Telecommunication

A Biden Federal Communications Commission needs to tackle exorbitant jail and prison call prices: extending reform efforts to jails and intrastate communications, tackling exploitative video call contracts for the first time, and addressing the problems of fees and monopolistic bundled service provision in addition to fully dismantling the regressive commission system.

The Federal Communications Commission universal service support fund's revenue base has been shrinking while the payouts have risen. As a result, the contribution factor, an ad valorem tax on the revenue base, rose from 16.7% in 2017 to 21.2% in 2020. We propose two solutions to the funding problem: A near-term funding reform proposal that widens the revenue base by replacing the current definition of assessable services (interstate and international) with a more inclusive definition of all communication services that have a telecommunications component.

The Federal Communications Commission launched a proceeding to determine whether to end China Telecom (Americas) Corporation’s authority to provide domestic interstate and international telecommunications services within the US under section 214 of the Communications Act. The protection of national security is an integral part of the FCC’s responsibility to advance the public interest, and Dec 10’s action seeks to safeguard the nation’s telecommunications infrastructure from potential security threats. 

The following items have been deleted from the list of items scheduled for consideration at the Dec 10, 2020 Federal Communications Commission Open Meeting. Items 6 and 8 have been released by the FCC. Items 7, 8 and 10 have been adopted.

6. Florida Community Radio, Inc., Construction Permit for Proposed NCE Station DWRBD (FM), Horseshoe Beach, Florida: The FCC will consider a licensing matter. 

In a letter the leadership of the Senate and the Senate Committee on Appropriations, senators urged full funding for the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act and the Broadband DATA Act. The Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act (“rip and replace”) created a program to help small, rural telecommunications operators remove equipment posing a security threat to domestic networks and replace it with equipment from trusted providers. Fully funding the Broadband DATA Act would ensure more accurate broadband maps and better stewardship over the millions of dollars the federal go

The Federal Communications Commission published its twelfth annual report to Congress on the collection and distribution of 911 fees by states. The report finds that in 2019, states and territories collected more than $3 billion in 911 fees, and more than $200 million of that funding was diverted for uses other than 911. The report identifies five states—Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and West Virginia—where 911 fees were diverted for other purposes. 2019’s report found that almost $198 million in 911 fees were diverted for non-911 uses by the same five states.

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau (Bureau) announces that Global Tel*Link Corporation (GTL) has filed a petition for reconsideration1 of the 2020 ICS Report and Order on Remand.2 GTL requests reconsideration of a single sentence from the 2020 ICS Report and Order on Remand stating that “the jurisdictional nature of a call depends on the physical location of the endpoints of the call and not on whether the area code or NXX prefix of the telephone number associated with the account, are associated with a particular state.”

Jeff McElfresh, CEO of AT&T Communications, described AT&T's broadband policy goals. He said Congress should act to directly fund the Universal Service Fund, changing the funding mechanism since the contribution factor — the percentage of voice revenues that goes toward USF — is on track to exceed 30% for the first time. Other AT&T broadband policy recommendations outlined:

The Federal Communications Commission will hold an Open Meeting on the subjects listed below on Thursday, December 10, 2020:

The Federal Communications Commission's Wireline Competition Bureau and the Office of Economics and Analytics released the 2021 reasonable comparability benchmarks for fixed voice and broadband services for eligible telecommunications carriers (ETCs) that are subject to broadband public interest obligations.