 service.” E911 service isn’t technically feasible with Inmarsat because even up-to-date terminals have the capability of pinpointing callers up to only a few thousand square miles, Telenor said. It said compliance would be a “huge expense” for a relatively small customer base and very few emergency calls, making the application of E911 requirements to Inmarsat MSS operators unjustifiable. Telenor said the Inmarsat system did have an emergency communications service, the Global Maritime Distress & Safety System, “a necessary and appropriate tool in the environment in which Inmarsat terminals are used.”

State regulators are eyeing wireless best practices as a potential way to avert the need for service quality regulation, at the same time as industry is drafting voluntary guidelines, officials said. Neb. PSC Comr. Anne Boyle told us she had circulated proposed best practices at last month’s National Assn. of Regulatory Utility Comrs. (NARUC) winter meeting for review. Boyle said the issue was teed up for an upcoming NARUC meeting in Denver, with hopes that industry, FCC and the National Assn. of State Utility Consumer Advocates (NASUCA) would participate, she said. Meanwhile, the Mo. attorney general is in negotiations with Sprint PCS and Nextel on a lawsuit filed in Dec. over billing practices.

The Assn. of Public Safety Communications Officials (APCO) and the National Emergency Number Assn. (NENA) opposed petitions for reconsideration filed last month by T-Mobile USA, Nextel and Cingular Wireless on an aspect of Enhanced 911 rules. The carriers, in separate filings, challenged an FCC order that set guidelines for requesting information about the E911 Phase 2 readiness of public safety answering points (PSAPs). They argued that the order didn’t adequately consider the complexities of when a PSAP or wireless operator was “ready” to roll out Phase 2. NENA and APCO said the latest rule they were challenging provided “necessary balance” to the requirement that carriers need offer Phase 2 data only if requested by a PSAP and only if the PSAP was, or would be, ready to receive and use that information. “Rather than accepting the rules and moving on, some carriers appear to have adopted a strategy of challenging every minute detail and requesting clarification to address every conceivable circumstance,” the opposition filing said. “The public safety community has moved past FCC rulemaking disputes and is focusing on making E911 a reality. The carriers should do the same.” The petitions for reconsideration embody a “misguided view” that the Phase 2 deployment responsibilities of carriers and PSAPs should be sequential instead of simultaneous, the groups said. “They would have PSAPs do everything necessary to receive and process Phase 2 data, and only then would carriers be obligated to fulfill their responsibilities,” they said. The underlying premise of the rule is that all stakeholders have to move ahead at the same time toward Phase 2, they said. “If both parties are waiting for the other to move, nothing will happen, at least not within a reasonable time frame,” NENA and APCO said. AT&T Wireless said in separate comments that it supported the challenges by T-Mobile, Cingular and Nextel. AT&T Wireless said it agreed with those petitions that the procedural rules at issue had “added unnecessary complexity to the E911 deployment process and will frustrate, not advance, the Commission’s objectives.” AT&T Wireless said the framework also denied the rights of carriers to seek documentation from PSAPs as to their readiness.

T-Mobile USA told the FCC it planned to use a network- based technology for its Enhanced 911 Phase 2 solution, rather than continuing to implement Enhanced Observed Time Difference of Arrival (E-OTD). The move comes after AT&T Wireless and Cingular Wireless delivered a similar message to the Commission in recent months on discontinuing plans for installing E-OTD technology. E-OTD is a hybrid handset- network solution for locating wireless 911 callers. Cingular told the FCC in Oct. it was conducting field trials of alternative location technologies for the GSM part of its network. T-Mobile Senior Corp. Counsel Robert Calaff told the FCC Wireless and Enforcement bureaus in a letter Fri. that the carrier had decided to use a network-based Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA) system for Phase 2. Factors in the decision included the “practical likelihood of continued strong vendor commitment to implement and upgrade E-OTD” to meet the Oct. 2003 accuracy standard in light of the decision by AT&T and Cingular to shift away from E-OTD for their GSM networks. T-Mobile also cited the “likelihood” that the AT&T and Cingular decisions would draw vendor time and resources away from further E-OTD development. It also listed the “Commission’s imperative that carriers deploying handset solutions achieve 95% penetration of location-capable handsets throughout their customer base by December 2005.” T-Mobile said a factor that set it apart from AT&T Wireless and Cingular was that it used only GSM and couldn’t leverage automatic location identification (ALI) technology developments for other air interfaces. It also said it “had to weigh the difficulties of changing Phase 2 technologies midstream, after devoting substantial time and effort to E- OTD development and delivering Phase 2 E-OTD services to a number of PSAPs.” But it said the decision to move away from E-OTD reflected a recognition of the “practical difficulties” of being the only national carrier pursuing E-OTD, “including the ramifications for future vendor support and development and the consequent uncertainty surrounding the ability to refine further the accuracy of E-OTD technology consistent with the Commission’s timelines.” T-Mobile cited the challenge of reaching 95% handset penetration in its subscriber base by Dec. 31, 2005, “given the slower-than- expected pace of development of ALI technologies.” Nextel said last week it backed removal of the 95% ultimate deadline in 2005 if carriers were meeting interim benchmarks for handset deployment (CD March 25 p4). T-Mobile also told the bureaus it wouldn’t immediately discontinue Phase 2 E-OTD in areas where the service already had been rolled out. A transition for such areas will be part of its deployment plan for TDOA, which still is under development, the carrier said.

Eight telecom bills met defeat in Conn. when they failed to pass out of committee by a procedural “move or die” deadline. Four failed bills would have changed municipal jurisdiction over wireless telecom tower siting. They were HB-5124 and HB-6031, which would have given local land-use authorities the right to regulate tower siting; HB-5124, which would have restricted tower placements near residential or agricultural property, and HB-6022, which would have required municipalities to file reports with the state on where wireless towers were located within their boundaries and would have compelled wireless carriers to notify local govts. and neighbors before constructing any new tower at any location in a municipality. Conn. also saw 3 telemarketing- related bills defeated in committee: SB-481, which would have allowed state regulators to revoke the certificate of a telephone carrier that persistently violated the state’s no- call telemarketing law; SB-141, which would have allowed ISPs and consumers to sue spam senders who failed to desist upon request, and HB-5090, which would have allowed fax numbers on the state no-call list. Also failing was SB-1001 that would have required state regulators to conduct an annual review of the assessment that supported the state’s enhanced 911 systems.