The South Carolina Public Service Commission seeks comments by Nov. 15 on edits to state USF guidelines proposed by the Office of Regulatory Staff (ORS), said a Wednesday notice in docket 2023-301-C. Parties seeking to intervene should file petitions by Nov. 1. ORS asked in a Sept. 1 petition to clarify certain USF procedures, including by specifically listing interconnected VoIP providers as USF contributors, incorporating a South Carolina confidentiality law and adding a deadline for contributors to dispute required contributions. In the same petition, ORS seeks a waiver of USF guidelines so it can provide a refund to Cox subsidiary Palmetto Net for overreporting assessable revenue in a 2022 worksheet, which resulted in an overpayment.

Michigan could take a broader view of underserved locations as it looks to distribute money from NTIA’s broadband, equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program. The Michigan High-Speed Internet Office posted the first volume of its draft initial proposal Thursday. The state plans to adopt NTIA’s model challenge process with some changes, including treating as underserved all DSL locations and places considered served on the national map where speed tests show service “materially below 100 Mbps downstream and 20 Mbps upstream,” the document said. Also, Michigan plans to treat as underserved multiple dwelling units with at least 20 units identified served on the national map “that are located in Census tracts that have high broadband availability but high rates of households reporting no internet subscription,” it said. It will also consider underserved those locations where fixed wireless is the only technology satisfying served requirements, the draft said. Comments are due Oct. 31. Also, the state broadband office said it seeks early feedback by Oct. 13 on the subgrant process it will describe in the upcoming volume two of its BEAD initial proposal.

Dish Wireless may provide Lifeline service in Michigan, state commissioners decided Thursday. The Michigan Public Service Commission voted 3-0 to grant Dish’s application for eligible telecom carrier (ETC) designation (case U-21382). “The Commission is persuaded that ETC designation for DISH promotes the availability of universal service and is in the public interest,” said the order. Also Thursday, the commission unanimously supported granting permanent licenses to Altafiber (case No. U-21449) and EarthGrid (case U-21417) to provide basic local exchange service statewide in areas served by AT&T and Frontier Communications. The PSC granted those companies temporary licenses last July.

The California Public Utilities Commission asked the public to talk Nov. 8 about lacking internet. The public participation hearings are to be at 2 p.m. and 6 p.m. PST, Administrative Law Judge Thomas Glegola ruled Wednesday in the CPUC's rulemaking to implement NTIA’s broadband, equity, access and deployment program (docket R.23-02-016).

The Treasury Department awarded Oregon $156.7 million through the Capital Projects Fund Wednesday. About $149 million of the award will be used for broadband infrastructure projects to connect more than 17,000 homes and businesses through the state's broadband deployment grant program, said a news release. The remaining $7.7 million will be used for administrative purposes. “This unprecedented funding will strengthen Oregon’s broadband infrastructure and expand access to quality internet service,” said Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek (D).

Renew funding for the affordable connectivity program, North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper (D) urged his state’s congressional delegation this week. “We can run fiber broadband to every home in North Carolina, but if the residents can’t afford the service, they still risk being left behind,” said Cooper in letters shared Wednesday by the governor’s office. ACP funding could dry up this April, said Cooper: “Without bipartisan collaboration between Congress and the White House to continue the ACP, nearly 20 million households enrolled nationally could lose connectivity as well as all the essential services that come with it.”

The California Public Utilities Commission’s top goal for transitioning its foster youth pilot into a permanent program "should be ensuring that few youth lose service during the program transition,” said iFoster, the nonprofit that led the pilot. In comments Tuesday in docket R.20-02-008, iFoster said it knows “many foster youth lose their service during transitions of service providers and program administrators.” For example, during the migration from Boost to T-Mobile, “only about 25% of the foster youth successfully transitioned,” it said. Major changes proposed by staff could make the transition complex, said iFoster. The plan “contains many fundamental changes,” including a transition of users to California LifeLine at age 18 instead of 26, more service providers and possible changes to eligibility requirements, said the nonprofit. Every transition from the pilot into LifeLine has failed so far, even when LifeLine approves foster youth as eligible, iFoster said. “As an example, a foster youth successfully transitioned to the LifeLine program, and received a new device. Two days later, the youth was notified of termination as the youth was deemed to already have [affordable connectivity program support] in the form of at-home Internet. This was not the case.” The Utility Reform Network supports making the pilot permanent to "reduce foster youth’s barriers to accessing LifeLine services, particularly for minors,” TURN commented. The CPUC sought comments earlier this month on the proposal to make the foster youth pilot permanent (see 2309050080). T-Mobile recently said it found data discrepancies with the pilot (see 2309130016).

The Oregon Public Utility Commission set an evidentiary hearing for Nov. 15 at 1:30 p.m. PST on Lumen’s price plan, Administrative Law Judge Sarah Spruce ruled Monday in docket UM 1908. Lumen and PUC staff should file their stipulation and testimony Oct. 10, and intervenors should file objections and testimony Oct. 24, said the ALJ: Lumen and staff’s reply will be due Nov. 7. Opening briefs for both sides will be due Dec. 1 and closing briefs are due Dec. 22, said Spruce: The commission will target a Feb. 9 order. The Oregon PUC extended the expiration date on Lumen's current price plan to Feb. 29, in a Tuesday order. It would have expired Thursday.

Ohio must find a “long-term solution” to fund 988, said state Rep. Gail Pavliga (R) at an Ohio House Finance Committee hearing livestreamed Tuesday. Pavliga’s bipartisan HB-231 proposes a 10 cent fee on VoIP, wireline and wireless monthly bills and each retail sale of a prepaid wireless service in the state. The state has relied on federal funding for the mental health hotline, but that won’t last forever, said Pavliga. In its first year, Ohio's 988 program received 8,671 calls and 3,368 texts and chats per month, she noted. The committee didn’t vote.

NTIA should guide Ohio to revise its draft proposal for the broadband, equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program to make it conform with NTIA policy on defining unserved areas, wireless groups said Monday. The Wireless ISP Association (WISPA), NATE, the Open RAN Policy Coalition and the Competitive Carriers Association sent NTIA a letter about the issue Monday. WISPA and the other groups said volume one of the state’s draft initial proposal has problems due to an Ohio budget bill (HB-33) passed earlier this year. Wireless groups had raised concerns with the state budget including a section removing wireless broadband from definitions of tier one and tier two broadband services for the purposes of getting grants (see 2307050064). The law “includes locations served by licensed fixed wireless broadband in the definition of ‘unserved,’ regardless of the quality of service delivered,” WISPA and the other groups said Monday: This is "a material change in policy -- one that could potentially add millions of additional unserved locations to the BEAD program if applied nationally at a time when many states are already deciding how to best stretch their BEAD allocations.” Treating areas with licensed spectrum as unserved would be inconsistent with the BEAD notice of funding opportunity, they said.