Federal Communications Commission (FCC)

Rural wireless ISP (WISP) operators urged the FCC Tues. to consider changes in power limits in unlicensed bands and more spectrum, particularly below 5 GHz. At a daylong Rural WISP Workshop in a packed Commission meeting room, rural WISP developers said they also could use changes in the agency’s Part 15 rules for unlicensed spectrum and help from the FCC on restricting local ordinances for tower siting. Citing the turnout for the workshop, Comr. Adelstein suggested it might be helpful for the FCC to take such meetings on the road, with a possible next workshop somewhere in the Midwest.

Senate Communications Subcommittee Chmn. Burns (R-Mont.) said he wasn’t sure when he will introduce the Universal Service Fund (USF) draft bill that has been floating around for some time, but said it could be before this session ends (CD Oct 28 p1). “We're thinking pretty quick, we think,” he said. Burns also said that once recommendations were received from the Federal-State Joint Board that’s studying USF distribution methods, further legislation might be warranted. “We don’t want to go down the distribution route until we see what the Joint Board has done,” he said. “I don’t want to preempt them in any way.”

Freeing Vonage from common carrier regulation would “clearly undercut” the ability of law enforcement officers to conduct electronic surveillance under the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), the FBI and Dept. of Justice told the FCC in a joint filing earlier this week. The filing was one of more than 4 dozen commenting on whether the Commission should preempt a Minn. PUC ruling that Vonage’s voice-over-Internet-Protocol (VoIP) service was a telecom service subject to common carrier regulation.

Citing the alleged failure of private telecom providers to sufficiently deploy advanced broadband services to rural and less profitable markets, the Consumer Federation of America and High Tech Broadband Coalition filed briefs in the Supreme Court Fri. backing federal preemption of state laws that barred municipal entry into the telecom business. In June, the Supreme Court granted review of an 8th U.S. Appeals Court, St. Louis, decision vacating an FCC order. The Commission had denied preemption of a Mo. statute that barred localities and municipally owned utilities from providing telecom services or facilities. Petitions for writs of certiorari had been filed by the FCC, the state of Mo. and Southwestern Bell.

States and municipalities are expressing concern that legislation designed to prevent taxes on access to Internet service eventually could restrict local govt. regulation of telephony and cable service. NARUC, the National Governors Assn. (NGA), National Assn. of Telecom Officers & Advisors (NATOA) and the TeleCommUninty Alliance (TCUA) are among the local interests expressing concern about S-150, the proposed Internet Tax Non-Discrimination Act.

The FCC voted at its agenda meeting Thurs. to allow use of spectrum in the 71-76 GHz, 81-86 GHz and 92-95 GHz bands for commercial services such as high-speed, point-to-point wireless local area networks (LANs) and broadband Internet access. Those spectrum blocks, now used mainly for govt. and scientific purposes, are “well-suited for licensees to offer a broad range of innovative products and services,” the agency said.

With utilities girding to roll out commercial broadband over power line (BPL) services, the FCC may have to confront the issue of classifying the service sooner rather than later, said officials and lawyers we interviewed. However, opinions differed on whether the recent ruling by the 9th U.S. Appeals Court, San Francisco, overturning the FCC’s declaratory order classifying cable modem service as an interstate information service would have a direct bearing on the agency’s thinking on classifying BPL service. Utilities recently unveiled BPL commercial deployment plans ranging from this month to early next year (CD Sept 23 p4).

A federal judge ruled Thurs. that Internet voice service between computers, or between computers and phones, couldn’t be regulated by the states. U.S. Dist. Judge Michael Davis, Minneapolis, classified Vonage’s offering as an information service and therefore concluded that Minn. PUC regulation had been preempted by Congress in its protection of nascent Internet activity. The opinion was hailed by Vonage and by voice-over Internet protocol (VoIP) promoter Jeff Pulver, but was criticized by NARUC and the Media Access Project (MAP).

Advocates of competing plans for mitigating public safety interference at 800 MHz wrangled in an occasionally heated panel discussion Thurs. about possible technical fixes and funding. At the Industrial Telecom Assn.’s (ITA) Private Wireless Summit in Washington, backers of different solutions for alleviating interference showed how far apart the factions continued to be, even as the FCC was set to move ahead as soon as year-end. One of the few factors on which most panelists agreed was that whatever the FCC did in that area was likely to end up in court.

One way or another, a court decision that effectively would allow unrelated Internet service providers to piggyback on cable’s broadband lines (CD Oct 7 p1) will not take effect, NCTA officials said confidently Wed. in a press briefing. NCTA Pres. Robert Sachs said that while the decision by the 9th U.S. Appeals Court, San Francisco, had left some cable companies uneasy, for the most part they saw that development as one of many to come along a path toward deregulation.