Tennessee Legislators Aim To Allow Municipal Broadband Providers To Build Outside City Limits
Legislators in Tennessee plan to try again to change a state municipal broadband law so networks such as the one created by the Chattanooga’s Electric Power Board can expand outside of city limits. Reps. Dan Howell and Kevin Brooks, both Republicans, are among the legislators pushing for the second year to get a bill passed after lobbyists for the incumbents were among the reasons the legislation was tabled last session, Howell said. Tennessee legislators have been trying to change the law for a number of years, even before the FCC preempted the state broadband rules recently. Some hope that if Tennessee is able to change its law, it will lead the way for the dozen or so other states with similar laws to do the same. Others, though, don’t think municipal broadband is the way to go and would prefer states, including Tennessee, install conduit to make it easier for incumbents and other private telcos to build out service. AT&T and Comcast didn't respond to requests for comment on Friday.
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In Howell’s district, which covers several counties, it's common for residents to have access to only DSL, he said. Some small-business owners have to go to the library to fill online orders because of the lack of access, he said. It doesn’t matter to Howell what the solution is -- high-speed access from a municipally owned network or the incumbent provider -- as long as his constituents get adequate access to broadband, he said. That is why he teamed up with Brooks to push for a change to current state law that doesn't allow municipal broadband networks to expand beyond city limits, he said. When the next legislative session starts in January, Howell hopes the bill will move forward quickly, he said. “We need to have the same access to this infrastructure in the rural areas as we have in the suburban areas,” he said. “Let's face it, the cities are running out of land; they're going to have to expand and go into the rural areas.”
In previous sessions, other state legislators have failed to change the law and now, with the state locked in a battle with the FCC over the same law (see 1509230075), it’s not clear what will happen should the FCC lose the case, industry observers said. Berin Szoka, TechFreedom president, said that should the FCC lose in court, it would make more sense for the legislature to move forward to try to change the law. But an FCC win likely would mean the law is essentially overturned, he said. Regardless of the pending lawsuit, he said, it’s a terrible idea to change the law.
Municipalities that have the extra money to build out a network should put it toward installing conduit because that will help the incumbents to install fiber and connect more people, said Szoka. "At least see if private providers are willing to use it," he said. "This is my No. 1 complaint about this issue, that middle-ground, very pragmatic option simply does not get considered. And as far as I can tell it's because of some mix of people not understanding it or thinking about it, one, or two, an ideological obsession with displacing private companies, or three, this absurd fetishization of speed levels."
Szoka said a number of misconceptions about DSL and broadband speeds makes it seem as though a municipal network is a good idea, but that’s not the case. The telcos have been upgrading their DSL to "radically" faster speeds over the past few years, he said.
Despite previous opposition to changing the law, Chris Mitchell, Institute for Local Self-Reliance director-Community Broadband Networks Initiative, said he has a feeling that 2016 is a good year for the modernization of Tennessee's broadband law. Once that happens, it should pave the way for other states to catch on to how important it is to get everyone connected via these municipal broadband networks, he said. "It's getting so big now, I have to assume they've got a really great shot at fixing this mistake," Mitchell said. "We see other areas that are working on that, as well. ... We are seeing more and more organizing in many states around this."