The National Public Safety Telecom Council began a working group to explore questions raised by public safety’s pending loss of the T-band, which was part of the February spectrum law. Public safety got the 700 MHz D-block in the legislation, but had to give up the T-band, heavily used in 11 major metropolitan areas. NPSTC sent out a questionnaire (http://xrl.us/bnkk2a) to gather information as the group prepares a report, targeted for release near the end of the year. Among the major cities where public safety uses the band are Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, New York, Houston and Washington, D.C. The legislation required public safety users to clear the band within nine years so it can be resold in an FCC auction.

Hulu isn’t exempt from the Video Privacy Protection Act, the U.S. District Court in San Francisco ruled Friday, letting proceed a privacy lawsuit seeking class-action status (http://xrl.us/bnkk3o). The company, whose owners include Disney, Comcast’s NBCUniversal and News Corp., argued that because the website that streams video from cable and broadcast networks offers no physical product in a brick-and-mortar store, the VPPA, which dates to 1988 and covers providers of “prerecorded video cassette tapes or similar audio visual materials,” does not apply. U.S. Magistrate Judge Laurel Beeler ruled that the statute “is about the video content, not about how that content is delivered.”

The FCC’s mandatory annual survey of cable programming and equipment rates found that average cable rates increased at more than three times the Consumer Price Index (CPI) during 2010, the most recent year for which it has survey results. The commission’s report, a congressionally mandated look at average cable prices, was released Monday (http://xrl.us/bnkkuv) and follows a March 2012 release of the 2009 survey (CD March 12 p7). It also brings the agency closer to releasing more current price data. The results once again showed that cable rates broadly went up, even in regions where the FCC has found cable operators to be subject to effective competition.

FCC Commissioners Robert McDowell and Ajit Pai are expected to dissent on two items set for a vote in the next week at the agency, commission officials said. The first of the Republicans’ expected dissents will be on an interim rule change for the commission’s special access rules. The second is on the FCC’s Section 706 broadband competition report.

Last week’s Asia-Pacific Telecommunity meeting did not end with a formal set of proposals for the upcoming World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), potentially damaging the region’s influence in the lead-up to the conference, said David Gross, former State Department international communications and information coordinator. But the general consensus coming out of the meeting bodes well for the U.S. position on whether the conference, led by the ITU, should adopt controversial proposals to change how the Internet is regulated, he said. Gross said he attended the Asia-Pacific meeting in Bangkok as chair of the Ad Hoc World Conference on International Telecommunications Working Group, which represents 15 major multinational telecom and Internet companies.

Maine’s contended with what municipal officials believe to be a radio jammer who repeatedly distorts public safety channels, apparently intentionally. The FCC has acknowledged and is investigating the problem, which lasted for what some say is years. The investigation is ongoing and focuses on Lebanon, a town of about 5,000 people in Maine’s southern York County.

The FCC’s review of the Verizon Wireless/cable deals has reached its final stage, agency officials said Friday. An order approving the deals could circulate as early as this week, agency officials said Friday. Meanwhile, Reps. Jerrold Nadler and Brian Higgins, both New York Democrats, urged federal regulators to give Verizon Wireless’s proposed buy of AWS licenses from SpectrumCo and Cox extra-close scrutiny. That’s especially so given accompany marketing and other agreements, they said during a call with reporters Friday sponsored by the Communications Workers of America. A Verizon Wireless spokesman questioned CWA’s motives in turning up the heat on the deal as an order nears.

Some fines issued by the FCC to college-owned stations for compliance violations could hurt student-run stations, college radio professionals and students said. Recently proposed fines of $10,000 each to Toccoa Falls College in Georgia and Rollins College in Florida were issued after the FCC found that their stations violated rules on properly maintaining public inspection files. The fines are too harsh a penalty for stations that are managed by students and funded by educational institutions, and go against the educational goal of having a station at those institutions, said attorneys representing such stations.

The FCC’s World Radiocommunication Conference Advisory Committee (WAC) formally got to work Thursday, with its first meeting at commission headquarters. WAC Chairman Scott Blake Harris told members the work they do will be critical. That point was underscored by Commissioner Ajit Pai, who opened the meeting. The WAC represents commercial interests as the administration prepares unified U.S. positions prior to the next WRC in 2015.

SAN FRANCISCO -- The robust Supreme Court jurisprudence on First Amendment law doesn’t seem to favor San Francisco’s case defending its law requiring retailers to provide information about potentially harmful effects of cellphone use at the point of sale, a judge hearing the case said during oral argument Thursday. CTIA and the city and county of San Francisco each appealed aspects of a U.S. District Court’s ruling on the law (CD Oct 31 p7), which CTIA says violates the industry’s First Amendment rights. The argument Thursday was over whether a preliminary injunction against the city from enforcing its new law should be lifted. “Let’s assume this case is going to go the U.S. Supreme Court,” said Consuelo Callahan, judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. “Tell me how you're going to get upheld there,” she asked a lawyer from San Francisco’s City Attorney’s office.