Vote on Special Access Order Could Come Friday, FCC Officials Say
Commissioners are scheduled to see the latest draft of the FCC’s long-awaited special access order Friday morning, agency officials said. The three Democratic commissioners voted over a month ago to approve the order, which would provide guidance to the Wireline Bureau on what a data collection request on the special access market should say (CD Oct 26 p3). Republican Commissioners Robert McDowell and Ajit Pai have not voted on the order.
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One major hold-up is how to conduct a market analysis, FCC officials said. If the commission relies on a 1999 definition of special access instead of looking at everything available in the market, that would probably be inadequate to survive an appeal, they said. McDowell and Pai want to ensure that the commission collects data on the full scope of services at issue in the market, so they get a full view of all the options consumers and business customers have, agency officials noted.
It’s been a slow process, FCC officials said, and at least two “must vote” deadlines have come and gone. The first such date was in mid-November, officials said. Chairman Julius Genachowski has the power to push the deadlines back if he feels members are making substantial progress on negotiations, commission officials said. They said a vote could take place Friday, but it depends on whether commissioners are satisfied with the latest draft. Officials said commissioners will work hard to get a vote done before McDowell and Genachowski travel to Dubai Monday night for the World Conference on International Telecommunications conference.
If the Republican commissioners do approve the draft order, the Democrats would get an opportunity to look at the changes, and decide whether to accept them, an FCC agency official said. The order can’t go out with changes that the Democrats don’t approve. Upon seeing the new draft, the Democrats could change their vote to no, or approve some changes and concur or dissent from others, the official said. “It’s not as though the thing is written in stone,” the official said. “It’s not."
Telecom companies have been meeting with Wireline Bureau officials and aides to commissioners about whether to collect information on “best efforts” services, ex parte filings show. NCTA spoke with a McDowell aide Tuesday in an effort to convince the agency not to collect data on the pricing of these non-dedicated broadband services offered by cable providers to business customers (http://xrl.us/bn34ib). “Information regarding the prices offered by competitive providers at a particular point in time is not useful in achieving the primary goal of the data request, which is to determine where incumbent LECs face competition for special access services,” the association said. The request could also “substantially increase the burden on respondents, in violation of the Paperwork Reduction Act,” NCTA said. Sprint Nextel met Monday with an aide to Genachowski to discourage the collection of such data. “A mandate that parties submit data related to such services could create substantial costs without corresponding benefit,” Sprint said (http://xrl.us/bn34ij).