June 2016

In debate before a vote on the End Taxpayer Funded Cell Phones Act of 2016 (HR 5525), House Commerce Committee Ranking Member Frank Pallone (D-NJ) took to the House floor to slam Republican backers of the bill, which would disallow low income Lifeline telecommunication subsidies for mobile broadband phones or service.

"[House Speaker Paul] Ryan and the Republican majority is bringing a bill to the floor that would eliminate the successful Lifeline program that provides millions of low-income Americans access to basic communications services," said Ranking Member Pallone. He said Republican lawmakers are looking to gut a Lifeline program created in the Reagan Administration and expanded to wireless in the Bush Administration. He said the claims of waste, fraud and abuse come despite the Obama Administration's elimination of nearly $750 million of that. The bill would continue to collect the same fees from ratepayers used for the subsidy but not allow any to be used for wireless, which Ranking Member Pallone says does nothing to help taxpayers. "The American people know that if Republicans were really serious about battling poverty and shrinking the size of Lifeline, they would work with us to create more jobs for those that are unemployed or under-employed. The best way to lower the costs of the Lifeline program is to lift people up, not to take away their connection to a better life," he said.

Senators pushed the head of a nascent communications network for first responders to make sure that it covers rural areas. “Although FirstNet has made commendable progress in the past year, questions linger about the future viability of the network,” said Senate Tech Subcommittee Chairman Roger Wicker (R-MS) during a hearing on public safety network FirstNet. “I appreciate FirstNet’s commitment to providing our rural communities with the same services as larger, urban cities, but rural and remote coverage remains a major concern of mine.”

The Subcommittee held the hearing on the network, which policymakers launched after first responders suffered communications failures during incidents like the Sept 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. In theory, a unified network would allow first responders from different agencies to communicate more effectively. Its early build-out was marred by allegations of failing to properly vet its board of directors and other complaints from watchdogs. But the situation at the network has gotten better, some lawmakers have said. The organization is now moving forward with courting vendors to build the system. Lawmakers on Tuesday said they remained watchful of the network’s development. “With vastly rural populations having differing emergency needs, what challenges do you have there and what are your thoughts about covering the rural areas of this nation?” asked Chairman Wicker. Other lawmakers also raised questions about the way the network would serve rural communities.

Uber and Airbnb have set their sights on global expansion. They’re about to face a global response. Mayors from New York to Paris to Seoul think they’ve found the trick to coping with so-called “sharing economy” apps -- working together. Ten markets are jointly preparing a unified rule book in a bid to leverage their combined size to promote clearer ground rules.

These companies have been used to dealing with regulators, but they’ve done so mostly on a city-by-city basis. That’s about to change: Representatives for cities that also includes Athens, Barcelona and Toronto, have started their first concerted effort to produce a common framework. While there’s no white paper or policy drawn up yet, multiple city representatives met for the first time last month in Amsterdam to discuss. Paris is calling for a first publication by October.