Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., introduced a bill Tuesday that would update the Universal Service Fund E-Rate program to increase broadband adoption. After the FCC releases its National Broadband Plan next month, it’s expected the House will take a close look at the Markey legislation, a bill on broadband affordability (HR-3646) by Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., and a long-gestating USF revamp bill by Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher, D-Va., and Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., as possible ways to overhaul USF, said a House source. Markey’s E-Rate 2.0 Act (HR-4619), co-sponsored by Matsui and Rep. Lois Capps, D-Calif., would direct the FCC to start three E-rate pilot programs. One would distribute vouchers to low-income students to buy residential broadband services, Markey said in the House Tuesday as he introduced the bill. The second would open a competitive grant program to provide funding for broadband equipment and services to “selected community colleges and head start facilities that best demonstrate need and incorporation of broadband use in their educational mission,” Markey said. The third would allow certain E-rate applicants serving “particularly low-income students to apply for significantly discounted services and technologies for the use of e-books,” he said. The bill would also increase the current $2.25 billion cap on E-Rate to adjust for inflation, and streamline the application process. NCTA President Kyle McSlarrow praised the bill as “proposing pragmatic steps that will enable students participating in the federal school lunch program to utilize broadband to improve their educational experience.”

The Comcast-NBC Universal combination will be a focus of a cable-industry conference April 19-21 and visits to lawmakers by small cable operators. The American Cable Association conference near Washington, D.C., also will touch on a retransmission-consent overhaul, broadband deployment and revamping Universal Service Fund so “subsidies flow to rural broadband access providers for the first time” in the FCC’s 76-year history, the group said Wednesday.

Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., introduced a bill Tuesday that would update the Universal Service Fund E-Rate program to increase broadband adoption. After the FCC releases its National Broadband Plan next month, it’s expected the House will take a close look at the Markey legislation, a bill on broadband affordability (HR-3646) by Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., and a long-gestating USF revamp bill by Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher, D-Va., and Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., as possible ways to overhaul USF, said a House source. Markey’s E-Rate 2.0 Act (HR-4619), co-sponsored by Matsui and Rep. Lois Capps, D-Calif., would direct the FCC to start three E-rate pilot programs. One would distribute vouchers to low-income students to buy residential broadband services, Markey said in the House Tuesday as he introduced the bill. The second would open a competitive grant program to provide funding for broadband equipment and services to “selected community colleges and head start facilities that best demonstrate need and incorporation of broadband use in their educational mission,” Markey said. The third would allow certain E-rate applicants serving “particularly low-income students to apply for significantly discounted services and technologies for the use of e-books,” he said. The bill would also increase the current $2.25 billion cap on E-Rate to adjust for inflation, and streamline the application process. NCTA President Kyle McSlarrow praised the bill as “proposing pragmatic steps that will enable students participating in the federal school lunch program to utilize broadband to improve their educational experience.”

The FCC is expected to establish a mix of proposals and options to provide broad direction for Universal Service Fund/intercarrier reform, said Stifel Nicolaus in a note. “We believe the FCC would like to trim fat from high-cost USF voice support, shift funding to broadband adoption and deployment, expand the USF contribution base and reduce and unify intercarrier compensation rates,” the analysts said. The drive for reform creates risk for rural local exchange carriers “if the commission moves to cut intercarrier compensation without providing adequate revenue replacement.” The upside could be “if reforms help RLECs compared to current trends by shifting cost recovery from declining intercarrier access charges to greater (broadband-oriented) USF support and end-user fees.” Verizon, AT&T and Qwest are likely to benefit from USF revisions and intercarrier rate cuts. “Wireless carriers seek greater USF parity, and while their voice support appears at risk, the FCC is looking to promote mobile broadband,” the analysts said. Reforms could possibly be followed by litigation. “Congress could help by clarifying the FCC’s jurisdiction, but legislation remains a tough sell.”

Other countries are taking cybersecurity more seriously than the U.S., judging by recent mandates in Europe, a former Obama administration official said Tuesday. Melissa Hathaway, who led the Cyberspace Policy Review that culminated in President Obama’s promise not to “dictate” standards for industry (WID June 1 p1), sounded a note of frustration over slow progress in fleshing out the recommendations in her report. “I feel like we have lost the sense of urgency” that held sway in the wake of the report, she told the Internet Security Alliance in Washington, which gave Hathaway an award.

Federal universal service support for wireless carriers should be limited to one connection per household to help support broadband deployment to unserved areas, Qwest said in an ex parte filing. Fifty-two percent of wireless lines are in family plan packages and on average there are 2.8 handsets per wireless family plan, the telco said. Based on 2007 wireless market data, “Qwest’s calculations reflect an estimated Universal Service Fund savings of $463 million if USF high-cost support were limited to one handset per wireless family plan.” To perform its calculations, Qwest assumed that all competitive eligible telecommunications carriers receiving high-cost support are wireless providers.

As more states join the Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Agreement (SSUTA) and high-profile e-tailers like Amazon and Overstock.com battle states that want taxes on in-state affiliate sales (WID July 6 p6), Congress is mulling its options for clarifying the conditions under which states and localities can tax remote sales, known as “nexus.” Lawmakers on the House Judiciary Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee largely held their cards in a Thursday hearing, but were advised by a professor and business representative that Congress shouldn’t sit on the sidelines. A tax administrator involved in the SSUTA urged lawmakers not to view the dispute as “hungry states versus businesses."

An order circulated for a vote at the Feb. 11 FCC meeting proposes changes to the E-rate program to allow participating schools to open their networks to the general public after school hours without reducing the school’s level of Universal Service Fund support. Currently, schools are permitted to allow the public to access their computers, but they have to cost validate and reduce the amount of USF they receive.

The FCC has adequate authority under Title I of the Communications Act to reconfigure the Universal Service Fund to pay for broadband, without reclassifying broadband as a Title II service, AT&T said. “There can be no dispute that the commission can fund some broadband Internet service providers,” the telco said in a white paper. Commission precedent gives providers the option of offering “retail consumers solely an integrated service that inextricably intertwines broadband transmission with Internet access service,” or offering broadband transmission service as a telecom service under Title II, which can be used “as an input to retail service,” it said. The FCC can support providers who select either option because it’s authorized “to perform any and all acts, make such rules and regulations, and issue such orders … as may be necessary in the execution of its functions,” the telco cited from the Communications Act.

The FCC has adequate authority under Title I of the Communications Act to reconfigure the Universal Service Fund to pay for broadband, without reclassifying broadband as a Title II service, AT&T said. “There can be no dispute that the commission can fund some broadband Internet service providers,” the telco said in a white paper. Commission precedent gives providers the option of offering “retail consumers solely an integrated service that inextricably intertwines broadband transmission with Internet access service,” or offering broadband transmission service as a telecom service under Title II, which can be used “as an input to retail service,” it said. The FCC can support providers who select either option because it’s authorized “to perform any and all acts, make such rules and regulations, and issue such orders … as may be necessary in the execution of its functions,” the telco cited from the Communications Act.