Landline services in Florida would no longer come under the state Public Service Commission’s authority if S-1524 becomes law. The bill reflects technological changes and has gained wide industry support, supporters said. But Florida regulators worry that the measure could prevent the state from meeting federal obligations.
The FCC offered clarity on how utilities can show their poles are full and so can’t be used by cable operators, telcos or others to attach equipment at low rates. An order approved by the commissioners and released Wednesday sided with four cable operators in a challenge to an administrative law judge (ALJ) ruling that was brought by a utility in Florida. It resolved a case dating to a 2000 complaint the operators filed against a unit of Southern Co. over whether the company’s Gulf Power utility can charge rates above what cable companies usually pay to use space on thousands of poles in the state. A 2007 ruling by Chief FCC ALJ Richard Sippel, in favor of the cable operators, was upheld by the commission.
A House budget compromise is a victory, not an end to the battle for public broadcasting, facing legislators’ threats to yank all federal funds for it, industry executives said in interviews. The House maintained funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in its final continuing resolution. The final draft of the CR was released Tuesday. While the CPB will receive the remainder of its $445 million for fiscal 2011, $80 million was cut from additional programs. During the last fiscal year, CPB was appropriated $420 million.
Some rural telcos are worried that cuts to the Rural Utilities Service budget in the fiscal 2011 continuing resolution could upset rural broadband investment. But other groups are breathing a sigh of relief that the budget deal, up for a House vote Thursday, dropped a proposal to prohibit the FCC from acting on its net neutrality order. The resolution would fund the government through September.
Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., called for major reforms in how the FCC does business. The chairman of the Commerce Committee’s Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee spoke Tuesday at a Free State Foundation event. Stearns said change is overdue and promised his subcommittee will focus on regulatory reform in a series of upcoming hearings.
Legislation to authorize voluntary incentive auctions could include provisions to spur investment by broadcasters, Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., said Tuesday at a House Communications Subcommittee spectrum hearing. Most members appeared to support incentive auctions. But Walden and others said they are still considering how best to use the 700 MHz D-block to build a national public safety network.
Some claimed as inevitable a transition to broadband from public switched telephone networks, while others cautioned that IP-to-IP networks lack the economy and regulation that public switched telephone network (PSTN) has. The comments came at a Regulatory 2.0 Workshop hosted by Pillsbury Winthrop on Tuesday.
The FCC went too far with the questions it asked in a Jan. 25 rulemaking notice on a common technology platform for a nationwide public safety broadband network, the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials and the Public Safety Spectrum Trust warned in separate comments in docket 07-100. The notice delves too deeply into operation of the 700 MHz network, APCO said. “The Commission should limit its rules to that which is necessary now to ensure nationwide interoperability across the network.” Operability requirements “should not be incorporated into the rules,” APCO said. It said the agency must avoid adopting prematurely “rules covering operational and technical issues that have yet to be fully explored in real world environments."
LAS VEGAS -- “It feels great to be back,” as a member of NAB, said CBS CEO Leslie Moonves during an on-stage conversation with association President Gordon Smith at the NAB convention Tuesday. “At the time we left, there really was a rift between what some of the stations wanted to do and what the networks were doing,” Moonves said. “And now some of those issues look rather trivial.” Before rejoining NAB, Moonves said “I looked at how the cable people were operating [their trade association] and they were operating with a bigger voice than we were, and I said, ’there was something wrong about this.'"
LAS VEGAS - Broadcasters had mixed responses to a speech in which FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski stressed what he called the importance of freeing up spectrum for mobile broadband through voluntary incentive auctions (CD April 12 p1), they said in interviews Tuesday. “We respect the position that there is a need for spectrum, but there is a lot of information that is not fully developed,” said Paul Karpowicz, president of Meredith’s Local Media Group and a member of the NAB executive committee. Genachowski emphasized a need for cooperation and attacked some arguments against the commission’s auction plans. Wireless industry officials rushed Tuesday afternoon to support Genachowski and criticize the NAB.