The FCC should make several changes to mitigate “regression analysis issues” inherent in the commission’s new USF model for determining reimbursable capital and operating expenditures, NTCA told the Wireline Bureau chief and advisers to Chairman Julius Genachowski and commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Ajit Pai (http://xrl.us/bnu3vv). NTCA wants the commission to extend the phase-in associated with the regression analysis caps; maintain current 2012 model cost limits but add together the capital and operating expenditure values for 2013 support calculations “pending consideration of a single regression model”; and adopt a rule that keeps the caps constant over a period of several years starting in 2014, as opposed to shifting year by year, its ex parte filing said. Further testing and analysis over the next year will help the commission identify “potential alternatives” to improve predictability, accuracy and transparency of the model, NTCA said.

Lingering regulatory uncertainty is frustrating telcos’ efforts to deliver quality broadband services, NTCA told FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai and an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel in separate meetings Monday (http://xrl.us/bnupq8). Representatives of Wheat State telco and Wilson Communications said their plans to upgrade their networks to deliver faster broadband speeds were “on hold pending greater transparency and visibility into the effects of the regression analysis-based caps,” and the possibility of further changes to the rules, an NTCA ex parte filing said. The companies supported updating the USF mechanisms, but asked the commission to “build upon the best aspects of those mechanisms” rather than “replacing proven systems altogether,” the filing said. The commission should provide universal service support in high-cost areas where consumers want broadband without “being required to take legacy services as well,” it said.

The FCC Wireline Bureau denied two requests for review of Universal Service Administrative Co. decisions. Bestel sought review of a decision upholding late fees assessed for failure to pay into the USF on time. Bestel argued it didn’t receive invoices until months after the due date, but the commission has “consistently stated that carriers must pay their USF obligations even if they do not receive a USAC invoice,” the bureau said Tuesday (http://xrl.us/bnuppa). Baltimore-Washington Telephone Co. (BWTel) sought review of a USAC decision assessing late fees for failing to timely file the Form 499-A annual telecom reporting worksheets from 2008-10. BWTel said the employee responsible for filing the form had been fired, and so USAC’s multiple invoice statements didn’t reach the right person. This didn’t sway the bureau, which said USAC is “under no obligation to notify filers of delinquent filings” (http://xrl.us/bnupqh). The bureau also denied a request by Digital Compass Telecom for a waiver of USF contribution obligations until December. Digital said it “inadvertently overstated projected revenues” on its Form 499-A, but the bureau found that the company made only “merely cursory” statements and did not explain in specific terms why the waiver would be appropriate and in the public interest (http://xrl.us/bnupqq).

New York’s plans for its new state USF fund have not gone entirely smoothly, a letter released Tuesday shows (http://xrl.us/bnuoxb). When the New York Public Service Commission announced its Aug. 16 adoption of a $17 million USF fund proposal, its plans called for “the scheduling of consideration of Phase III issues (intrastate access charges and the New York Targeted Accessibility Fund ("TAF")), and discussions on these issues will commence within 30 days” among the relevant stakeholders (CD Aug 17 p9). Administrative Law Judge Eleanor Stein expressed doubts on Friday that these stakeholders can come together properly, and the stakeholders disagreed in the Tuesday letter. Initial proposals for settlement were due to Stein Sept. 21, an earlier notice said (http://xrl.us/bnuow9). “Even if Your Honor concludes that an impasse has been reached in the collaborative, the Signatories -- a diverse group with widely varying interests that constitutes a clear majority of the parties who have been active in this proceeding -- believe, based on their exploratory discussions both within and outside of the collaborative, that they should be able to enter into a Joint Proposal with respect to Phase III issues,” the group said in a letter to Administrative Law Judge Howard Jack. These signatories include the PSC staff, the New York Cable Telecom Association, Level 3, Frontier, tw telecom, Verizon New York, Windstream, and a group of smaller ILECs. These parties want “a reasonable opportunity to finalize and submit their Phase III Joint Proposal,” they said, which would avoid “lengthy and burdensome evidentiary hearings on the merits of the access and TAF issues."

The Wisconsin Public Service Commission set new assessment rates for its USF funds, “applicable to the Technology for Educational Achievement in Wisconsin (TEACH) programs, the University of Wisconsin (UW) -- System services, the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) BadgerLink, Newsline, library service contracts and aid to public library systems, and the Public Service Commission (PSC) USF programs,” PSC Telecom Administrator Chris Reader said in a commission decision filed Tuesday (http://xrl.us/bnuosp). The assessment rates will take effect this month, the decision said. It includes a chart breaking down the monthly assessments and the details of the rate changes.

Verizon’s renewed agreement with group-purchasing organization MiCTA will help “state and local government agencies, K-12 schools, colleges and universities, libraries and nonprofit organizations across the U.S.” through its August 2015 run, Verizon said Tuesday (http://xrl.us/bnuhyr). The agreement, reaffirming a partnership in place since 2010, includes an expansion of services, including “international availability of the company’s Private IP networking service; interoperable video conferencing; mobility and managed mobility services; and a cloud-based unified communications and collaboration platform,” said Verizon. School and library purchasers may be able to use USF E-rate money, it added. The agreement has helped “more than 600 customers across the U.S.” so far, Verizon said.

The FCC’s regulation of rural broadband is akin to the taxation of the British government two and a half centuries ago, said Harold Furchtgott-Roth, former FCC commissioner and head of the Hudson Institute’s Center for Economics of the Internet. “Today the situation is eerily similar,” he said at a Hudson Institute panel on rural telecommunications Monday. His comparison kicked off a series of scathing critiques among panelists of how FCC policy contributed to the U.S.’s rural broadband divide. “Flat out, it’s a terrible set of rules that they came up with,” Furchtgott-Roth said of the FCC’s USF/intercarrier compensation order of November 2011.

A petition by Central Texas Telephone Cooperative for a temporary waiver of USF caps demonstrates the underlying flaws in the rules, and should be granted, NTCA said Thursday (http://xrl.us/bntu46). Central Texas, which has fewer than 1.5 customers per square mile, needs to deploy longer loops to reach individual consumers over the “vast distances” in its territory, NTCA said. The facts in Central Texas’s petition “provide more than good cause” for the grant of a waiver, and the petition “highlights several critical flaws in the current regression model” that necessitate general corrections to the model, NTCA said. The petition “demonstrates the oddity of a model that assumes that providers should realize lower costs in deploying telecommunications plant over greater distances -- the negative coefficient for road miles in the model is intuitively incorrect, highlighting an underlying flaw in the model that should be corrected through more robust and deliberate testing of independent variables,” NTCA said.

The Universal Service Administrative Co. should consider “other reliable proof” submitted by wholesale carriers during an audit to establish its reasonable expectation the customer is a reseller, XO told the FCC Wednesday (http://xrl.us/bntpam). The FCC should also clarify that USAC may not assess USF on the “subject revenue” at both the wholesale and retail levels, XO said. If the commission requires apportioning of wholesale purchases to provide reseller certifications on a more specific basis, it should provide a guide to compliance, and an adequate transition period to implement the requirement, XO said.

The FCC Wireless Bureau seeks comment on a petition by Cordova for waiver of USF rules that determine support for competitive eligible telecom carriers starting Jan. 1, 2012 (http://xrl.us/bnto6m). Parties can request access to the confidential version of Cordova’s waiver petition, the bureau said. Comments in WC docket 10-90 and WT docket 10-208 are due Nov. 12, replies Nov. 27.