The FCC should “stand up for taxpayers in North Carolina and Tennessee” Thursday by rejecting petitions seeking pre-emption of anti-municipal broadband laws in those states, said National Taxpayers Union President Pete Sepp in a statement Wednesday. The agency is expected to approve the petitions from the Electric Power Board of Chattanooga and from Wilson, North Carolina (see 1502020037). There have been “numerous examples of failed municipal broadband networks,” Sepp wrote: “From Oregon to Florida, Utah to Vermont, hard-working" residents "have suffered -- paying higher taxes or bearing the burden of lower debt ratings -- when their local leaders decided to enter the broadband market.” Officials from Highland Springs and Holly Springs, North Carolina, as well as business and nonprofit leaders from North Carolina and Tennessee told Chairman Tom Wheeler aide Gigi Sohn and other agency officials in a phone call Tuesday of their inability to get high-speed broadband, said an ex parte filing posted in dockets 14-115 and 14-116 Wednesday. Matthew Shuler, Highlands town director, said small businesses are frustrated about broadband prices and speed limitations, according to the filing. It said Dukenet had offered faster speeds, but when the company was acquired by Time Warner Cable, "the service offerings went away." Comcast and TWC didn't comment.
The Kentucky House passed HB-152 71-25 Tuesday to significantly reduce the Public Service Commission’s oversight of wireline service and completely end its jurisdiction over consumer wireless complaints and consumer broadband complaints. AT&T, Cincinnati Bell and Windstream no longer would be required to provide basic wireline phone service in most cities and major suburbs, including state capitol Frankfort and Lexington. The telcos instead could opt to provide basic service in those areas solely through wireless or VoIP, said the bill's text. Customers in rural areas can seek to retain wireline service, the bill said. HB-152, which requires state Senate approval via SB-3, would retain PSC jurisdiction over wholesale issues, carrier-to-carrier issues and anti-competitive telecom practices. State Rep. Rick Rand, a Democrat who sponsored HB-152, said in a speech prior to the vote that AT&T and other telcos are “asking us to allow them to move from old technology to new technology.” Rep. Chris Harris, a Democrat who voted against the bill, said during debate on the bill that he’s worried “that what we're doing here is leaving behind that section of the state … that our regulations were meant to protect -- poor, rural families who do not have lobbyists here to represent their interests.” Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear, a Democrat, endorsed HB-152 in a statement as “an important piece of legislation that strikes a right balance between providing consumer protection and creating economic development opportunities that result from robust broadband accessibility in communities all across the commonwealth.”
The Virginia Cyber Security Commission held the first of a planned series of town hall meetings on the commission’s work and related cybersecurity issues Tuesday in Blacksburg, Virginia, said Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s (D) office. The next town hall will be March 23 at New College in Martinsville, with additional meetings April 24 at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, May 19 at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville and June 9 at Norfolk State University. “The cyber security industry is a cornerstone of the new Virginia economy, and these town hall meetings are a great way for our commission members to hear concerns and suggestions from citizens, academia, and industry across the state,” said McAuliffe in a news release. McAuliffe has made cybersecurity one of his administration’s priorities since taking office last year, adopting the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s “Version 1.0” Cybersecurity Framework soon after its release in February 2014 (see 1502230063).
The municipal broadband networks run by the Electric Power Board of Chattanooga and Wilson, North Carolina, demonstrate the First Amendment concerns with allowing more such networks, wrote Enrique Armijo, a member of the Free State Foundation's board of academic advisors and an assistant professor at the Elon University School of Law, in a paper released Monday. There is “good reason” to conclude free speech protections “are being sacrificed at the altar of the new," he wrote: That "certainly should give pause to those that want the FCC to preempt state restrictions on these networks and expand municipalities' power in the online communications space.” The FCC is expected to approve petitions from Chattanooga and Wilson Thursday to pre-empt anti-municipal broadband laws in those states (see 1502020037). Chattanooga’s acceptable use policy bars users from using the network to "’transmit, distribute, or store material" that is illegal, ‘obscene, threatening, abusive or hateful,’” Armijo wrote. It also bars users from posting messages on third party blogs that are ‘excessive and/or intended to annoy or harass others’ -- ‘regardless of [the] policies’ of the blogs on which the users post,” he wrote. Wilson has similar restrictions, said Armijo. “One does not need to be a free speech scholar, or even a lawyer, to be troubled by these provisions.” First Amendment "doctrine makes clear that outright government bans on protected speech -- even indecent speech, let alone ‘excessive,’ ‘derogatory,’ ‘harassing,’ ‘abusive,’ or ‘hateful’ speech -- are never narrowly tailored enough to survive strict scrutiny,” said Armijo. Chattanooga and Wilson officials didn't comment.
CenturyLink and Education Networks of America said they won’t end service to the Idaho Education Network broadband network on Sunday amid legislative efforts to provide funding to reimburse state schools that have to enter contracts with other vendors if the IEN shuts down. CenturyLink previously had threatened to end its service to IEN on Sunday if the state didn’t pay more than $1.5 million it owes for services rendered on the network. Idaho has been prohibited from paying CenturyLink and ENA for IEN services since state District Court Judge Patrick Owen ruled in November that the contract that established the network was illegal. Owen reaffirmed that ruling last week. Gov. Butch Otter, a Republican, had sought a rebid of the contract last month (see 1501130023). “Our primary focus is on the students of Idaho who have become dependent on these services,” CenturyLink said Thursday, saying it's still working with state officials to receive payment for the IEN services. The Idaho Legislature’s Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee refused to implement an emergency contract with CenturyLink and ENA Tuesday, choosing instead to recommend appropriating almost $3.6 million in temporary funding to reimburse schools that switch to other broadband providers for the remainder of the current fiscal year. The Idaho House voted 68-1 Thursday to approve the $3.6 million stopgap funding bill, sending it off for state Senate consideration.
NARUC's board voted to approve resolutions urging the FCC to give state agencies access to the commission's Network Outage Reporting System, and to continue giving states a role in 911 backup battery power and consumer protection issues included in the commission's IP transition NPRM. NARUC's Telecom Committee passed both resolutions unanimously Tuesday (see 1502170051). The Broadband Coalition praised NARUC for approving the IP transition resolution, saying it's "a sign that the FCC’s action on competition and the tech transition are in tune with the needs of local businesses who want a choice in broadband service."
Cablevision is "glad" to have finished “contentious negotiations” with the Communications Workers of America (see 1502130058), it said in a statement. Under the agreement with CWA, most Brooklyn, New York, employees will be kept at 96 percent of wage parity over the term of the contract, and Cablevision will be allowed to apply performance-based standards to its Brooklyn employees, the cable operator said.
Congress should enact his kill switch legislation, Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., said in a news release Friday. He applauded the decrease in smartphone thefts in London, New York and San Francisco. “These numbers prove that ‘kill switch’ technology is effective as a theft prevention mechanism and underscore why we need to keep pushing to ensure every smartphone has the tools available that consumers need to protect their device and private data,” Serrano said in a statement. He plans to reintroduce the Smartphone Theft Prevention Act, his spokeswoman told us earlier this year (see 1501140025). He had introduced HR-4065 last year, but it and its Senate companion never advanced.
Municipal broadband projects have had a history of “costly business failures that have saddled citizens with substantial financial failures,” CenturyLink's Melissa Newman, senior vice president-federal policy and regulatory affairs, told aides to FCC Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel on Feb. 11, said ex parte filings posted Friday in dockets 14-115 and 14-116. Newman cited Greenlight in Wilson, North Carolina, which had a deficit of $1.2 million in June 2013. The Utah Telecommunication Open Infrastructure Agency “experienced millions of dollars in operating losses every year and has failed to meet projections on customers and revenues, thus requiring it to go back to its member cities for additional financing" (see 1407090034), Newman said. Many state municipal broadband laws were adopted to “protect citizens from projects that could very likely increase their taxes," she said. "Many of the laws adopted were done so to ensure a level playing field for private investment.”
California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) Administrative Law Judge Karl Bemesderfer recommended the commission approve Comcast’s proposed purchase of Time Warner Cable (TWC) with significant conditions. Proposed conditions released Friday include a requirement that Comcast expand the eligibility requirements for its Internet Essentials service to include all households in its service area in the state that have a household income equal to 150 percent of the federal poverty level and provide free Wi-Fi to Internet Essentials enrollees in the state. Comcast would also have to sign up 45 percent of eligible households in its service area in the state within two years unless it can show that penetration rates of eligible customers in those areas is less than 45 percent. Comcast would also need to offer stand-alone broadband service for five years after the deal closes, with that service having a specific price cap, the CPUC said. The commission will be able to consider the proposed decision as early as its March 26 meeting.