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Governor Brown signs California net neutrality law

30 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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Network neutrality is now the law of the land in California. Governor Jerry Brown signed senate bill 822 today. That’s according to a tweet by the bill’s author, senator Scott Wiener, (D – San Francisco).

It reinstates network neutrality rules that were scrapped last year by the Federal Commission. The three bright line rules established by the FCC in 2015 – no blocking, throttling or paid prioritisation of Internet traffic – are back on the books.… More

California net neutrality bill faces midnight deadline

30 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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UPDATE 2:the Trump administration’s political hacks in the justice department were on alert – they challenged SB 822 in federal court. Quickly. Click here for more.

UPDATE: Brown approved SB 822. Click here for more.

Today is decision day for network neutrality in California. Governor Jerry Brown must either sign senate bill 822 into law, or veto it, or simply ignore it and let it become law automatically tonight, when the midnight deadline for acting passes.… More

FCC backs off on timing, but not substance of municipal wireless property preemption

28 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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The final version of the Federal Communications Commission’s ruling preempting local ownership of street lights, traffic signals and other publicly owned property in the public right of way has been posted. It gives cities and counties more time to comply with its diktats – that’s the major change I spotted last night as I was reading through it.

Originally, the ruling was set to take effect 30 days after it’s published in the Federal Register.… More

FCC preempts local property rights, gives street light poles to wireless companies

27 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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Cities and counties shouldn’t take more than 60 days to process a permit to allow a wireless company to attach equipment to an existing structure, or more than 90 days if building a “small wireless facility” requires installation of a new pole or tower. That was the unanimous vote of the Federal Communications Commission yesterday. Democrat Jessica Rosenworcel joined her three republican colleagues and endorsed that particular section of an FCC ruling that also preempts local ownership of property that wireless companies might covet.… More

FCC says wireless companies matter, local governments don’t

26 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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State and local governments have to give mobile carriers unlimited access to publicly owned property along roads and waterways, according to an FCC ruling approved this morning by the Federal Communications Commission. All three republicans on the commission voted aye; the lone democrat endorsed shorter shot clocks for permit processing, but otherwise voted no.

Cities, counties tell FCC that local property rights are beyond its authority

25 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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With the Federal Communications Commission set to vote tomorrow on new rules it wants local governments to follow when issuing permits for “small wireless facilities”, support and opposition is flooding in from the usual directions. CTIA, the primary lobbying front for mobile carriers in Washington, D.C., met behind closed doors with all four commissioners last week (the fifth seat, formerly occupied by Mignon Clyburn, is vacant, awaiting confirmation of a democratic nominee, Geoffrey Starks).

In its legally required disclosure statement, CTIA “applauded the commission” for giving industry lobbyists pretty much everything they could possibly ask for.… More

Prediction: Brown will sign California net neutrality bill into law

22 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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With a week left to go before a decision is due, California governor Jerry Brown hasn’t said which side he’s going to land on in the network neutrality debate. Senate bill 822, which would restore net neutrality rules in California, is still sitting on his desk.

Brown does not give away much, if anything, when he’s considering bills. He gives bills serious thought. Some more than others, but he makes his own decisions. He’s good at balancing political, fiscal, operational and philosophical considerations.… More

AT&T, Comcast, Charter paying big bucks to California’s anti-net neutrality legislators

19 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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California’s biggest telecoms companies – AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, Charter Communications and their lobbying fronts – are being very generous to the members of the assembly’s communications and conveyances committee who ripped the guts out of senate bill 822 back in June. That’s the bill, authored by senator Scott Wiener (D – San Francisco) that would restore network neutrality rules in California. If governor Jerry Brown signs it.

The damage done was reversed, after netizens went feral on the committee’s chair, assemblyman Miguel Santiago (D – Los Angeles) and democratic party leaders leaned on him.… More

“Crony” capitalist FCC chair rips California’s “nanny state legislators”

18 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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Ajit Pai verbally grasped at straws to slam a California bill that would reinstate network neutrality rules. In a speech in Maine, the chair of the Federal Communications Commission snarked “I can understand how they succumbed to the temptation to regulate. After all, I suppose a broadband pipe might look to some like a plastic straw”. He was referring to Californian attempts to send plastic straws the way of the disposable bag.

Pai repeated a common argument used by industry lobbyists – that senate bill 822 would end popular free data plans – and called it “a radical, anti-consumer Internet regulation bill”.… More

FCC commissioner frames preemption of local streetlight ownership as digital divide issue

14 September 2018 by Steve Blum
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Big cities are blocking 5G deployments in rural communities with high permit fees and expensive aesthetic requirements for new wireless facilities. That’s the argument FCC commissioner Brendan Carr made at the Mobile World Congress Americas show in Los Angeles yesterday. He’s the principal author of new, draft rules that would set federal benchmarks that, he hopes, cities and counties will follow when processing permit applications.

If mobile carriers have to spend more money than they want to when they build out 5G networks in high value, high priority cities, then there won’t be anything left over for rural areas, his reasoning goes…

Despite all of that progress, there still are many communities, especially in rural America, that feel that they may be left behind.

… More