rural broadband – Page 3 – Steve Blum's Blog

CPUC fumbles bid to win billions of federal broadband dollars for California

2 October 2020 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, public policy, rdof, rural broadband

Fumble

Californian Internet service providers that try for broadband deployment subsidies in the Federal Communications Commission’s Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) reverse auction later this month might be able to sweeten their bids by as much as 10% or 20%. Or they might not.

Yesterday, the California Public Utilities Commission published what might be described as a discussion draft of possible rules for using money from the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) to backfill RDOF bids.… More

Frontier is the only wired broadband choice for 69,000 low income California households, if they can get it at all

1 October 2020 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, frontiercommunications, public policy, rural broadband

A “collection of facts” about Frontier Communications’ history as a broadband and telephone service provider in California will serve as a primer for members of the public that want to weigh in on the California Public Utilities Commission’s review of the company’s bankruptcy settlement.

The report analyses the thousands of complaints about Frontier’s service and billing practices over the years, and the service quality problems it continues to have. In some respects, Frontier is doing better – it’s on track to have fewer complaints this year than last – but it has continuing issues with service outages and repair times.… More

CPUC considers topping up broadband subsidy fund, but money will still fall short

22 September 2020 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, public policy, rdof, rural broadband

California’s primary broadband infrastructure subsidy fund will grow by about $70 million, if the California Public Utilities Commission approves a proposal to nearly double the tax that pays for it.

The California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) gets its money from a tax on phone calls made within California. That’s source of revenue is on the decline. The CPUC can collect up to $66 million a year for the fund (more, under certain circumstances), and sets the tax rate accordingly.… More

Broadband and other hot, unfinished business might send the California legislature into overtime. But don’t bet on it

10 September 2020 by Steve Blum
ab570, casf, public policy, rural broadband, sb1130

The California legislature might not be done with broadband for the year. Or with other major issues it failed to address as the regular session collapsed into inter-house and partisan acrimony last week. Governor Gavin Newson is being asked to call the legislature back into topic-focused special sessions and broadband is on the list, along with housing, policing and other disputes. It’s also possible that the legislature will come back on its own. They can do that for particular kinds of bills, mostly ones that need a two-thirds majority such as “urgency” legislature or tax measures.… More

Taco Bell cares more about disconnected Californians than California’s leaders do

4 September 2020 by Steve Blum
ab570, casf, public policy, rural broadband, sb1130

Kids sitting on curb in front of a fast food restaurant in order to get the broadband connection they need to go to schools that only operate online now is the best we can do now. The California legislature was diverted by pork barrel schemes from friends of AT&T, Comcast and other monopoly model incumbents, and finally bought into submission by the millions of dollars that those big telecoms companies pay them. Lawmakers took no action on bringing California’s broadband standard up to 21st century levels and did nothing to make it available to the millions of Californians who lack access to to it.… More

AT&T not on FCC’s list of potential RDOF bidders, but 505 others are

3 September 2020 by Steve Blum
ab82, casf, cpuc, rdof, rural broadband

AT&T is not on the list of 505 would-be rural broadband subsidy bidders released by the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday. It’s also not listed as a member of any of the 38 consortia – bidding groups – and none of the other 467 contenders are obviously AT&T subsidiaries. None of the FCC registration numbers directly held by AT&T match up to any of the listed bidders either.

It’s difficult to prove a negative, but so far it appears that absence of evidence is also evidence of absence.… More

Killing broadband upgrade bill is good business for California assembly leaders

2 September 2020 by Steve Blum
ab570, casf, public policy, rural broadband, sb1130

Money matters in Sacramento, and the more ambitious the politician, the more it matters. The two men primarily responsible for killing senate bill 1130, which would have raised California’s broadband speed standard – assemblymen Anthony Rendon (D – Los Angeles) and Ian Calderon (D – Los Angeles) – hold high office, assembly speaker and democratic floor leader respectively. It comes at a high price.

In his eight years in and running for the assembly, Rendon has been paid a total of $9 million by a wide range of special interests, according to the FollowTheMoney.org… More

AT&T, cable company money buys obedience from California assembly, and slow broadband for everyone else

1 September 2020 by Steve Blum
ab570, casf, public policy, rural broadband, sb1130

A last minute push to convince democratic leaders in the California assembly to allow a vote on raising the state’s minimum broadband speed standard failed last night in the final, chaotic hours of the regular 2020 legislative session. If you can get – well, are offered – broadband service at 6 Mbps download/1 Mbps upload speeds, you are still considered adequately served under California law. Which adequately serves the monopoly business model needs of AT&T, Comcast, Charter Communications and the other big, incumbent broadband providers who blocked the vote.… More

Kids don’t need fast broadband if they have fast food, California assembly says

31 August 2020 by Steve Blum
ab570, casf, public policy, rural broadband, sb1130

Gratitude to the Taco Bell workers in Salinas who cared, and props to Monterey County supervisor and former assemblyman Luis Alejo for the photo.

Democratic party leaders in the California assembly iced a bill yesterday that would have raised the state’s broadband standard to modern speed levels. Speaker Anthony Rendon (D – Los Angeles) bowed to pressure – and bags of cash – from AT&T, Comcast, Charter Communications and other monopoly model incumbents, and blocked senate bill 1130 from a floor vote in the California assembly.… More

“Virtual separation” of Frontier’s fiber systems could mean actual abandonment of rural Californians

26 August 2020 by Steve Blum
casf, cpuc, frontiercommunications, public policy, rural broadband

The gap between urban fiber haves and rural have nots could grow wider in California as a result of Frontier Communications’ bankruptcy settlement. Its reorganisation plan was filed with the California Public Utilities Commission yesterday, after receiving approval from the federal judge in New York overseeing the bankruptcy proceeding.

The plan turns ownership over to banks and financiers who hold billions of dollars of Frontier’s now worthless debt. A cryptic paragraph buried deep in the plan calls for Frontier to develop a “detailed” proposal for a “virtual separation” of “select state operations” where the new owners “will conduct fiber deployments” from other operations in those states which will be blessed with vague “broadband upgrades and operational improvements”.… More