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New Jersey Gets New Broadband Law
by Michael Martinez
New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine this week signed into law a measure to let communities develop their own high-speed Internet infrastructures.
The statute clears the way for municipal and county governments to partner with private companies and build wireless broadband networks. Under the law, counties, municipalities and joint authorities can own and operate the infrastructure for broadband community services.
According to the site MuniWireless.com, several municipal wireless projects already are under way in New Jersey. Camden and Gloucester counties also are working on a joint initiative with a private partner to provide a public broadband network.
State Sen. Shirley Turner, one of the bill's chief sponsors, said in a release that communities need the right to pursue their own affordable broadband initiatives. She said access already is too expensive in some parts of the state.
"Studies have shown that service costs of government-maintained, wireless broadband networks are often half of what is paid for private Internet access," she said. "Because they are able to take advantage of economics of scale, local municipalities are able to negotiate better prices for Internet service than individual consumers, which helps keep the prices low for residents."
Sen. Steve Sweeney, who also sponsored the measure, said New Jersey communities will suffer if they lack the ability to offer affordable broadband access. "Internet services and home computing are rapidly becoming necessities, not luxuries, especially if we want our students to be able to compete for educational opportunities," he said.
A few high-profile broadband projects in large cities sputtered earlier this year. Initiatives in Chicago and San Francisco were shelved over cost concerns. A project in Houston has been delayed. All of those initiatives involved EarthLink, which said in August that it would not consider any more citywide broadband projects until it moves to a more solid business model.
Officials in Provo, Utah, are wrangling over whether an aggressive fiber-optic network project there is broken beyond repair. The iProvo network reached 10,000 subscribers this past September, roughly a year behind schedule. A report submitted to the Provo City Council this year found that the network is still hundreds of thousands of dollars in the red.
But city and state lawmakers across the country have been fighting this year for the rights of localities to pursue similar measures. In North Carolina, a coalition of consumer advocates and local groups successfully derailed legislation that would have severely limited the ability of municipalities to build and operate their own broadband networks.
AT&T, Connecticut Continue Telecom Fight
Connecticut regulators and AT&T continued their legal fight this week over the company's bid for a license to operate its Internet-based television service in the Nutmeg State.
AT&T was denied a license for its so-called U-verse service by the state's Department of Public Utility Control earlier this month. The company immediately sought emergency declaratory relief in state court to reverse the board's decision and declare it unlawful.
The fight over the service dates back to last year, when the department ruled that U-verse is a data service and should not be subjected to the same regulations as similar cable offerings. That decision was successfully challenged in federal court by the state's Office of Consumer Counsel.
AT&T has argued that a new state telecommunications law rendered moot the court's decision. But the department this month rejected the company's application for a license and instructed it to apply for a cable franchise by the end of the year.
On Thursday, the Office of Consumer Counsel planned to submit in state superior court a brief claiming that AT&T illogically interpreted the new law and that the court would defeat the public policy goals of the statute if it were to grant the company the relief it is seeking.
"The OCC is in no way trying to stop AT&T from providing cable service to existing customers or to add new customers," the brief states. "AT&T need only obtain a franchise under existing law ... to fully qualify under state and federal laws to provide cable services throughout Connecticut as a cable operator."
In other telecom-related news this week, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced that Verizon Wireless has agreed to reimburse $1 million customers to settle a probe over its account termination policies for wireless Internet service.
Investigators from Cuomo's office determined that Verizon misleadingly advertised plans that allow wireless Internet access for laptop computer users. Cuomo claimed that the company falsely advertised the services as "unlimited plans" when they only permitted limited activities, such as Web browsing and e-mail access.
Prosecutors alleged that Verizon terminated customers with high levels of usage who may have tried to access streaming video or other applications prohibited by the terms of service. The company has agreed to pay New York $150,000 in penalties and revise its marketing plans.
"This settlement sends a message to companies large and small answering the growing consumer demand for wireless services," he said in a statement. "When consumers are promised an 'unlimited' service, they do not expect the promise to be broken by hidden limitations."
W.Va. Insurance Agency Reports Data Breach
The West Virginia Public Employees Insurance Agency this week reported the loss of a computer tape that contained personal information on about 200,000 participants of a state insurance program.
The agency announced in a release that the tape was lost by a third-party carrier used to transport the data to an analyst in Pennsylvania. It has sent letters to the hundreds of thousands of past and current participants of the Children's Health Insurance Program and AccessWV initiative to notify them that their personal data may have been compromised.
According to the agency, the tape did not contain any medical or prescription data. The notification letters remind those affected by the loss of the tape that they are eligible to place security freezes on their credit files under a new state law.
A spokeswoman told The Charleston Gazette that officials suspect the tape is somewhere in a Kentucky distribution center. The mail carrier, United Parcel Service, is performing an exhaustive search for the tape, the agency said.
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