Supreme Court Won't Review FCC Pole Attachment Decision

The Supreme Court declined to review a US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit upholding the Federal Communications Commission's pole attachment rate order.

The court does not have to explain why it denies an appeal, simply saying that the petitions for appeal in Electric Power Service v. FCC had been denied and that Justice Alito had taken no part in the decision. The DC Circuit had found that the FCC, in changing decades old policy on pole attachments, had justified the standard for its change in policy. The FCC in July 2011 had voted to reform its pole attachment rules as another way to promote broadband deployment and ease telecom's route to that deployment. “We are pleased that the Supreme Court has rightly put a final stake in the efforts of the electric utility industry to delay the FCC’s implementation of the statute’s clear directive," said USTelecom Vice President Glenn Reynolds.