Telcom Update Teed Up In House

According to a Hill source, House Commerce Committee staffers and members have gotten the word that a preliminary draft of legislation updating and re-crafting the 1996 Telecommunication Act will be handed out Thursday. Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), chairman of the Telecommunications Subcommittee, has called an 11 p.m. meeting to distribute the 70-page discussion draft, which is essentially a conversation-starter that will be subject to changes following negotiations and meetings among members. The bill will try to come up with regs and rules of the road for broadband video, voice, and Internet, essentially filling in areas where technology has outstripped the 1996 rewrite of the 1934 Act.