The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit’s Jan. 14 decision largely rejecting the FCC’s net neutrality rules clarified that the FCC has broad authority over broadband, said Verizon Senior Vice President Craig Silliman Tuesday at the Free State Foundation telecom conference. Nonetheless, Verizon decided not to challenge some of the court’s conclusions because the carrier believes it’s time to move on to other issues, Silliman said. The FCC under Chairman Tom Wheeler also decided not to appeal the case (CD Feb 20 p1).

Two more states, Colorado and Kentucky, may ease carrier of last resort (COLR) obligations to provide landline services, as a wave of deregulation proposals continues flowing through the states. For AT&T, the passage of the Kentucky bill would put it on the verge of “running the table” on deregulating the shift to IP, said National Regulatory Research Institute Principal Sherry Lichtenberg.

Lobbying is intensifying on services rules for the AWS-3 auction, with many meetings in the works, eighth-floor FCC officials said. The FCC is scheduled to approve parts of the rules at its March 31 meeting, so industry lobbyists likely have only through Monday to ask for meetings with commissioners and staff.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler will recommend raising the USF contribution rate and sending more money to schools and libraries, if that’s necessary, he told a meeting of the Council of Chief State School Officers in Washington Monday. “I will recommend this to my colleagues if warranted,” Wheeler said, according to prepared remarks (http://fcc.us/1qMDLLo) for the event, which was not open to the public. “But my colleagues and I can’t just pour more money into the program as it presently stands,” he said. “The first step in expansion is introspection."

Analyst and investor worries that broadcaster growth will be crimped by a coming FCC order to make attributable joint sales agreements (JSAs) between separately owned TV stations led stocks to slump Monday, said Wall Street professionals in interviews. In what an industry executive called a rare move, one of the few analysts who the official said still cover all “pure-play” TV station stocks cut her rating on them that morning. A vote tentatively scheduled for the March 31 FCC member meeting (CD March 7 p7) -- on a draft to require JSAs be attributable to the brokering station when it cuts deals for more than 15 percent of ads -- was among the sources of broadcaster worry on Wall Street, said a longtime investor and analysts.

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler’s use of delegated authority reached a high point of sorts last week when AT&T’s buy of Leap Wireless was approved by the Wireless and International bureaus, rather than by commissioner vote (CD March 14 p5), officials said. Commission Democrats Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel complained internally that they would have preferred a commission vote on that deal, which gave one of the two biggest wireless carriers control of an important prepaid service player, FCC officials told us. Republicans Ajit Pai and Mike O'Rielly have complained about other items being approved on delegated authority, agency officials said.

HD Radio sales will hit about 7.5 million units this year, up from about 5.2 million in 2013, due largely to continued deployment in vehicles, said iBiquity Digital CEO Bob Struble in an interview. Many FM stations and a smaller number of AMs are using HD Radio from iBiquity, which licenses the digital-radio technology, and some FMs have boosted the power levels after the FCC allowed it (CD June 21 p8). Radio stations increasingly see HD Radio use in cars as a way to compete with so-called connected vehicle technology, executives have told us.

Recent developments indicate there’s some movement on legislation to improve the U.S. patent system and curb abusive patent litigation, though concerns about provisions in individual bills remain, said industry stakeholders in interviews. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., placed the Patent Transparency and Improvements Act (S-1720) on the docket for the committee’s March 27 executive business meeting, meaning the committee could mark up the bill as soon as April 3. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., introduced the Patent Fee Integrity Act Thursday night, earning support from stakeholders. That bill would establish a separate fund for Patent and Trademark Office user fees to allow PTO full access to that line of funding. Sens. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., and Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., were original co-sponsors of the bill (1.usa.gov/1fYavy4). The future for the Transparency in Assertion of Patents Act (S-2049) remains murky, with no firm date yet set for a rescheduled markup following two postponements, stakeholders said.

AT&T urged the FCC to provide more certainty for carriers engaged in spectrum transactions by refraining from ordering divestitures in markets where overall spectrum holdings don’t trip the commission’s screen. “To be sure, modest steps are still needed to update the screen and restore its validity,” said AT&T Vice President Joan Marsh in a blog post Friday. Marsh didn’t elaborate on any transactions where a carrier had to give up spectrum below the screen. But in an order released Thursday on AT&T’s buy of Leap (CD March 14 p5), the FCC said explicitly that just making sure a carrier is under the cap in a given market isn’t enough.

U.S. District Judge Denise Cote set the “headline rate” for Pandora’s license for American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) works for 2011-2015, in a Friday order, according to court records.