casf – Page 28 – Steve Blum's Blog

California's broadband tax on phone service poses hard choice

2 March 2016 by Steve Blum
broadband, casf, public policy

Half Dome in Yosemite National part taken August 2005 by uploader (Mike Murphy) from Glacier Point. {{GFDL}}{{cc-by-sa-2.0}}

Is it a rock or a hard place?

The ban on state or local Internet access taxes creates a dilemma for policy makers in California. Right now, some broadband infrastructure construction is subsidised by the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF), which gets its money from a relatively small tax on telephone bills.

In other words, telephone customers are paying to improve service and, presumably, reduce costs for broadband subscribers. Nearly all people who buy broadband service are also telephone customers – the CASF tax is applied to mobile and VoIP service too – but the reverse isn’t true.… More

California broadband consortia try for second round of grants

23 February 2016 by Steve Blum
broadband, casf, regional consortia

Click for the big picture.

Funding for the regional broadband consortia that the California Public Utilities Commission approved four years ago has either expired or soon will. For most, that’ll mean a gap in funding while proposals for new consortia grants are processed. A total of fifteen applications were filed by last month’s deadline.

The San Diego consortium did not reapply, but it’s been inactive for some time. The One Million New Internet Users consortium in Los Angeles County didn’t come back either, which is no surprise given the way it was ripped by a state audit.… More

Californian WISPs argue for exclusive right to offer poor service at a high price

12 February 2016 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, public policy, wireless broadband

True. Someone needs to think smarter.

A couple of fixed wireless operators are fighting a rear guard action against a fiber to the home project in Nevada City. Approved for a $16 million California Advanced Services Fund subsidy by the California Public Utilities Commission in December, the Bright Fiber project would bring FTTH service to about 2,000 homes in the Nevada City area. Smarter Broadband and ColfaxNet don’t like that: they’ve gotten used to selling slow and expensive service to people that don’t have a choice.… More

Cable lobby keeps shovelling false figures at California broadband policymakers

9 February 2016 by Steve Blum
broadband, casf, public policy

I participated on a broadband funding panel, organised by the California Broadband Council at its meeting last week. Other panelists included telephone and cable industry representatives and a wireless Internet service provider. Much of the discussion was about the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) – the state’s primary broadband infrastructure subsidy program – and how it interacts with other sources of funding, public and private.

The cable industry’s principal lobbyist in Sacramento, Carolyn McIntyre, tried to paint a false picture of how CASF has impacted broadband service and usage in California, claiming that only 4,000 new customers have signed up for service as a result of subsidised projects.… More

Big buck proposal for California broadband aims for wide appeal

4 February 2016 by Steve Blum
ab1758, broadband, casf, cpuc, public policy

More money to build broadband infrastructure in California is back on the table, along with even more money for other broadband-related initiatives. Assembly bill 1758 was introduced at the state capitol by assemblyman Mark Stone (D – Santa Cruz) this week. It’s a new and improved and greatly enlarged version of last year’s effort to put more money in the California Advanced Services Fund, and raise the minimum broadband standards it supports.

AB 1758 would more than double the size of the fund, raising it from its current maximum of $315 million to an eventual $665 million.… More

Technology neutral does not mean price and service oblivious

3 February 2016 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, fcc, mobile broadband, public policy

By JohnHStover (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

It was either pay the rent or the Verizon bill, but at least I’m getting good reception.

The Federal Communications Commission got it right last week, and the California Public Utilities Commission got it wrong. On the one hand, the FCC formally decided that “fixed and mobile broadband services are not functional substitutes for one another“, and reaffirmed that the minimum acceptable speed for wireline service is 25 Mbps down/3 Mbps up.… More

Sorry Lee Vining, mobile is good enough for you

1 February 2016 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, ftth, public policy, race telecommunications

Daniel Mayer [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0) or GFDL (https://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html)], via Wikimedia Commons

No future here.

Fiber to the home service is coming to a string of small Mono County communities generally along U.S. highway 395 (and along the Digital 395 fiber backbone), but one – Lee Vining – will be left out.

The California Public Utilities Commission approved a $6.6 million grant to Race Telecommunications from the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) to build out FTTH systems in South Chalfant, Benton, Benton Hot Springs, Swall Meadows and Mono City.… More

Two small – for now – broadband bills advance in Sacramento

30 January 2016 by Steve Blum
ab1549, broadband, casf, public policy, sb745

One side makes you bigger, one side makes you small…

A move to force Caltrans to play nice with broadband companies – at least, a little nice in little while – and some minor tinkering with the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) infrastructure subsidy program are moving forward in Sacramento.

The state assembly unanimously passed AB 1549, authored by Healdsburg assemblyman Jim Wood. As currently written, it would require Caltrans to make information available about conduit it installs in its own projects.… More

Competition heats up for broadband subsidies in the Californian desert

22 January 2016 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, public policy, race telecommunications, uia

There’s a second bid for grant money to build a fiber to the home system in the San Bernardino County desert communities of Phelan, Piñon Hills, Oak Hills and West Cajon Valley, plus parts of Victorville and Hesperia. Yesterday, Ultimate Internet Access, Inc. (UIA) asked for a $21 million infrastructure subsidy from the California Advanced Services Fund CASF) for the project. It’s now competing directly with Race Telecommunications for the cash.

Last August, Race submitted a $48 million grant proposal, also for an FTTH build in that area.… More

CPUC approves first subsidy for Internet via TV white space

19 January 2016 by Steve Blum
broadband, calnet, casf, cpuc, public policy

White space below the tree line.

Besides allowing a wireless claim jumper to ace two towns out of fiber to the home service last Thursday, the California Public Utilities Commission approved a $1.1 million grant from the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) for wireless Internet service in northern Eldorado County. Cal.net’s deployment is the first CASF project to lean heavily on newly available television white space spectrum.

The plan is to use a combination of three bands: unlicensed 5 GHz, LTE in semi-licensed 3.65 GHz spectrum and coordinated TV white space, with three usage cases, i.e.… More