Wireless carriers urged the FCC to proceed with caution as it considers rules requiring better location accuracy for 911 calls coming from wireless devices indoors. The carriers, responding to a Sept. 9 FCC public notice, said they have a good track record of trying to make call location as accurate as possible. An FCC workshop on the topic is slated for Wednesday. Public safety groups want the FCC to take more steps to require better indoor reliability for wireless calls to 911 (CD Sept 26 p19).

The Association of Public Safety Communications Officials urged the FCC to act to improve location accuracy for wireless calls to 911, in response to Sept. 9 FCC public notice. The issue is the topic of an Oct. 2 workshop at the commission. “APCO has frequently urged the Commission, wireless carriers, and location technology providers that improvements must be made in location accuracy for 9-1-1 calls made from indoor locations,” the group said, saying it plans to take part in the Oct. 2 workshop. “More and more American homes are ‘cutting the cord’ and relying exclusively on wireless devices for all of their voice communications. Recent data suggests that nearly a third of U.S. households may no longer have wireline service.” The “predominant” technology for most of the calls is Assisted GPS (A-GPS) APCO said (http://bit.ly/18q16aO). “However, as the technology implies, A-GPS relies in large part on having direct line-of-sight for GPS signals, which do not penetrate buildings well in most cases,” the group said. “Thus, it is indisputable that a wireless 9-1-1 call from an indoor location will generally provide significantly less accurate location information than a call from an outdoor location.” The International Association of Chiefs of Police (http://bit.ly/1bGg95g) said the commission’s Communication Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council has looked at “evolving indoor location accuracy technologies,” which “represent a significant advancement and offers consumers and first responders a valuable tool to improve the capabilities of our nation’s public safety system.” The International Association of Fire Chiefs said it’s time for the FCC to update its wireless location accuracy rules. “Currently, the FCC’s rules establish an automated location information and accuracy standard for PSAP calls and contacts, including those initiated using wireless handsets outdoors, but not for wireless calls initiated indoors,” the group said (http://bit.ly/17139nd). “The majority of emergency calls placed to Emergency 911 are made from indoors and large and growing shares of emergency calls are made from wireless communication devices."

Nearly six weeks after the FCC voted 2-1 to reduce interstate prison calling rates (CD Aug 12 p1), the text of the order hasn’t been released. A decade after a Washington, D.C., grandmother asked the commission to lower rates to prisons, the industry continues to wait. Prison phone providers and prisoners’ rights groups say they can do little but speculate -- and worry. Prisoners and their families worry about continued injustices as they decide between talking to a loved one and paying the rent. Prisoners’ rights attorneys are waiting for federal leadership to help guide state commissions on their own intrastate ratemaking. And the nation’s No. 2 U.S. inmate calling service provider carries on uneasily, fearing federal overreach and preparing to file a lawsuit against the commission.

The incentive auction the FCC plans will be critical for funding the billions of dollars required by FirstNet, said North American Number Association CEO Brian Fontes in a Wednesday op-ed for The Hill (http://bit.ly/1eiHv3x). “This is the best and perhaps only opportunity to raise the necessary funds for investment in a network we so desperately need,” he said. “We cannot settle for half-measures and incremental moves -- the FCC must take decisive steps and set up an auction that delivers the resources needed to empower our public safety officials.” Fontes backed an auction in which all bidders are allowed to participate. “A limited spectrum inventory will reduce funds generated from the auction, and jeopardize the future of FirstNet and funding for Next Generation 9-1-1,” he said.

Mignon Clyburn has been acting chairwoman of the FCC since May 20 and has had what most observers see as an active chairmanship. On Aug. 9, the commission approved on a 2-1 vote what Clyburn had made clear was a top priority -- an order addressing high rates for prison calling (CD Aug 12 p1), though the order has yet to be released three weeks later. The big question many FCC observers were asking last week is how much more Clyburn will try to take on, especially since it’s unclear how much longer she has as interim chair. Will her tenure be over shortly after the commission’s Sept. 26 meeting, or will she still be acting chairwoman in November? The scenarios require different approaches, FCC and industry officials agree.

The NG-911 Institute has “made a real difference as a clearinghouse,” FCC Public Safety Chief David Turetsky said Sunday at an institute reception in Anaheim during a meeting of the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials. The institute is a nonprofit that supports the Congressional NextGen 9-1-1 Caucus. Turetsky said, “911 has to be modernized.” APCO President Terry Hall described “the hard road ahead of us” in that transition, talking about the difficulty in bringing stakeholders together and in negotiating with Congress.

By a 2-1 vote, the FCC adopted an interim prison phone rate cap of 21 cents a minute for debit and pre-paid calls, and 25 cents a minute for collect calls -- reducing the cost of a 15-minute call from as much as $17 to less than $4. “A change has finally come,” said acting FCC Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn. Rates weren’t made as low as the petitioner sought, and the order had aroused controversy within the agency before it was adopted, with Commissioner Ajit Pai dissenting, as expected (CD Aug 9 p1).

Verizon’s proposal to replace wireline services on a portion of Fire Island, N.Y., with its Voice Link fixed wireless service concerns the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials, it said in comments Monday (http://bit.ly/12YtOfJ). “APCO’s principal concern in this regard is to ensure that all subscribers in the affected area have 9-1-1 service comparable to the wireline service being replaced,” it said. While it “takes no position” on Verizon’s specific request, APCO urged the commission to take into account the inferior level of reliability of wireless services compared to copper wireline services. They're susceptible to disruptions from extreme weather, and damage to a single cell site could “leave large numbers of customers stranded,” APCO said. “If the Commission grants Verizon’s request, it should require that Verizon take appropriate steps to increase the reliability of the wireless networks used for Voice Link communications in the impacted areas,” APCO said. For example, cell sites could be “hardened and equipped with substantial backup power,” additional cell sites added, and 911 calls be given priority, the association said.

The three-judge panel selected to hear Verizon’s appeal of the 2010 FCC net neutrality order (CD June 26 p1) could be a good panel from the agency’s perspective, but there are few certainties in appellate law, said attorneys following the case closely. While Republican-appointed judges outnumber by 9-5 those appointed by Democrats at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, two Democratic appointees, David Tatel and Judith Rogers, were selected for the panel, as was Laurence Silberman, widely viewed as the intellectual leader of the conservative appellant movement.

The four national wireless carriers are on target to make text-to-911 messages available to all public safety answering points capable or receiving them by a May 15, 2014, deadline, they said in reports filed this week at the National Emergency Number Association. That deadline stems from a voluntary agreement Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile signed with NENA and the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials last year, under FCC pressure (CD Dec 10 p1). All four carriers said they're already transmitting bounceback messages to subscribers who try to send emergency texts before 911 call centers can handle them.