Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., may introduce a bill to...

ability of cities and towns to provide Internet service to local families and businesses that are underserved,” his spokesman Caley Gray told us by email. “Access to affordable, reliable broadband is critical for economic development, and that is why Senator Lautenberg is considering re-introducing his legislation to prohibit states from interfering with a municipality’s ability to provide this vital service.” Free Press Senior Director-Strategy Tim Karr described ongoing talks with the senator this weekend during the Free Press meeting in Denver. “It may take a federal bill to repeal local legislation,” Karr said during a panel on the American Legislative Exchange Council. He referred to the 19 states that have passed laws restricting municipal broadband, which some have argued hurts the free market. Karr hopes that a federal bill will preempt these state efforts, such as the one in Georgia earlier this year. “We're hoping to have a [Republican] cosponsor on that,” Karr said of the Lautenberg bill. “I would disagree with the senator,” Georgia House Rep. Don Parsons, a Republican who cosponsored such a municipal network-restricting bill in the Georgia Legislature this spring, told us. Georgia House Bill 282 failed in a House floor vote this March (CD March 11 p7). Parsons called the idea of such federal preemption legislation, which would affect business internal to a state’s operations, “just totally wrong.” Parsons supports rural broadband but not at the expense of taxpayers, he said, saying Georgia legislators aren’t likely to drop the issue: “It’s not over at all.”