Subject: [NEXTEL-1] FCC begins inquiry into broadband deployment

From: Marcelrf <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 12 Mar 2004 14:08:27 -0500

FCC begins inquiry into broadband deployment
By Heather Forsgren Weaver
March 12 12:39:00, 2004

WASHINGTON—The Federal Communications Commission started the six-month
process of determining what constitutes broadband services, who has it
and if someone doesn’t have it, why.

It has been more than two years since the FCC last conducted a Section
706 inquiry—so named for its place in the Communications Act. Section
706 requires the commission to conduct regular reviews of advanced
services and determine whether they are being deployed in a reasonable
and timely fashion. In the past, the FCC pre-determined that high-speed
services transmit 200 kilobits in both directions, and when it found
that at least one person in a ZIP code had access to such a service, it
considered that ZIP code covered. This definition and determination has
consistently come under fire from those advocating additional resources
be spent to deploy broadband technology to under-served areas and
populations like the disabled community.
The FCC gathers data twice a year from telecommunications carriers that
have 250 or more high-speed service lines or wireless channels in
service in a state. While the commission publishes the results of this
data collection, it keeps company-specific information private.

The inquiry will also look at why the United States was recently ranked
11th by the International Telecommunications Union in broadband
deployment.

FCC Commissioner Michael Copps, who has often criticized the agency’s
data-collection activities, was apparently successful in getting
additional questions asked during this inquiry.

“I have had problems—methodological and otherwise—with the approach the
FCC took in the past with this inquiry. I thought our questions were not
sufficiently probing and our conclusions were not supported by the
facts,” said Copps.  “We need to dig deep, beyond cursory ZIP-code data
and outdated kilobit standards for advanced service. We have to figure
out who is being left behind and why and then articulate a plan to fill
in the deployment gaps we identify. This task is not small.”

http://rcrnews.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?newsId=17274

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