Monday, November 9, 2009

Firms Urges FCC To Enforce Telecom Act Rules

A coalition of communications companies that compete with the old Bell companies filed a petition Monday calling on the FCC to adopt rules that supporters say is aimed at boosting competition in the telecom and broadband markets. The coalition maintains that the FCC has been too lax in enforcing rules put in place by the 1996 telecommunications act requiring the Bell operating companies to open their networks to competitors. At the same time, they say the federal courts have barred the states from addressing the problem. The Bells "have taken advantage of this vacuum," said Genevieve Morelli, a partner at the Kelley Drye & Warren law firm who spoke on behalf of the coalition. She said the Bells have essentially ignored their obligations in recent years to provide competitors with access to the Bells' networks at just and reasonable rates. The petition provides "a framework to remedy the situation."

While the Obama administration has been working to increase broadband deployment, the coalition argued that their members' ability to offer broadband is being hampered by their limited access to the Bells' networks. Morelli noted that a recent draft study on broadband from Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society found that access to unbundled elements "is critical to first generation and next generation broadband deployment."

Section 251of the telecom act required the Bells to provide access to unbundled elements of their network to competitors who couldn't adequately compete without such access, while section 271 imposed additional unbundling obligations on the Bells in exchange for allowing them to provide long-distance and information services in their markets, Morelli noted. The coalition's petition calls on the FCC to craft rules that propose "clear requirements for access to each network element specified in Section 271" of the 1996 telecom act and provide "a clearer definition for the 'just and reasonable' rate standard the FCC has previously determined applies to these elements," according to a news release.

In response to the petition, Jon Banks of the U.S. Telecom Association, which represents the Bells, said "given that the FCC and state commissions have put in place extremely detailed requirements about compliance through hundreds of thousands of pages of orders, it's hard to believe that any additional regulation could be required. Consumers, the FCC and the communications industry's efforts to invest in building the broadband networks of the future and creating the jobs that go with it would all best be served by looking forward and not re-fighting what are now long irrelevant battles."