WASHINGTON, July 19, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- The Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) must, under federal statutes,
submit for peer review a revised assessment of competition in the
business data services (BDS) marketplace, according to six U.S.
telecom carriers who last month filed a Motion to Strike an earlier
version of the same report.
The revised report "raises significant new concerns," the
carriers say in a new filing with the FCC. The agency's actions
"reflect a desire to find shortcuts toward a pre-determined outcome
rather than a neutral commitment to evaluate" competition in the
BDS market, the filing says.
In June, AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T), CenturyLink,
Inc. (NYSE: CTL), Cincinnati Bell, Inc. (NYSE: CBB),
Consolidated Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ: CNSL), FairPoint
Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ: FRP) and Frontier Communications
(NASDAQ: FTR) filed a Motion to Strike the earlier report from
the FCC's hired economist. That motion was in response to
acknowledgements by four of the largest cable providers that
they had significantly undercounted the number of locations that
are capable of providing business data services. The FCC based
its May 2 further notice of proposed rulemaking (FNPRM)
on the report, which the carriers described as "irretrievably
flawed" in their motion.
According to the carriers, the revised report from the FCC's
hired economist states the agency's analysis of competition in the
BDS marketplace is "essentially unaffected by [cable providers']
updated submissions." This conclusion comes despite the
Commission's longtime position that the installation of Metro
Ethernet does in fact constitute cable providers as relevant BDS
competition, according to the filing.
"Instead of conducting a thorough review to include an
accounting of the cable industry's participation in the business
data services market," said John
Jones, CenturyLink Senior Vice President, Public Policy and
Government Relations, "the FCC apparently is doubling down on their
original flawed report."
Jones said the FCC's reliance on a non-peer reviewed revised
report would violate the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and
"exacerbate the Commission's violation of the Data Quality Act
(DQA)."
"Not only is this revised report inconsistent with proper
rule-making procedures," Jones said, "but by violating both APA and
DQA, it would preclude reliance on either the original report or
the revised analysis in any final order.
"The FCC should be commended for much of what they got right in
the FNPRM," he continued. "But they shouldn't allow a rush to
regulate prevent them from getting this critical data on
competition right."
The "Invest in Broadband for America" coalition
(investinbroadband.org) is made up of CenturyLink, Inc., Cincinnati
Bell, Inc., Consolidated Communications, Inc., FairPoint
Communications, Inc. and Frontier Communications.
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SOURCE Invest in Broadband for America