Beware of legislation promising “competition.” A bill passed by the General Assembly last year that was intended to jump-start competition in the cable TV industry has had the unforeseen consequence of costing the state and local governments across North Carolina millions of dollars in lost revenue. And six months after the law went into effect, that promised competition is nowhere in sight.
Category: Community Broadband
State Developments 2005-06
Battles Over State Barriers Proposed in 2005 and 2006
Federal Developments 2005-2006
- Rep. Pete Sessions’ Proposed Federal Barrier (H.R.2726)
- Lautenberg-McCain “Community Broadband Act of 2005” (S.1294)
- Lautenberg-McCain Bill Status
- Senator Lautenberg floor statement
- Senator McCain floor statement
- Senators Lautenberg and McCain reiterate support for community broadband
in accepting FirstMile.US award - Response to USTA: Lautenberg-McCain is Constitutional
- Senator Ensign’s Bill: “The Broadband Investment and Consumer Choice Act” (S.1504)
- Senator Ensign’s 3-page summary
- Senator Ensign’s floor statement
- Jim Baller’s response to Senator Ensign’s municipal networks provision
- Lautenberg-McCain “Dear Colleague” letter (February 13, 2006)
- Senator DeMint’s Bill: “The Digital Age Communications Act of 2005” (S.2113)
- First Community Broadband Coalition Letter to 100 Senators, supporting Lautenberg-McCain
- Second Community Broadband Coalition letter to Senate Commerce Committee
supporting the Lautenberg-McCain bill (February 13, 2006) - FTTH Council statement to Senate Commerce Committee supporting
the Lautenberg-McCain bill (February 14, 2006) - Consumers Union/Consumers Federation of America letter to Senate Commerce
Committee supporting the Lautenberg-McCain bill (February 2006) - Texas communities letter to Senate Commerce Committee supporting the
Lautenberg-McCain bill (February 13, 2006) - Barton-Rush-Upton-Pickering bill, “The Communications Opportunity, Promotion,
and Enhancement Act of 2006,” HR.5252 - Status of Barton-Rush-Upton-Pickering bill (HR.5252)
- Stevens Bill: “The Advanced Telecommunications and Opportunites Reform Act”
or “The Communications Act of 2006” (8-4-06) (HR.5252RS) (Municipal Broadband begins at 184) - Senate Commerce Committee Report on HR 5252 (Municipal Broadband at 32-33)
Bristol Virginia Utilities fiber network is revitalizing SW Virginia
There was a time when Bristol, Va., and other mountain communities yearned for better roads — ribbons of asphalt that would link them with the world beyond. Today, an impressive network of highways crisscrosses this region in Southwest Virginia.
Now leaders of this city of 18,000 at the Tennessee state line have turned their attention to building a different kind of highway over which voice, data and video can travel at lightning speeds.They’re laying cables of hair-thin glass fibers — fiber optics. Their goal remains unchanged: to link with the outside world so that the region can stay in the game when it comes to economic development. Build it and they will come.
America Needs a Fiber-Based National Broadband Policy Now
By Jim Baller and Casey Lide, the Baller Herbst Law Group
In his latest album, Modern Times, Bob Dylan paints a troubling picture of what may lie ahead for the United States. In a track called “Workingman’s Blues #2,” Dylan sings of the diminishing buying power of American workers; of low wages becoming a reality in the face of brutal competition from abroad; of our inability to give away, let alone to sell, what we have to offer; of hunger creeping into our bellies; and of our fear of sinking into lives of continual crime.
“The place I love best is a sweet memory,” Dylan laments, “It’s a nude path, that we trod.” Dylan urges each of us to choose: “You can hang back or fight your best on the front lines, singin’ a little bit of these workingman blues.”
Are Dylan’s concerns overstated? Are they premature? We think not. Whether one agrees or disagrees with the details of President Bush’s broadband policies, most of us would surely agree with his observation in his most recent State of the Union address that America’s ability to remain competitive in the “dynamic world economy” is at risk. Noting the rapid emergence of competition from India, China, and other countries, he challenged America to take the dramatic steps necessary to ensure that we will continue to occupy the position of global leadership to which we have become accustomed.
In this paper, we discuss the critical importance of an aggressive national broadband policy that emphasizes the development of high-bandwidth communications systems, particularly FTTH systems. The stakes for America are huge. It is a fight from which we cannot hang back but must give our best on the front lines.
Verizon admits Penn. barrier to municipal entry was a “debacle”
After years of fighting to protect the rights of municipalities to provide broadband and other telecom services, Jim Baller, an attorney with the Baller-Herbst Law Group, has to admit he’s breathing a lot easier these days.
APPA report on battles over state barriers (2006)
Communities across the United States are working to bring broadband to their residents. Often, they are working with the private sector to provide services. But where private companies are unwilling or unable to meet local needs as fast as the community demands, some municipal governments are considering providing advanced communications networks and services themselves. Incumbent telecommunications companies and cable operators have often responded with fierce opposition and launch efforts to obtain state laws obstructing municipal broadband initiatives. Municipalities in Indiana faced such a fight this year — and secured a victory.
Freedom For Our Future responds to alleged municipal failures
The opposition has cited cities (out of over 620) where they say a municipal broadband utility has failed… They ALSO SAY that there aren’t any other communities out there who are providing Fiber To The Home (FTTH). That’s news to the 217 communities who belong to the FTTH Council.
Baller Herbst white paper on municipal fiber systems
The Tennessee Broadband Coalition has asked the Baller Herbst Law Group to respond to the main criticisms that opponents of public Fiber-to-the-User (FTTU) initiatives have raised in Tennessee and elsewhere. The Coalition would like to know whether any of these criticisms is valid, and, if so, what lessons the Coalition can learn from them to avoid or mitigate similar problems in Tennessee.
Financing Community Broadband
By Cathy Swirlbul
Municipal utilities are expanding into offering broadband service for a variety of reasons. Some communities have a history of providing utility services through public ownership. Other areas pursue community broadband when the incumbent cable and telecommunications companies fail to provide the service. What these projects have in common is the need for financing. The reality of financing in today’s market, though, may be different from commonly held perceptions.
The Case for Municipal Broadband in Florida
By Florida Municipal Electric Association
Why barriers to entry stifle economic development, disadvantage school children, and worsen health care.
Important study of FTTH usage patterns in Japan
As peer-to-peer applications become popular, an unprecedented increase in user-to-user traffic has been observed worldwide, particularly in Japan due to its high penetration rate of broadband access.
USA Today again supports Lafayette fiber project
Lafayette, La., is on the leading edge of the broadband revolution. Or at least it could be if BellSouth would just step out of the way, says Joey Durel, president of the city-parish.
Carol Wilson: “Munis Hit Back at Heartland”
A Heartland Institute study challenging the financial viability of municipal broadband networks is rife with “mistakes, misinterpretations, unsupported and insupportable claims, irrelevancies, innuendos, key omissions and obvious untruths,” according to Jim Baller of The Baller Herbst Law Group, the attorney for both of the municipal networks profiled in the study.
Lafayette responds to second Heartland Institute paper
In its latest “study” entitled Municipal Broadband: Optimistic Plan, Disappointing Reality (June 20, 2005), the Heartland Institute attempts to achieve two purposes simultaneously: (1) attack the municipal fiber project in Bristol, Virginia, and (2) use its criticism of the Bristol system to undermine the Lafayette fiber project. Heartland’s paper contains so many mistakes, misinterpretations, unsupported and insupportable claims, irrelevancies, innuendos, key omissions, and obvious untruths in Heartland’s latest harangue against municipal broadband that it would take a paper many times the length of this one to respond to them all.