AT&T at Odds with CLECs Over Stricter Copper Retirement Rules
AT&T opposed a proposal at the FCC by several CLECs to adopt rules making it harder for ILECs to retire copper loops, and making it easier for CLECs to get access to last-mile copper facilities. The telco said granting the petition by TelePacific, Mpower, Level 3 and others could delay the transition to all-Internet Protocol networks and drain ILEC bank accounts. CLECs and state regulators supported the petition, saying ILEC opposition is driven not by a desire to further the public interest but to maintain their own dominance.
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The CLECs had requested several revisions to the copper retirement rules (http://bit.ly/12rZhf8), such as clarifying that copper “retirement” does not permit physical removal, and that state commissions may adopt stronger restrictions on copper loop removal than the FCC. They also asked the FCC to deny USTelecom’s request that the notice time period for retirement begins with the ILEC notice to interconnecting carriers, rather than with the federal commission’s public notice.
NASUCA supports the CLEC-proposed revisions, saying the copper-based system is reliable in power outages and should be maintained so as not to deprive customers of resilient service (http://bit.ly/12rWtP2). The data submitted in docket 12-353 about the extensive use of Ethernet-over-copper shows that it’s a “viable” means of getting broadband to rural customers, the association said. It said Verizon and AT&T have “competitive reasons” for desiring to retire copper plant “as early as often as possible, even when that plant is still useful.” Because they're required to give CLECs access to copper facilities, while no such requirement exists for fiber, the ILECs “have every incentive to retire copper plant” even when customers are using it, NASUCA said. Retiring functional copper deprives customers of a technology that “is far more likely to function during prolonged power outages,” it said. “Allowing unwarranted retirement of copper plant is not in the public interest."
AT&T said the commission “should not reverse course” and expand CLECs’ access to copper facilities to provide broadband services (http://bit.ly/12rXV43). The requested relief would exceed the commission’s authority, and be too costly for ILECs absent a “practical mechanism” to recover costs, AT&T said. “This proposal would amount to a new federal carrier-of-last-resort mandate for obsolete legacy facilities.” To effectively manage the IP transition, “ILECs must be free to superintend their networks and to retire network elements that have been rendered anachronistic,” the ILEC said: What the CLECs seek could “delay or compromise the transition to all-IP networks.”
CompTel supported the revisions, saying the cost of providing service to small and medium sized businesses could increase dramatically if the commission doesn’t revisit its rules (http://bit.ly/12rWHFW). The ILECs that want easy copper retirement rules “have not demonstrated that there is significant burden to making copper available,” CompTel said. ILECs would recover their cost of maintaining copper facilities in the unbundled network element prices that ILECs would receive for any copper leased to an Ethernet-over-copper provider, CompTel said. The commission must revise rules to fix last-mile bottlenecks, the association said. “Because an ILEC can retire its copper loops, without any requirement to provide a functionally and equivalently priced alternative, the impact of copper retirement is the same as a grant of forbearance to the ILEC of its obligation to provide unbundled loops pursuant to [Telecom Act] Section 251(c), which the Commission could not justify granting even in the most competitive markets.”