After a prolonged negotiation, DOJ reached agreement with T-Mobile/Sprint and Dish Network (see 1907260021). Justice got five attorneys general onboard from states that hadn't tried to block the multibillion dollar transaction. Industry officials said getting some support from states was important to the department and delayed an announcement by a day, though opposing states are expected to continue their lawsuit in federal court in New York. The California Public Utilities Commission also hasn't approved the deal. DOJ’s consent decree with the companies did little to mollify most critics.

In the days before the sunshine period for August's FCC meeting, the eighth floor had a parade of parties urging tweaks or changes to the broadband mapping draft order on this coming Thursday's agenda. That's according to docket 19-195 postings.

Wireless carriers supported broad implementation of Shaken/Stir and said a safe harbor, based on the use of reasonable analytics, is critical. Companies concerned about reaching customers urged the FCC to build in safeguards that make sure only illegal and unwanted calls don’t get through. Some comments closely tracked concerns raised at the FCC’s recent summit on secure handling of asserted information using tokens (Shaken) and secure telephone identity revisited (Stir) (see 1907110023) Comments were due Wednesday in docket 17-59 (see 1907240047).

Competitive LECs want more time to move away from regulated resale of voice-grade copper TDM phone services bought from incumbents if commissioners vote soon to proceed with a forbearance order as expected (see 1907020058). The draft addresses remaining aspects of a larger petition for regulatory relief USTelecom filed in May 2018 (see 1805040016). The draft proposes a three-year transition for CLECs or their customers to find new voice service arrangements or for CLECs to negotiate new contracts. CLEC allies are optimistic the agency will extend the time as they seek.

Educational groups asked the FCC to reject a petition from Texas carriers to initiate a rulemaking on E-rate to favor telecom companies that provided fiber to a school or library over an overbuilder during competitive bidding for the USF program (see 1907020016), in replies posted through Wednesday in docket 13-184. "Texas Carriers paint a very different picture than most rural carriers," said Funds for Learning. "Rather than working to earn business, they ask the FCC to regulate competition away." Texas education associations said the Texas carriers should participate in competitive bidding if they want future E-rate funding, "but the petitioners, instead of proposing bids, would rather propose unnecessary rules that allow them to remain on the sidelines without consequence." E-rate Partners said "the petition limits competitive bidding instead of encouraging it." Incompas said the proposals would significantly distort the competitive bidding process, cause higher prices and delay the application process for schools trying to upgrade their broadband services. Uniti Fiber said the "requested rule changes are unnecessary, do not offer solutions, and would harm the competitive market for E-rate services by installing a thicket of bureaucratic barriers to deploying broadband." Petitioners Central Texas Telephone Cooperative, Peoples Telephone Cooperative and Totelcom Communications said they "seek to eliminate waste, not competition," and characterizations of protectionism "are patently false, unsubstantiated and misunderstand many aspects of the Petitioners' proposal." The carriers encourage a mechanism "to consider and negotiate a reasonable rate to lease existing fiber to avoid duplicative costs and unnecessary overbuilding" in ways that would benefit both USF and schools. NTCA also asked for a rulemaking to reexamine E-rate rules adopted five years ago.

Educational groups asked the FCC to reject a petition from Texas carriers to initiate a rulemaking on E-rate to favor telecom companies that provided fiber to a school or library over an overbuilder during competitive bidding for the USF program (see 1907020016), in replies posted through Wednesday in docket 13-184. "Texas Carriers paint a very different picture than most rural carriers," said Funds for Learning. "Rather than working to earn business, they ask the FCC to regulate competition away." Texas education associations said the Texas carriers should participate in competitive bidding if they want future E-rate funding, "but the petitioners, instead of proposing bids, would rather propose unnecessary rules that allow them to remain on the sidelines without consequence." E-rate Partners said "the petition limits competitive bidding instead of encouraging it." Incompas said the proposals would significantly distort the competitive bidding process, cause higher prices and delay the application process for schools trying to upgrade their broadband services. Uniti Fiber said the "requested rule changes are unnecessary, do not offer solutions, and would harm the competitive market for E-rate services by installing a thicket of bureaucratic barriers to deploying broadband." Petitioners Central Texas Telephone Cooperative, Peoples Telephone Cooperative and Totelcom Communications said they "seek to eliminate waste, not competition," and characterizations of protectionism "are patently false, unsubstantiated and misunderstand many aspects of the Petitioners' proposal." The carriers encourage a mechanism "to consider and negotiate a reasonable rate to lease existing fiber to avoid duplicative costs and unnecessary overbuilding" in ways that would benefit both USF and schools. NTCA also asked for a rulemaking to reexamine E-rate rules adopted five years ago.

The FCC will give relief to incumbent LECs, granting them forbearance from pricing regulation on lower-speed legacy transport and requirements to sell the transport as unbundled network elements (UNE) to competitive carriers that then use them in their business data services, voting unanimously at its meeting Wednesday on a petition from USTelecom (see 1905130050). The agency issued a draft order in late June in docket 18-141 (see 1906190044). The new order allows CLECs to continue to buy the UNE transport from ILECs for the next six months, and gives them three years (concurrently) to transition away from the transport networks or negotiate new business agreements with the ILECs.

The FCC voted along party lines Wednesday for partial pre-emption of San Francisco's Article 52 open-access rule, with dissenting Democratic commissioners complaining of regulatory overreach. Geoffrey Starks called the declaratory ruling “not sound law and not good policy." Jessica Rosenworcel said it's "an affront to our long history" of local control. The Republicans and Starks, meanwhile, backed the related NPRM asking about other ways the FCC could boost broadband deployment in multi-tenant environments (MTE), though Mike O'Rielly said he did so with reservations.

Incumbent rural broadband carriers and competitors disagreed on a petition from Texas carriers asking the FCC to prohibit E-rate funding overbuilding fiber networks for schools and libraries (see 1905230005). In comments posted to docket 13-184 through Tuesday, incumbents said competitive bidding rules can favor large, regional providers over local rural carriers and lead to inefficient government spending. Opponents said the proposals could stifle broadband competition, raise prices for rural schools and libraries, and drive up USF costs. NTCA wants the FCC to initiate a rulemaking as requested by the Texas telcos to develop safeguards in its competitive bidding process to ensure USF E-rate and high-cost programs don't cannibalize each other and waste resources. It asked that existing providers be given an opportunity to respond when a school or library files an application for self-construction so the incumbent could match the price. Incompas urged the FCC to deny the petition, saying "the proposal would significantly distort the competitive process, result in higher prices, add significant delay for applicants trying to upgrade their broadband services, and likely compel schools and libraries to select the incumbent provider to receive E-rate funding in a timely fashion." Significant competition in the E-rate program resulted in lower prices and increased bandwidth, Incompas said. USTelecom seeks NPRM issuance "expeditiously" to ensure rules are clear going into the 2020 E-rate funding year. It said the petition "does not go far enough in its requested relief" and ignores the plight of providers that are consistently overbuilt with E-rate funding. The Consortium for School Networking and the Schools, Health and Libraries Broadband Coalition opposed the petition. They said the changes "would serve as a barrier to competition" and could make it appear the FCC is "picking winners and losers" by insulating existing providers from competitive market forces. Uniti Fiber opposes the petition because the revamp would delay E-rate funding to eligible schools and libraries. "The requested changes add an additional 180 days when existing incumbents providers could review, challenge, and negotiate following the competitive bidding process," the company said, on top of the full year the competitive bidding and approval process can take.

Partial pre-emption of San Francisco Police Code Article 52 may not be necessary, with Incompas unaware of any provider that shares in-use wiring, it told aides to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and to Commissioners Mike O'Rielly and Geoffrey Starks, said a docket 17-142 ex parte posting Tuesday. It said the partial pre-emption declaratory ruling on July 10's agenda (see 1906190067) could deter other cities and local governments from mandatory access laws, and the FCC shouldn't expand the scope of the draft declaratory ruling to pre-empt other aspects of Article 52 such as mandatory access provisions. It said incumbent service providers and landlords have used revenue sharing and wiring and rooftop exclusivity arrangements as end runs around access rules and to keep competitive providers out of multiple tenant environments.