Delivered-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Date: Tue, 02 Mar 2004 21:24:21 -0500 From: "Peter D. Junger" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Court overrules FCC on phone competition To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] X-Spam-Status: No, hits=3.4 required=7.5 tests=NO_MX_FOR_FROM,MSG_ID_ADDED_BY_MTA_2 version=2.31 X-Spam-Level: *** X-Spam-Filtered-At: eList eXpress <http://www.elistx.com/>
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<http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-FCC-Phone-Competition.html?hp>
Court Tosses Rules for Phone Competition (p1 of 3)
WASHINGTON (AP) -- An appeals court on Tuesday rejected federal rules giving states more authority to determine which companies may offer local phone service within their borders.
The three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously sided with former Bell companies Verizon, BellSouth, SBC and Qwest. They claimed the rules adopted by the Federal Communications Commission forced them to give competitors access to their networks at artificially low prices.
It's the third time the commission's attempts to write rules for local telephone service competition have been rejected by the courts. The latest ruling decried the FCC's ``apparent unwillingness to adhere to prior judicial rulings.''
At issue is how to spur competition for local telephone service, which Congress mandated in 1996.
[snip]
The rules were the result of a contentious 3-2 FCC vote in February 2003. Chairman Michael Powell was on the losing end of the vote, the first time he had been on the losing side since taking over the five-member panel in 2001.
Powell applauded the court decision and said he already has ordered the FCC staff to begin work on new rules.
The court did uphold other rules requiring the former Bell companies to allow providers of high-speed DSL Internet service to use their copper wires, but not upgraded fiber optic or fiber-copper lines. The FCC said requiring the companies to provide access to the upgraded lines would act as a disincentive for the former Bells to develop better systems.
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Peter D. Junger--Case Western Reserve University Law School--Cleveland, OH
EMAIL: [EMAIL PROTECTED] URL: http://samsara.law.cwru.edu
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