Telecom is upset that markup of a broadband data bill is moving f...
Telecom is upset that markup of a broadband data bill is moving forward without a hearing, industry associations said in a letter to Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii. A major concern is S-1853’s promoting municipal broadband, which…
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would “chill private investment in existing and future broadband networks,” said the letter to Inouye from USTelecom, OPASTCO, the Independent Telephone Telecommunication Alliance and the Western Telecommunications Alliance. Federal promotion of municipal broadband encourages “cherry picking the easier-to-serve areas within town limits,” the letter said, adding that 14 states have “already come to the conclusion that regulating municipal entry enhances broadband deployment.” The bill should be changed to limit its effect to places without broadband service and to prevent municipal broadband networks from getting multiple subsidies and “thus able to offer cut-rate prices that cannot be matched by private firms,” the letter suggested. The committee plans to take up the bill Tuesday.