The Regulatory Mix, TMI’s daily blog of telecom related regulatory activities, is a snapshot of PUC, FCC, legislative, and occasionally court issues that our regulatory monitoring team uncovers each day. Depending on their significance, some items may be the subject of a TMI Briefing.

California Speech Technology Program

The PUC has launched an 18-month pilot speech technology program called Voice Options, which will offer iPads with speech applications to people with speech disabilities for short- and long-term loan through 10 demonstration centers throughout the state.  The pilot program will be administered by the California Foundation for Independent Living Centers and funded through the PUC’s Deaf and Disabled Telecommunications Program.

 Missouri Relay Fund 

The PSC has reduced the Relay Missouri Fund surcharge.  The surcharge must appear on the monthly telephone bills of Missouri consumers.   The Relay Missouri fund is used to fund Relay Missouri and CapTel services and to fund an equipment distribution program for qualifying individuals who are unable to use traditional telecommunications equipment due to disability.  TMI Briefing Service subscribers see Briefing dated 1/10/17.

FCC Digital Inclusion Plan

The FCC’s Consumer and Government Affairs Bureau released a plan designed to allow the FCC to better understand the barriers to digital inclusion and to examine how the FCC can facilitate ongoing efforts to address them.  The Plan includes recommendations for ways in which the FCC and others can address affordability, access, and adoption issues.  The recommendations address how to enhance education and outreach around broadband issues, what effective partnerships may look like, and what policy innovations may make a difference in promoting and furthering digital inclusion.  Specific suggestions include creation of an online hub that catalogues digital inclusion resources by state; convening a series of in-person and online National Digital Inclusion Summits across the country to bring together federal stakeholders with digital inclusion organizations, state business and community leaders, and anchor institutions; increasing outreach to people with disabilities and their representatives to stress the importance of digital inclusion programs that are accessible to people with disabilities; supporting Lifeline aggregation projects; and make purchasing ISP services simpler and more transparent by adopting a “No Surprises” billing recommendation to make shopping for broadband easier for consumers.

FCC LNP Transition Outreach And Education Event

The FCC announced that the 12th LNPA Transition Outreach and Education Plan (TOEP) webcast will be held on January 18, 2017.  The webcast will be hosted by Price Waterhouse Coopers, LLP, the Transition Oversight Manager (TOM).  Interested parties may register for the webcast here.  The objectives for the webcasts are: to provide transparent communications regarding the LNPA Transition; to serve as an open forum to gather and understand needs and concerns; and to incorporate feedback to improve future communications. 

FCC Chairman’s Last Address

In what are assumed to be his last Remarks as Chairman, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler spoke before the Aspen Institute and summarized the FCC’s accomplishments under his watch and warned of the danger if some of these decisions were reversed.  Noting that we have now “moved through a key stage of the IP revolution,” Wheeler listed his FCC’s accomplishments, including a new Connect America Fund, a revitalized E-rate program and a revamped Lifeline program; a series of actions repurposing spectrum for broadband and opening up new spectrum for 5G networks; adopting new privacy protections for ISPs, and net neutrality rules.  Concerning calls to roll back all or some of the new broadband-related actions, he said “We are at a fork in that road. One path leads forward. The other leads back to re-litigating solutions that are demonstrably working. Looking forward is an era of ISPs operating responsibly at both the edge and the core network under light touch regulation accompanied by a referee on the field to throw the flag when necessary. Looking backward takes away existing protections and throws into question ISP expansion into edge activities.”  He then argued why the FCC should stay the course he has set, which he argues is working to promote a thriving broadband ecosystem.