WASHINGTON-States shouldn’t raid funds collected from wireless subscribers for enhanced 911services, and carriers shouldn’t collect additional money to use to deploy E911 service if the state has a cost-recovery mechanism in place.
This was the single message of two separate actions last week.
At a House telecommunications subcommittee hearing, states were again implored to not raid E911 funds to balance state budgets. Panel members rejected calls to take away the carrot-and-stick approach, where states get grants only if they do not raid subscriber E911 funds.
“If any of my state legislators were to support raiding those trust funds and diverting those dollars for something else, I think there would be hell to pay,” said Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.). “We are looking at a new program to help save the local folks. I guess it is very much along the lines of the highway bill when we fund bridges and roads. The states have to make a commitment too if they are going to benefit from the federal dollars that are going to be added. If we are going to embark on that program, the states have to make it a priority, too. If they divert those funds for something else, then they must have decided that maybe it is not the priority that other states have, and that’s the reason that if they divert it, we have other areas that can benefit.”
Upton was energized about moving the bill before this session of Congress adjourns, which could be in early October.
The argument to let the public safety answering points get grants even if their states raid the 911 funds was raised by Indiana State Treasurer Tim Berry, but likely fell on deaf ears. Berry was joined in calling for the PSAP grants by Anthony Haynes, executive director of the Tennessee Emergency Communications Board
Upton was not swayed. “I have to say for at least my point, I will work very hard to stop efforts to take that section out because we want to keep their feet to the fire,” he said.
The Nebraska Public Service Commission has begun examining whether wireless carriers in that state can charge for E911 deployment when they may be eligible for cost recovery.
Nebraska PUC Commissioner Anne Boyle, a persistent critic of the wireless industry, said the fees some carriers are charging for E911 deployment are “tantamount to double dipping.”
In Nebraska, the PUC sets the 911 tax, collects it and distributes it.
Berry also told the subcommittee that although rural wireless carriers may have special needs when deploying E911, rural PSAPs may need a higher percentage of the grants in proposed legislation. Rural PSAPs have special challenges, and maybe a higher percentage of the grant money proposed in the House bill-$100 million-should be allocated for rural PSAPs, said Berry.
The E911 bill, sponsored by Reps. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) and Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), gives the FCC six months to review the accuracy standards for rural carriers.
Rural carriers-most of which chose TDMA technology for their digital networks-cannot meet the compliance requirements using their network-based solutions because they do not have an urban core to average non-compliance with compliance. Nationwide carriers take advantage of the averaging component of the law to counteract where their networks are not as built out. For rural carriers, this is more complicated because towers have been built along roads in a “string of pearls” fashion, making triangulation difficult. Handset manufacturers backed away from an E911 solution for TDMA when the nationwide carriers began migrating off that air interface.
A Senate bill sponsored by Sens. Conrad Burns (R-Mont.) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) does not contain the rural provisions.
Shimkus, Eshoo, Burns and Clinton co-chair the Congressional E911 Caucus.
