AUSTIN -- New NARUC Telecom Committee Chair Tim Schram praised NTIA efforts making broadband, equity, access and deployment (BEAD) allocations, in a Wednesday interview. Also, Schram and another Republican committee member, South Dakota Commissioner Chris Nelson, told us they’re glad the FCC may soon finally have all five seats filled.

AUSTIN – State commissioners softened a draft resolution meant to discipline telecom providers still using network equipment that might pose a national security risk. At NARUC’s conference here Tuesday, the Telecom Committee unanimously supported a measure that would recommend lower scoring for grant applications by providers with equipment on the FCC’s covered list.

Library groups and E-rate participants welcomed a draft FCC order and Further NPRM that would modify program rules for tribal colleges and university libraries and seek additional updates for all participants. Commissioners will consider the item during their open meeting Thursday (see 2306290056). Some sought clarifying language in the draft FNPRM.

"Americans in rural and urban communities who depend upon public media content and services are very disappointed by" the House Appropriations Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies Subcommittee's advancement Friday of a FY 2024 appropriations bill (see 2307140069) that would "eliminate CPB’s two-year advance funding," said CEO Patricia Harrison in a statement. Congress allocated CPB $535 million for FY 2025 in the FY 2023 omnibus appropriations package (see 2212210077). President Joe Biden proposed increasing its annual appropriation to $575 million for FY26, up 7%. The measure also doesn’t include funding for CPB system interconnection and infrastructure for FY24. The FY23 omnibus allocated $60 million for that purpose. It also doesn’t mention funding for the Education Department’s Ready to Learn educational programming grant program. "The elimination of this nearly 50-year funding structure would destroy the firewall that protects public media’s independence, and significantly weaken the public-private partnership that enables stations to raise needed funds," Harrison said: "Public media has always enjoyed strong bipartisan support, affirming its essential role in strengthening our nation’s civil society. The federal appropriation ensures universal access to free, high-quality, innovative, and diverse content that educates and enriches the public dialogue."

The Washington Supreme Court agreed to hear Assurance Wireless' petition for review of a lower court ruling that rejected its argument that the carrier's Lifeline services didn't involve a retail sale. The case (101873-8) is to be heard during the court's fall term. Assurance said in an April petition the state's retail sales tax for telecom services isn't possible for its Lifeline service because that service is free to eligible consumers, and the carrier "cannot be held secondarily liable for failing to collect sales tax from an unidentified buyer."

FCC Precision Ag Task Force members met Tuesday to hear updates from working group leadership and to hear from state officials and the FCC broadband data task force on federal funding to expand broadband. The meeting was the first to include an in-person option since the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020.

California consumer and county groups protested an AT&T request for carrier of last resort (COLR) relief in most of the state. The California Public Utilities Commission is reviewing the carrier’s amended application after an administrative law judge found an initial request lacked specificity. Plain old telephone service (POTS) remains a lifeline for many rural residents, especially in disaster-prone areas, said officials from Rural County Representatives of California (RCRC), The Utility Reform Network (TURN) and the CPUC’s independent Public Advocates Office (PAO) in interviews Friday.

The FCC appears unlikely to grant T-Mobile special temporary authority to launch service in the markets where it won licenses in last year’s 2.5 GHz auction, which ended almost a year ago. The agency declined to award the licenses, or grant a STA, after its auction authority expired earlier this year (see 2304260058).

State commissioners proposed NARUC telecom resolutions seeking permanent annual funding for the affordable connectivity program (ACP) and recommending no government subsidies to communications companies using network equipment that might pose a national security risk. The state regulator association may consider the draft resolutions at its July 16-19 meeting in Austin. Telecom Committee ex-Chair Karen Charles Peterson of Massachusetts proposed the ACP resolution and another draft that would urge expanding Lifeline Awareness Week to include broadband access. ACP funds are expected to dry up by Q2 2024, said the first resolution. “Establishing a new federal assistance program was a complex process at the federal, state, territory, tribal and local level,” and potentially losing a permanent low-income broadband program "with government oversight is troubling because universal high speed internet access is essential for a well-functioning economy.” New Telecom Committee Chair Tim Schram (R) of Nebraska proposed the national security resolution. Despite "efforts to rip out and replace equipment and services from" the FCC's covered list "to safeguard our communications networks," a March 1 FCC public notice found about 79 providers still have covered equipment. That poses "an unacceptable risk to national security,” the draft said. The resolution would encourage the FCC to work with state commissions and broadband offices to identify risky equipment and hold back funding. “NARUC recommends that no federal, state, or local governmental body provide universal service support, broadband deployment support, or any other form of grant funding to any communications company which utilizes equipment identified on the FCC’s Covered List anywhere in its network.”

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals approved a request Thursday for an en banc rehearing of Consumers' Research's challenge of the FCC's method for funding the USF. In March, a three-judge panel ruled unanimously against Consumers' Research, saying the FCC "has not violated the private nondelegation doctrine because it wholly subordinates" the Universal Service Administrative Co., and Congress "supplied the FCC with intelligible principles when it tasked the agency with overseeing" USF (see 2303240049).