The National Telecommunications Cooperative Association wants to meet with President Barack Obama to discuss how recent FCC universal service reforms undermine the president’s “vision for the future of sustainable broadband in rural America.” NTCA CEO Shirley Bloomfield made the request in a letter Thursday, co-signed by about a dozen managers of rural telcos and cooperatives. “We share your vision of universal broadband access,” NTCA wrote. “Unfortunately, mixed messages from the federal government now threaten to undermine our collective vision.” NTCA discussed the recent reforms to the USF, which it said “are throttling the predictable revenue streams needed to justify the business case” for rural telcos throughout the country, and to help repay stimulus and Rural Utilities Service loans. The “untested and unpredictable” caps on USF support are “undermining efforts by small businesses to engage in network planning and to deliver on your objective of sustainable rural broadband,” NTCA said. “At this critical juncture in our nation’s road to recovery, it would be unfortunate indeed to pursue a USF and ICC reform plan that injects regulatory uncertainty into the marketplace and calls upon small businesses to cut jobs and hike prices."

The FCC faces no shortage of opinions on how best to move forward with its reform of the Rural Health Care Program, as telecom associations, healthcare providers and states offered suggestions in comments in docket 02-60 last week. Groups widely supported the program, and discussed the importance of exercising fiscal responsibility, but differed on whether the funds should be used for infrastructure buildout. Proposed reporting requirements also attracted disagreement.

FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell will continue to push for USF contribution reform, though he still has an “open mind” about steps to take next, he said in an interview. McDowell has long championed taking on the contribution side of USF (CD Jan 9 p1). The FCC approved an order in October addressing the distribution side of USF and an order on the USF’s Lifeline program in January. In May, the FCC released a 182-page further notice of proposed rulemaking on contribution reform.

Representatives of the National Telecommunications Cooperative Association discussed “ongoing concerns” on the “transparency, accuracy, and predictability of regression analysis-based caps on universal service fund support,” in a meeting with aides to Commissioners Robert McDowell, Ajit Pai and Jessica Rosenworcel. “NTCA raised the need to address these issues consistent with the Applications for Review filed by NTCA and many others,” the group said in an ex parte filing (http://xrl.us/bnmn8d). “NTCA further asserted that the Commission’s broadband policy objectives can only be achieved through clear and well-tested ‘business rules’ that provide sufficient support and enable company managers to predict with a reasonable degree of certainty what investments and operations will be recoverable (or unrecoverable) through USF support prospectively. NTCA explained that many of the necessary and appropriate changes can be achieved in short order without affecting USF ‘budgetary’ objectives or creating any technical or administrative concerns, and expressed commitment to working with the Commission to address these issues."

The 2012 version of the FCC’s annual Section 706 report released Tuesday said once again that broadband “is not yet being deployed ’to all Americans’ in a reasonable and timely fashion.” Commissioners Robert McDowell and Ajit Pai issued blistering dissents. McDowell said the FCC majority has “co-opted” the 706 process, using it to justify a “'cynical cycle’ of regulation,” including the approval of net neutrality rules in December 2010.

Verizon is endangering Prairie Mountain, a small town in central Texas, with bad service, two representatives of the town told the Texas Public Utility Commission during a Friday hearing. The carrier has provided a “continuous decline” in service over the last decade or so, said resident Wallace Klussman. The population of Llano County, home to the town, is just above 19,000.

Assessing USF contributions on special access services bought by competitive LECs and used as an input to downstream retail broadband Internet access services violates the principle of competitive neutrality, tw telecom told an aide to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, an ex parte filing said (http://xrl.us/bnk4x7). That’s because no USF contribution is assessed where a firm provides broadband Internet access using its own facilities or unbundled network elements, the telco said. The commission could fix this discriminatory treatment by permitting wholesalers to rely on certifications from their wholesale customers on a company-by-company basis, tw telecom said.

The FCC’s broadband policy objectives can only be achieved through clear and well tested “business rules” that provide sufficient support and enable company managers to prospectively predict which investments and operations will be recoverable through USF support, the National Telecommunications Cooperative Association told an aide to Chairman Julius Genachowski Wednesday, an ex parte filing said (http://xrl.us/bnk4u4). The necessary changes can be achieved quickly without affecting USF “budgetary” objectives, or creating any technical or administrative concerns, NTCA said.

Lawmakers and rural telcos continued to protest the high costs and burdensome requirements of the FCC’s USF/intercarrier reform waiver requirements, which they say will curb broadband deployment in areas where people need it most. House and Senate members told us the FCC must do something to reduce the cost of waiver applications, which they said can exceed $100,000. A commission spokesman said it’s considering some changes to the waiver process, but emphasized that the waiver requirements are necessary to properly evaluate each company’s ability to use the money in a fiscally responsible way.

There is a general consensus within the industry that the current wholesale/resale certification process is not working, the Independent Telephone and Telecommunications Alliance told an aide to FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai Tuesday, an ex parte filing said (http://xrl.us/bnkyuq). “Not only is it administratively burdensome for wholesale carriers, it also creates incentives for resale customers to provide inaccurate certifications” to avoid USF line item charges, ITTA said. ITTA said it endorses Cincinnati Bell’s reform proposal, under which the resale customer would provide the wholesale carrier with its Form 499 ID and the wholesale carrier would check this against the Form 499 Filer ID database to identify whether the resale customer is a contributor. If the reseller contributes to the USF, the wholesale carrier would not be obligated to contribute on the basis of the telecom services it sells to the reseller. If the commission decides to require service-specific certifications, as proposed in the contributions reform further notice of proposed rulemaking, “it must give carriers sufficient time to adopt the new system and specific guidance on how to implement it to avoid uncertainty and confusion,” ITTA said.