Mayors Gush Over FCC Lifeline Order
The Lifeline order OK'd by FCC members 3-2 won praise from New York's Bill de Blasio and 37 other mayors. The FCC released all 224 pages of the Lifeline order last week (see 1604270028). De Blasio and mayors from Baltimore,…
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Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle and elsewhere sent a glowing letter to FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Thursday. “We write to applaud your leadership in modernizing and reforming the Lifeline program to include affordable broadband Internet service to benefit millions of low-income households,” the mayors wrote. “As leaders in local government, representing communities large and small, the modernized Lifeline program has tremendous potential to improve the lives of our low-income residents and enhance the long-term prospects for our cities as a whole. We are committed to working with you in support of this important action, and in partnership through the implementation process.” The mayors urged the FCC to design “a structure that will allow and encourage aggregation of subsidies to support deployment at public housing developments,” which they said “would complement local efforts by creating a robust and dependable funding stream for service costs.” While the local leaders praised the Lifeline order, states have railed against it, saying it flies in the face of federal statute and could be unlawful (see 1604010042).