Wireless firms and historic preservation officials failed to reach a compromise by an FCC target date on outstanding issues connected to a tower siting pact, according to a filing Thurs. at the agency. The Commission planned to have the national program agreement (NPA) ready for its Feb. agenda meeting, but last month gave participants until Feb. 19 to work out issues in time for the March meeting. “It appears in some important ways ground has been lost since then,” said the filing by the wireless coalition.

The Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Office of Advocacy told the U.S. Appeals Court, D.C., it planned to weigh in on the side of rural telcos in pending local number portability (LNP) litigation. The National Telecom Co-op Assn. (NTCA) and OPASTCO asked the D.C. Circuit in Dec. to review parts of an FCC order on wireline-to-wireless LNP requirements that affect small, rural LECs. The groups argued the FCC didn’t comply with the Regulatory Flexibility Act and Administrative Procedure Act when it adopted an intermodal LNP order in Nov. Wireless LNP went into effect in the top 100 markets Nov. 24. SBA’s chief counsel for advocacy told the court Fri. he planned to file an amicus brief in the case on the side of NTCA and OPASTCO. The groups had argued to the court that in setting the Nov. 24 deadline for carriers to support wireline-to-wireless LNP in the top markets, the FCC didn’t take into account that some 2% carriers also were located in those markets. These are carriers that each serve less than 2% of phone consumers in the U.S. SBA’s plans to file a friend-of-the court brief follow a filing its Office of Advocacy made at the FCC last week, in which it agreed with concerns raised by small wireline carriers about a further notice on LNP. Some wireline companies urged the Commission in comments not to impose costly technical solutions to ease intermodal porting in cases in which there was a mismatch between the rate center associated with a wireless number and the one in which a wireline operator would serve the customer.

Cingular Wireless CEO Stan Sigman said Tues. he would make a regulatory pitch that a $41-billion takeover of AT&T Wireless could be approved without divestitures. But analysts predicted regulators may require shedding of assets in at least some markets for a deal that would create the largest U.S. carrier. Consumers Union promptly denounced the plan, saying it comes at a time when service quality is already a problem industrywide.

As state lawmakers get down to the serious business of their 2004 sessions, regulatory reform bills advanced in 6 states. They would alter PSC procedures and deregulate phone rates.

The FCC reportedly is close to voting down AT&T’s petition seeking exemption from access charges for calls transported on its IP backbone. Sources said FCC Comr. Adelstein had indicated he probably would join FCC Chmn. Powell and Comr. Abernathy in voting against the request. Adelstein reportedly had concerns about the petition’s legality. An option would have been to include the AT&T petition in the VoIP rulemaking that was initiated at the agenda meeting Thurs., but that didn’t happen, one source said. The problem is there’s “no good answer to the universal service concern” raised by AT&T’s petition, an FCC insider said. Meanwhile, a group of midsize telecom companies mostly serving rural areas urged the FCC to “act promptly” and deny an AT&T petition seeking exemption from paying access charges on phone-to-phone IP services. “This traffic is clearly telecommunications traffic subject to access charges under existing FCC precedent because there is no net protocol conversion between the originating and terminating points of the call,” the companies wrote last week in 2 identical letters to FCC Comrs. Martin and Abernathy. The letters were signed by CenturyTel, Commonwealth Telephone Enterprises, Consolidated Communications, CT Communications, D&E Communications, FairPoint, Iowa Telecom, SureWest, TDS Telecom, TXU Communications and Valor Telecom. The companies said how their networks originated and terminated calls for AT&T had “not changed, only the way AT&T transports a call over its own network [had] changed.” They warned the commissioners that “allowing AT&T to engage in self-help by withholding access payments” ran counter to FCC policies and the “certainty that [they] need to attract investment in their networks and promote universal service.” They said they were “concerned” the Commission’s failure to act quickly on the petition would pressure other carriers into “taking self-help measures similar to those taken by AT&T.” They also warned the FCC that “allowing this practice to continue [risked] undermining other regulatory policies such as E911 and CALEA” and had the “potential of interfering with the collection of monies for public policy funds, such as universal service.” The companies urged the FCC to reaffirm that the traffic described in the AT&T petition was subject to access charges and deny the petition.

The FCC Wireless Bureau asked for comment on a compromise plan by Maritel on the use of VHF maritime channels 87B and 88B for Automatic Identification Systems (AIS). Comments are due Feb. 27, replies March 5. NTIA had urged the FCC last month to reject Maritel’s request to be the sole frequency coordinator for 2 channels in the AIS. Responding to concerns of the U.S. Coast Guard and the St. Lawrence Seaway Development Corp., NTIA urged the FCC instead to allocate the maritime VHF channels 87B and 88B exclusively for AIS operations. The Bureau said Maritel and NTIA were offering conflicting proposals -- Maritel sought a declaratory ruling that AIS transmitters not operate on channels 87B and 88B while NTIA wanted those channels earmarked exclusively for AIS. Maritel submitted a new proposal last week that it said could serve as a compromise, backing NTIA’s request as long as it could share the channels. Channels 87B and 88B are allocated internationally for AIS, although countries can use other channels for that service if those 2 aren’t available. The FCC directed licensees of VHF public coast service areas 1-9 to negotiate with the Coast Guard on the designation of 2 narrowband channel pairs for domestic AIS operations. At the time, the FCC said it would revisit the issue and select the channels if the negotiations didn’t result in an agreement. Maritel reached an agreement with the Coast Guard in 2002 designating maritime VHF channels 87 A/B for AIS use but ended the pact the next year. The Coast Guard had raised concerns that Maritel’s earlier request for a declaratory ruling was designed to generate revenue to compensate it for what it believed was an unauthorized taking of its spectrum. The Bureau said Maritel’s compromise plan would support NTIA’s request that those channels be reallocated for exclusive AIS use as long as Maritel’s sharing plan were adopted. Maritel said it wouldn’t seek payment from either the Coast Guard or ship station licensees as a prerequisite to letting them use spectrum licensed to it for AIS. Under that scenario: (1) NTIA would authorize use of Channel 88B by only the Coast Guard, Maritel and ship stations for AIS. (2) The Coast Guard would use the 2 channels for shore station operations to support Vessel Traffic Systems and surveillance applications for homeland security that were in line with the Maritime Transportation Security Act of 2002. Its use of the channels would be confined to those purposes. (3) Maritel could use the 2 channels in all maritime areas for shore station operations to support non-Coast Guard AIS applications. Maritel said the proposed sharing could be done with channel loading and time slot allocation so Coast Guard and ship station use of the channels for safety and homeland security communications would have priority over other communications. Maritel also proposed that the FCC adopt rules precluding reception and use of AIS transmissions except by Maritel, the Coast Guard and ship stations.

To reform federal spectrum policy, govt. users called Thurs. for a national strategy to provide more certainty and for a better balancing of incumbent interests against new technologies. But at the start of a 2-day NTIA forum at the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), several govt. spectrum managers said efficiency was an end in itself.

Changes in indecency laws are in the works, as several proposals were floated for a bill that would increase FCC fines for indecent broadcast. Fresh from a marathon 7-hour hearing Wed. (CD Feb 12 p7), House Telecom Subcommittee members Thurs. unanimously approved the original version of HR-3717, by Subcommittee Chmn. Upton (R-Mich.) and ranking Democrat Markey (Mass.) At least 11 amendments were floated during the markup Thurs., as members questioned whether fines would be large enough, affiliates should be subject to fines for network broadcasts and the FCC should revamp its complaint process.

Taking its first step into the murky issue of how to treat IP services for regulatory purposes, the FCC ruled Thurs. that an IP-based service offered by Pulver.com was a generally unregulated information service subject to federal jurisdiction. FCC commissioners and staff said the Pulver decision was a start in providing regulatory clarity for IP- based services.

The FCC approved Intelsat’s acquisition of certain Loral assets in a decision announced Wed. Intelsat said in July it would pay $1.1 billion for Telstar satellites 4-8 and 13. The Commission said the transaction didn’t raise significant anticompetitive issues and was in the public interest. It did adopt conditions on foreign ownership and the ORBIT Act: (1) No single foreign individual or entity could acquire more than 25% direct equity or voting interest in Intelsat without prior approval. (2) Approval would be needed before the company accepted indirect equity or voting interests from any investors in non-WTO countries. (3) Intelsat could provide bare capacity to companies providing direct-to-home, DBS, Ka- band or V-band services only after it completed its IPO. The Commission rejected conditions proposed by Starband.