COPPS: INTERIM UNE RULES ‘HIGHLY UNLIKELY’ IN NEXT 60 DAYS

Copps said if the D.C. Circuit’s ruling isn’t stayed, then on Day 61 “the state commissions will really step into the spotlight.” By vacating the FCC’s delegation of unbundling authority and its impairment standards, he said, “the ruling may trigger change-of-law provisions in interconnection agreements, and the states will have to interpret those provisions” contract by contract.

Copps said the D.C. Circuit’s ruling “will strike a serious blow to competition and consumers, unless wiser counsel can prevail.” He said it has undermined “the efforts by our lawmakers and regulators to promote competition.” If this decision stands, Copps said, “it will wreak havoc far outside of telecom” by invalidating all efforts by any federal agency “from FERC to OSHA to the Fish & Wildlife Service” to form federal-state partnerships for implementing federal policies. He said the FCC “will appeal this decision.

Echoing his colleague, Comr. Martin, Copps urged the states to continue their Triennial Review dockets: “No one is better positioned to amass critical data and analysis.” But Wash. Utilities & Transportation Comr. Marilyn Showalter asked: “How will we know what data to collect in the absence of a law or rule?” Copps replied that states “should keep going on their present course at least for the next 60 days” until the legal future becomes clearer: “This is no time to stop and wait for the smoke to clear. We are in the thick of battle; don’t stand down.”

Meanwhile, the NARUC Telecom Committee resurrected a troubled directory assistance (DA) policy resolution that had been set aside on Sun. and adopted a rewritten milder version of the original proposal. As approved, the resolution urged the FCC to update the record on its 2-year-old DA competition docket, but to leave decisions on how to encourage DA competition up to state regulators. The resolution said NARUC wouldn’t support 411 pre-subscription or any other plan that would involve surcharges on all phone lines to recover conversion and operating costs. The adopted resolution was shorn of language that some states feared might be interpreted as a call for the FCC to take power from the states in making DA decisions.

The telecom panel acted after hearing from competitive DA providers, who said effective competition in the DA market won’t happen until the “411” DA dialing code of the incumbent telcos is scrapped or expanded to allow competitors access to this well-known code. They told NARUC that the current system is unfair to competitors.

While 411 is “held captive, there’s no competition and no choice, said Lois Pines, infoNXX regulatory counsel. Incumbents’ profits are balanced on consumers’ backs,” she said. Pines said prices for DA calls should be going down because of automation but instead major incumbents like Qwest and BellSouth have raised their DA rates by about a 1/3 over the last few years. She said DA competition in Europe has produced lower prices for basic listing look-ups along with a variety of value-added premium listing services like driving directions or restaurant ratings.

Robert Lyons, Verizon pres.-retail mktg., said getting rid of 411 would confuse consumers while opening the number to competitive use would cause many millions of dollars in administrative costs. He said there are many options for finding a phone number, including fast-growing wireless and Internet sources: “People are using these substitute services more and more. It’s a change in our culture.” He said DA competition in Europe has had implementation problems, while DA in the U.S. “is of a high quality” that’s probably the best in the world. Consultant Kathleen Pierz said British authorities dealt with the dialing code problem by shuffling calls to the old national DA code to DA providers on a revolving basis. She said DA competition in Britain has been successful, bringing consumers a wide array of new services. -- Herb Kirchhoff

NARUC Notebook…

Top Congressional aides told NARUC that growing pressure for a rewrite of the Telecom Act could produce movement in that direction by the end of 2005. Greg Rothschild, senior minority counsel on the House Energy & Commerce Committee, said VoIP and the litigation over UNE-P and the Triennial Review have put the Telecom Act rewrite issue “squarely in our faces. There’s a growing consensus that a Telecom Act rewrite is needed. But the consensus breaks down over how to change it.” He predicted a “long and difficult debate. It took 10 years to pass the Telecom Act. We can’t afford another 10 years to pass the rewrite.” Joshua Lamel, aide to the House Commerce Committee, said state regulators “represent consumer interests so it’s vital that your voices be heard over the next year or 2” as the Telecom Act rewrite bandwagon accelerates: “You are the experts on the problems our constituents face daily.” He called UNE-P “the conundrum confronting any Telecom Act rewrite.” Paul Martino, senior majority counsel to the Senate Commerce Committee, said “technology is undermining the fundamental foundations of the Telecom Act.” He expects there will be hearings on the Act relatively soon “to see which of its assumptions are still valid.”