The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners has asked to join an appeals case arguing that rules on how telecom carriers use information about their customers be reinstated. The Federal Communications Commission last month asked for a review of an August decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit that threw out the rules because they violated the First Amendment.
NARUC, which recently concluded its annual convention in San Antonio, also passed five resolutions that impact that wireless industry. In addition to joining the CPNI lawsuit, NARUC will take all necessary action to ensure bill information is accurate, understandable and useful. NARUC will urge the FCC to require that notification for calling party pays calls include certain elements. NARUC will support the FCC merger review process before Congress. NARUC will urge the FCC to amend a proposal on long-distance access charges to clarify a number of questions.
The Federal Communications Commission should allow rural local exchange companies access to wireless broadband spectrum, such as local multipoint distribution service, said the National Telephone Cooperative Association last week. “By treating small incumbent local exchange carriers like the large telcos when this prohibition was imposed, the [FCC] prevented the companies most interested in serving remote areas with innovative new technologies from doing so,” said David Crothers, chairman of the NTCA government affairs committee.
As part of the federal budget passed by Congress earlier this month, the research and development-sometimes called the research and experimentation-tax credit was extended for five years. “A five-year extension will renew U.S. businesses’ confidence in the government’s support for U.S. R&D and will encourage American business to commit to more long-term U.S.-based R&D investments-greatly benefiting the U.S. economy and providing thousands of new jobs for U.S. workers,” said Bill Sample, chairman of the R&D Credit Coalition. The R&D tax credit was first adopted in 1981.
