The federal government is increasingly rife with spectrum fiefdoms among agencies, contrary to the FCC's core purpose as a centralized point of spectrum policy decision-making, Commissioner Brendan Carr said Wednesday during the Practicing Law Institute's annual telecom policy and regulation seminar. He said updating memorandums of understanding would help, but ultimately there must be deference to the expert agency making a final decision. Such "devolution" of spectrum policy will be a permanent fixture, but that trend needs some reversing, he said.

USTelecom appoints from OMB Michael Pauls as senior director-government affairs ... Information Technology and Innovation Foundation adds ex-FTC economist Julie Carlson as associate director-antitrust and innovation policy, ITIF’s Schumpeter Project on Competition Policy ... Kirkland & Ellis hires Scott Scheele as partner, Antitrust & Competition Practice Group; he was at DOJ as chief, Antitrust Division’s Media, Entertainment and Communications Section.

Require that affordable connectivity program providers apply the benefit only to "all plans that are presently offered to potential customers, not grandfathered plans," USTelecom CEO Jonathan Spalter told FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks and his staff, said a filing posted Monday in docket 21-450 (see 2111180067). Spalter said it's not "necessary" for providers to submit details of every plan that will be available and to allow "as much time as necessary" to transition from the emergency broadband benefit program.

ISP associations asked the 2nd U.S. Circuit of Appeals to require their brief by Feb. 23 on New York’s appeal of a lower court rejecting the state’s broadband affordability law, in letters Monday in case 21-1975 from the Satellite Broadcasting and Communications Association, New York State Telecommunications Association, CTIA, USTelecom and NTCA. U.S. District Court in Central Islip, New York, temporarily blocked the state law earlier this year, ruling ISPs would likely succeed on conflict and field preemption arguments (see 2107230044). Last week, in an amicus brief, California, Illinois, 20 other states and the District of Columbia said they “seek to defend New York’s sovereign right to exercise its police powers against Plaintiffs’ unwarranted assertions of federal preemption.” Amici “regularly exercise their sovereign authority to enact and enforce numerous laws applicable to broadband providers and other online businesses,” including laws “aimed at securing their residents’ access to vital goods and services,” they said. “There is nothing about the Internet that necessitates a departure from that normal state of affairs, and certainly nothing that warrants it in the absence of clear direction from Congress.” In other amici filings, the Benton Institute and Public Knowledge said the New York law is “a targeted and state-specific regulatory response to the problem of the digital divide.” Access Now, the National Digital Inclusion Alliance and others said federal “programs, while being helpful and effective, have not fully solved" the "broadband affordability problem.” The Greenlining Institute said states “have long played an essential role in regulating both interstate and intrastate communications, both as an exercise of their inherent sovereign police powers and within a federal statutory framework that leaves room to adapt communications law and policies to local concerns.” The district court's field preemption claim, if affirmed, "would invalidate vital state laws regulating areas of traditional local concern -- including consumer protection, public health, and public safety,” wrote seven internet law professors including Harvard Law School’s Lawrence Lessig and Stanford Law School’s Barbara van Schewick. It would “leave both the FCC and the states without regulatory authority, leaving Americans wholly unprotected from harms by interstate communications providers,” they said.

An FCC Further NPRM on curbing illegal robocalls to public safety answering points and improving the PSAP Do-Not-Call registry got mixed reaction from public safety organizations and industry in comments posted Thursday in docket 12-129 (see 2110010065). Commissioners approved the item in September. Comments were due Wednesday.

Tejasi Thatte, ex-chief of staff to Rep. Tony Cardenas and ex-NCTA, joins NBCUniversal federal affairs team ... USTelecom names Diana Eisner, ex-Frontier Communications, vice president-policy and advocacy, and Nicole Henry, ex-office of Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., senior director-government affairs; also promotes Hawley Stanton to senior director-government affairs ... John Howes, ex-Wireless Infrastructure Association, becomes counsel and senior policy adviser to Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, with responsibilities including telecom and tech ... New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) appoints Brian Lipman as director-Division of Rate Counsel; he had led it on acting basis after Stefanie Brand retired in September.

Broadband and housing advocates want more FCC scrutiny over multi-tenant environments and the deals MTE building owners make with providers, said replies posted Monday in docket 17-142 (see 2110210053). Some said exclusivity agreements could hamper enrollment efforts in the upcoming $14.2 billion Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP). MTE trade groups rejected additional regulation.

Allow the use of session initiation protocol 603 for blocked calls, said the Competitive Carriers Association in backing USTelecom's call-blocking petition for reconsideration, in a letter Thursday in FCC docket 17-59 (see 2106150062). Defer "any requirements to return SIP Codes 607 and 608 for blocked calls until standards-setting bodies have finalized the standards for those codes and complexities in deploying SIP Codes 607 and 608 can be resolved," CCA said.

While applauding the FCC for requiring covered text provider support of text-to-988 capabilities, mental health and disability communities raised caution flags about the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline having adequate resources come July to handle texting traffic. Commissioners unanimously approved an order Thursday that requires routing of texts sent to 988 to the Lifeline, and setting outer bounds for text message formats to be sent. The final item wasn't released. Also OK'd 4-0 was U.S. market access for French-flagged satellite IoT operator Kineis, as expected (see 2111030008), and a Further NPRM on creating an enhanced competition incentive program aimed at boosting spectrum access by small carriers and tribes (see 2111180071).

Industry and state officials disagreed whether the FCC's Further NPRM to impose additional requirements for those seeking direct numbering resources would further efforts to curb illegal robocalls, in replies posted Tuesday in docket 13-97 (see 2110180045). Require applicants for direct numbering access to disclose foreign ownership information and those with authorization to update the commission of any ownership changes within 30 days, said attorneys general from every state and the District of Columbia. The AGs backed requiring applicants to certify robocall mitigation compliance or Stir/Shaken implementation and rejecting or revoking authorization if the applicant or holder is found to originate or transmit illegal robocalls. These "reasonable proposals will help curb illegal robocallers’ ability to misuse our nation’s limited numbering resources and circumvent the protections of the Stir/Shaken call authentication framework," they said. Requiring VoIP providers to adhere to state requirements is "reasonable and helps to ensure a competitive market while imposing safeguards on limited numbering resources," said the Michigan Public Service Commission. The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission backed the 30-day notice for growth requests, and said it's the "only real means for state commissions to have a true sense of the entire universe of entities obtaining finite numbering resources." Allow state commissions to "assist the FCC and the Numbering Administrator to effectively oversee the use of numbering resources," said NARUC. Close "any perceived loopholes" in access stimulation rules, said Verizon, such as amending commission rules to qualify VoIP providers as access stimulators if they engage in such behavior. Verizon backed similar changes to the definitions of "end user" and "end office" that AT&T sought. Focus on "directly addressing any gaps in its existing frameworks" and avoid "imposing unnecessary, confusing, and/or duplicative requirements," said USTelecom. Don't adopt "new one-off rules that would apply uniquely to subsets of providers," said NTCA. The proposals "will make the robocalling problem worse," said RingCentral, Telnyx and Vonage. They "are neither necessary nor technologically neutral," said NCTA, which Microsoft and Lumen echoed. The "single most effective step" the FCC can take is a "targeted acceleration of the Stir/Shaken implementation deadline for those providers most likely to originate illegal robocalls," NCTA said.