The FCC won’t have an order ready on reverse auctions for the proposed mobility fund until mid-February at the earliest, Chief Margaret Wiener of the Wireless Bureau’s Auctions & Spectrum Access Division said Monday at a Federal Communications Bar Association lunch. In October, the commission opened a rulemaking on whether it should use between $100 million and $300 million left over in the high-cost Universal Service Fund to create a reverse auction in which wireless companies in underserved areas have a chance to win subsidies to build out 3G networks. The comment period for the current rulemaking closes Dec. 16, and replies are due Jan. 17, Wiener said, making it unlikely that an order will be ready to go out before mid-February.

The American Public Communications Council will ask the FCC for an emergency subsidy from Universal Service Fund cash to help keep its pay phone company members from collapsing, the group told us. The emergency petition will be accompanied by a petition for rulemaking asking the commission to consider using its Lifeline program to subsidize pay phones. The petitions could come as early as Monday afternoon, APCC President Willard Nichols said.

Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., hopes to bring certainty to industry next year on long-brewing telecom issues like net neutrality and Universal Service Fund reform, the House Communications Subcommittee member said in an interview last week. Providing subsidies to make broadband more affordable for low-income Americans and addressing fears about lack of privacy online are two important ways to motivate more people to embrace fast Internet service, she said.

Carriers shouldn’t get reimbursed by the Universal Service Fund Link-Up fund for activation charges that the carrier waives or reduces when customers buy extra airtime, said TracFone Wireless in a Dec. 1 petition for declaratory ruling. At least one eligible telecommunications carrier, ReachOut Wireless, is doing that, TracFone said. Also in the petition, TracFone asked the FCC to declare that a carrier receiving Link-Up money for wireline services may not use the money for wireless unless it first gets FCC approval. And TracFone wants the FCC to declare that a carrier must use “some of its own facilities” to be designated as an ETC in a particular state. The FCC should clarify that a carrier can’t cite wireline facilities to meet that requirement if it’s providing wireless services, “unless those wireline facilities are being used to transmit or route the wireless services that are designated for support.” TracFone’s proposed rules “are necessary to ensure that disbursements from the federal USF are only received by properly-designated ETCs and are only used to support services as allowed by the Commission’s rules,” TracFone said.

The first-quarter 2011 Universal Service Fund contribution factor will be based on a $16.67 billion revenue base, said the Universal Service Administrative Co. That’s down 4 percent from USAC’s Q4 2010 projected base of $17.44 billion. The base, reported in a USAC paper to the FCC on Thursday, includes total projected collected interstate and international revenue based on revenue reports submitted last month by 3,678 carriers.

The FCC should focus on helping the buildout and expansion of 4G services, Commissioner Meredith Baker said in a keynote at the Phoenix Center telecom symposium Thursday. She called moving forward on net neutrality rules “a legal and political mistake.”

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski formally announced Wednesday that he'll bring a net neutrality order to a vote at the Dec. 21 meeting. The draft had been expected for several days. Genachowski and his staff said they have broad support from industry, public interest and other stakeholders. Senior officials said privately that they had secured no commitments not to challenge the proposed rules in court. Nonetheless, the chances of being sued by a major ISP are much lower if the commission doesn’t reclassify broadband and instead proceeds with net neutrality sticking with its Title 1 authority, industry executives and lawyers said.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski formally announced Wednesday that he'll bring a net neutrality order to a vote at the Dec. 21 meeting. The draft had been expected for several days. Genachowski and his staff said they have broad support from industry, public interest and other stakeholders. Senior officials said privately that they had secured no commitments not to challenge the proposed rules in court. Nonetheless, the chances of being sued by a major ISP are much lower if the commission doesn’t reclassify broadband and instead proceeds with net neutrality sticking with its Title 1 authority, industry executives and lawyers said.

The number of subscribers to the FCC’s Low-Income Program jumped by nearly 1.5 million from 2008 to 2009, and payments from the fund increased almost $180 million, the GAO reported Tuesday. Enrollment had been “relatively stable” from 2005 to 2008, leveling off at about 7.1 million subscribers and about $823 million in payments, the agency said. The GAO attributed the spike to a decision by the Universal Service Administrative Co. to hand out prepaid wireless phones to recipients. Without a cap, the program’s budget will reach $1.4 billion by year-end, the GAO said. The FCC “has taken limited steps” to institute controls over the fund, but “these steps do not fully align with useful practices,” it said. The GAO urged the commission and USAC to impose a strict control system.

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski seems to prefer not to reclassify broadband transport as a telecom service and instead to keep it as an information service, as part of enacting the net neutrality rules he seeks, according to a high-ranking commission official who has been briefed about the recent stakeholder meetings on net neutrality and to other officials who have been represented at those gatherings or also been briefed. Genachowski appears to prefer to stick with the current Title I information service regime for broadband, especially if he can get ISP support for net neutrality rules that don’t include reclassification, commission, industry and nonprofit officials said.