SAN FRANCISCO – The FCC has “a lot more competition policy to go” and needs the support of Incompas and its members, as well as their customers' stories, said Gigi Sohn, counselor to Chairman Tom Wheeler at the Comptel Plus meeting Tuesday. “We're going to rely on you,” Sohn said, providing an overview of the Wheeler agenda on the incentive auction, special access, IP technology transition, broadband deployment, Lifeline, USF and video reform. “Keep telling those stories and we'll get more and more people on the side of competition and bigger, faster broadband,” she said.
The FCC reminded all eligible telecommunications carriers receiving support from the USF’s high-cost program they must follow agency rules and face sanctions if they don't. Commissioner Ajit Pai complained that the FCC had “turned a blind eye” to such conduct for too long by Hawaii’s Sandwich Isles Communications, a company whose former owner, Albert Hee, was convicted of tax violations in July. Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Mike O’Rielly said in a joint statement that Monday’s public notice doesn't go far enough.
SAN FRANCISCO -- Comptel renamed itself Incompas Monday, as it seeks to expand its reach and membership across communications sectors. Promoting competition remains its top focus, said CEO Chip Pickering at the group's Comptel Plus conference (which kept its name for this year). FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel said there that advancing competition is central to the agency's mission and she repeated support for Internet openness and USF Lifeline and E-rate broadband moves. Pickering and Incompas members urged the commission to complete its special-access review and address Bell business service rates and practices the competitors believe are anticompetitive.
Campaigning will distract more than a third of the Senate Commerce Committee in the months ahead. Eight Senate seats belonging to Commerce Committee members are up for grabs in the 2016 elections, six held by Republicans and two by Democrats. Two GOP Commerce members also are scrambling for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination, which means its own intense string of town halls, debates and travel.
Rep. Richard Nugent, R-Fla., alerted FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler to a problem that Wheeler agreed would be cause for great concern. “It has come to my attention that contractors for the Universal Service Fund are setting up booths outside of Veterans Administration locations offering free cellphones with service, implying strongly that it is a government benefit specifically for veterans,” Nugent told Wheeler in a letter. “However, mere months later, the veterans receive a notice that they must provide proof that they meet the income threshold.” He blasted this as “an abuse” of USF intentions, with veterans “misled” and the targeting of veterans disgraceful. Wheeler responded in an Oct. 2 letter released this week. “I am as outraged as you are that agents of a wireless phone company would target veterans with false and misleading information with the goal of scamming those veterans and the Lifeline program,” Wheeler told Nugent. “It is an insult to the veterans who were targeted, and it undermines the integrity of the Lifeline program. We will not stand for it.” Commission staffers have worked with the veterans, who should be held harmless, Wheeler said. Tracfone “has promised that the affected veterans will be able to use the service at least through the end of the year,” Wheeler added. “Tracfone must better police its agents and ensure that they immediately stop this activity, so that no additional veterans are victimized.” He has asked staffers to investigate further and is open to, “if necessary, withholding future remittances to Tracfone.” Wheeler referred the case to the FCC Office of Inspector General “with a request that they work to bring appropriate legal action,” he said. “Our referral of this matter to OIG reflects the gravity of the alleged violations.” Tracfone had no immediate comment.
The FCC Wireline Bureau further revised its broadband cost model for rural telcos that could choose to rely on model-based USF support under possible revamping of rate-of-return carrier subsidy mechanisms (see 1510050062). The latest Alternative Connect America Cost Model (A-CAM v2.0) incorporates various changes, including to rural carrier "study area" (service territory) boundary lines and node locations, based on updated data collection, said a public notice released Thursday. The bureau said because of the boundary line changes, "it will be difficult to draw meaningful comparisons" between results from ACAM v2.0 and prior versions, the most recent of which was released on Aug. 31 (see 1508310060). The model-based approach is one part of an overhaul envisioned by FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler, who recently said the reform effort was close to bearing fruit but could also still fall apart (see 1509210029).
CTIA’s request that the FCC revisit its Lifeline privacy authority drew opposition from consumer and media watchdog groups, and support from the American Cable Association. The consumer and media groups said Thursday the commission could rely on the two Communications Act provisions targeted by a CTIA petition for reconsideration, which they called substantively and procedurally flawed. The ACA supported the Lifeline USF program and the need for customer privacy, but it backed CTIA’s petition and argued the commission was exceeding its congressional mandate.
FORT LAUDERDALE -- FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn made a strong pitch for a permanent mobility fund, during a Thursday keynote address at the Competitive Carriers Association convention. CCA members have pushed hard for a new mobility fund, building on Phase I launched four years ago.
Net neutrality sparked familiar divisions but also some projections and legal analysis from attorneys on a Digital Policy Institute webinar Wednesday. While the FCC’s order faces many court challenges, Andrew Schwartzman, Georgetown Institute for Public Representation senior counselor, said he believes judges will likely focus on the commission’s authority to reclassify broadband as a Title II telecom service under the Communications Act and accord the agency’s view deference. But Brent Skorup, a George Mason University telecom research fellow, and Stuart Brotman, a University of Tennessee electronic media professor, questioned FCC deference in this case. Skorup suggested the commission was vulnerable on First Amendment grounds, but Schwartzman was skeptical. The three speakers did agree Congress is unlikely to pass a legislative compromise for now.
FORT LAUDERDALE -- The FCC won't back down from clamping down on local governments that stand in the way of building out wireless infrastructure, FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly told the Competitive Carriers Association Wednesday in a keynote speech. In adopting an order a year ago designed to speed deployment of distributed antenna systems, small cells and other wireless facilities (see 1410170048) the commission “finally ended, or so we thought, some of the disruptive practices of states and localities to impede the placement of wireless towers.” But resistance to tower siting continues, he said.