The FCC should move forward to approve Telcordia as the new Local Number Portability Administrator (LNPA), taking the contract away from Neustar, said USTelecom and CTIA in joint reply comments posted by the FCC Monday. Federal law enforcement didn’t pick sides but filed reply comments asking the commission to move forward with caution.

The FCC should clarify that the elimination of support in areas covered 100 percent by an unsubsidized competitor does not apply to price cap areas, USTelecom said in a petition (http://bit.ly/1oqU2pk) for reconsideration or clarification posted Friday in docket 10-90. If the elimination is intended to apply to price cap carriers, the agency should reconsider the provision, the petition said. Price cap carriers received no notice of the potential application of this rule to them, the petition said. The discussion in the USF/ICC Transformation Order was eliminating support in those situations to rate-of-return carriers, the petition said.

Sprint, T-Mobile and others told Congress that the U.S. needs regulated interconnection, even amid and following the IP transition, said comments submitted to the House Communications Subcommittee. Comments were due Friday and generally not yet released online, addressing a July white paper (http://1.usa.gov/1r0IyeZ) on interconnection that House Republicans released as part of their initiative to overhaul the Communications Act. USTelecom and some others strongly disagreed with Sprint and T-Mobile and slammed the notion of such rules or state involvement.

An FCC order on circulation would generically ask the agency’s Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service to examine changes to USF contribution methodology without recommending how the group should proceed, said agency and industry officials in interviews this week.

The petition for reconsideration filed by the American Cable Association and NCTA about protesting eligibility for Connect America Fund Phase II support should be denied, USTelecom said in comments posted to docket 10-90 Friday. ACA and NCTA had protested the Wireline Bureau’s decision to require that parties present evidence of current or former customers in a census block in order to challenge the determination that the block is unserved (http://bit.ly/WX2Dpu). “The reasonable evidentiary standard adopted by the Bureau will help ensure that residents of rural areas are not denied the opportunity to have broadband available to them based upon the type of thin assertions” made during the challenge process, USTelecom said.

Basing net neutrality rules on Communications Act Title II would mean small- and medium-sized ISPs would be “burdened with the costs required to retain lawyers” and “to administer the reporting and other rules that would no doubt go along with it,” 99 companies wrote Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker, hoping to push President Barack Obama’s administration to oppose treating the companies as common carriers. “We want to get the president’s ear,” said Alex Phillips, FCC committee chairman for the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association, of the letter to the cabinet-level agency from WISPA members.

Rural electric cooperatives excel at providing broadband access and need funding, Robert Hance, CEO of Midwest Energy Cooperative, testifying on behalf the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, told House lawmakers Tuesday. The FCC must be “inclusive” with its Connect America Fund money, Hance said during a House Agriculture Subcommittee on Livestock, Rural Development and Credit, telling Congress that rural electric cooperatives “need your support to compete for the billions of dollars available to provide broadband in high cost areas.” The FCC is still struggling when it comes to providing USF for rate-of-return companies, USTelecom Vice President-Policy David Cohen testified, praising the agency’s retreat from quantile regression analysis and urging “serious consideration” of the proposal put forth by the rural telecom industry. Rural Utilities Service (RUS) Administrator John Padalino touted the government’s efforts to finance rural telecom and the relevance of RUS in the 21st century. “While the focus of this hearing is on the deployment of broadband through Rural Utilit[ies] Service programs, these programs are not operated in a vacuum,” Subcommittee Chairman Rick Crawford, R-Ark., said in his opening statement. “It will be helpful to review those changes in the recent Farm Bill in light of the FCC’s changes to how rural telecommunication companies receive assistance. The efforts by the FCC to reform the USF have a direct impact on smaller rate-of-return carriers who both rely on USF support to provide service, and RUS loans to expand their coverage areas.” Officials representing CTIA and NTCA also testified (CD July 29 p12).

CTIA sees spectrum as its top priority, it plans to tell the House Tuesday: “Congress therefore must encourage the [FCC] to do everything necessary to ensure that these [spectrum] auctions are successful and on schedule,” Executive Vice President Chris Guttman-McCabe plans to say, according to his written testimony, at a House Agriculture Subcommittee on Livestock, Rural Development and Credit hearing on broadband investment. He will advocate for less regulation for the wireless industry and a “predictable, expedited process for seeking siting approvals,” as well as the removal of barriers to the deployment of fiber. The hearing will begin at 10 a.m. in 1300 Longworth. Rural Utilities Service Administrator John Padalino is also scheduled to testify, as is USTelecom Vice President-Policy David Cohen; Robert Hance, CEO of the Midwest Energy Cooperative on behalf of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association; and Lang Zimmerman, vice president of Yelcot Communications on behalf of NTCA. Zimmerman plans to focus on the funding that rural companies need. “Unfortunately, the success, momentum, and economic development achieved from the RUS’s telecommunication programs were put at risk as a result of the regulatory uncertainty arising out of USF reforms,” he will say, according to written testimony. “It will be all the more important to continue providing RUS with the resources it needs to lend to the rural telecom industry as demand for financing will inevitably increase when reforms are improved and small carriers are given certainty, hopefully through a program like the Connect America Fund that is designed to promote broadband investment.” He will also talk about the urgency with which rural companies require access to such funding, warning against the possible implementation delays that could come from any major tweaks in reauthorizing the farm bill. “Thankfully, it appears that the final Farm Bill left RUS with discretion in administering the program that grants sufficient leeway to make it function more smoothly than the initial Senate Farm Bill would've allowed,” Zimmerman will say. Congress should give “an express directive” to the FCC to broaden “the [USF] contribution base to include the information services that USF already supports,” he will say.

Glenn Reynolds joined the NTIA as chief of staff, from USTelecom where he was vice president-policy. Reynolds is also a veteran of BellSouth and the FCC, where he was deputy chief of the Common Carrier Bureau and chief of the FCC’s Enforcement Division. Reynolds replaces Tony Wilhelm, longtime chief of staff who left in May and is now vice president-external relations at Affiniti.

Neustar capped the contentious back and forth with Telcordia, its rival that seeks the Local Number Portability Administrator (LNPA) contract Neustar now has, saying in a filing posted Monday that the FCC cannot legally grant the contract to Telcordia. The agency needs to issue a rulemaking notice before acting, Neustar said in the filing submitted Friday, at the end of the comment period on the North American Numbering Council’s recommendation to give Telcordia the contract. Neustar questioned the request for proposal process as “procedurally flawed,” in docket 09-109 (http://bit.ly/1kjyDyu).