A district court stopped Georgia Public Service Commission elections “simply because Republicans have been too successful,” Georgia said Monday at the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. The Supreme Court last month vacated the 11th Circuit’s Aug. 12 stay of an Aug. 5 decision by the U.S. District Court in Atlanta to postpone PSC elections over the issue. The court was wrong to say electing Georgia PSC members for specific districts on a statewide, at-large basis unlawfully dilutes Black citizens’ votes in violation of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, said the state in case 22-12593. “The district court accepted a [Section] 2 vote dilution claim because black voters in Georgia (who generally do not vote for Republicans) regularly see their preferred candidates for Public Service Commission defeated (by Republicans),” the state said in a Monday brief. “Plaintiffs never established -- nor could they -- that their preferred candidates’ lack of electoral success was due to unequal opportunity ‘on account of race.’ There was no evidence that the non-black majority voted, on the basis of race, to defeat black-preferred candidates.” The Voting Rights Act doesn’t allow federal courts to force new government models on states, Georgia added: “But demanding Georgia shift from a century-old, constitutionally required, statewide system to single-member districts does exactly that.”

Lumen supported Colorado draft rule changes on emergency service network reliability. Stakeholders agreed to the draft changes in workshops (see 2209070041). “The workshop process … resulted in a set of Consensus Rules that, while not perfect, are good and, most important, further the intended purpose of ensuring excellent basic emergency service in Colorado,” Lumen commented Monday in docket 22R-0122T. Agreed rules “provide an efficient infrastructure for the filing, approval, implementation, and funding of” an improvement plan, it said. The carrier suggested a tweak to proposed informal investigation rules. “Lumen believes that a bit more flexibility in the process will maintain the purpose behind investigating outages while allowing for adaptability and reducing burden both on the [basic emergency service provider] and the commission staff where appropriate, said Lumen: Limit any recordings “to the confines of the informal investigation to ensure prompt, open and robust communication.”

Broadband and 5G training by the Wireless Infrastructure Association received approval for four credentials in Ohio’s TechCred program. Employees who participate in the training will be eligible for reimbursement through state grants, WIA said Monday. Employers with a physical presence in the state may apply for the funding.

The California Public Utilities Commission should reject a Wireless ISP Association motion to clarify that wireless is eligible for broadband funding from the CPUC’s federal funding account (FFA), consumer and community groups urged Friday. WISPA is “belatedly, and inappropriately, requesting substantive changes to a decision that was well reasoned and based on a comprehensive record,” said Center for Accessible Technology, The Utility Reform Network and others in docket R.20-09-001. The CPUC decided FFA rules more than four months ago, and WISPA didn’t participate in that proceeding, they said. “It is unclear why WISPA has just now intervened, and it is even more unclear why WISPA is demanding that the Commission act on an ‘expedited’ basis notwithstanding its own deferred involvement in the proceeding.” Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) must decide by Sept. 30 whether to sign a legislature-passed bill (AB-2749), supported by WISPA and other industry groups, to require wireless eligibility (see 2209160037). “There is no appropriate way that WISPA can know the Governor’s intent, and his actions will speak for themselves in a matter of weeks,” the consumer and community advocates said. “If the Commission grants the motion, providers will continue to invest in high-quality, future-proof fiber infrastructure in wealthy, predominantly white communities and invest, if at all, in inferior wireless infrastructure in low-income communities and communities of color.”

The Wireless ISP Association urged Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) to sign a broadband bill (AB-2749) to update the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) grant review process and require wireless eligibility for funding. “An inclusive approach to broadband deployment smartly enlists the help of those on the ground, such as WISPA’s community-based providers, many of whom employ both fiber and fixed wireless technologies in their networks,” WISPA State Advocacy Manager Steven Schwerbel said Thursday. Consumer advocates earlier urged Newsom to veto the bill, saying it would hurt underserved communities (see 2209120062). Other industry supporters of AB-2749 include USTelecom and CTIA (see 2208290020).

A federal court disagreed with constitutional arguments to dismiss a class-action lawsuit brought under the Florida Telephone Solicitation Act. In an order Thursday in Borges v. SmileDirectClub (case 1:21-cv-23011), the U.S. District Court in Southern Florida denied a motion to dismiss by the defendant, which argued that FTSA violated the First Amendment as a content-based speech restriction and defied the 14th Amendment’s due process clause because the law fails to define what is an “automated system for the selection or dialing of telephone numbers.” Judge Melissa Damian disagreed. The state law isn’t subject to strict scrutiny under the First Amendment because it regulates only commercial speech, said the judge, citing May’s decision by the 11th U.S. Circuit Appeals Court on a Florida social media law (see 2205230049). FTSA survives intermediate scrutiny because the commercial speech at issue isn’t misleading or related to unlawful activity, and because the law is narrowly tailored and serves a substantial government interest of protecting consumer privacy, Damian said. The court isn’t persuaded that FTSA is unconstitutionally vague, the judge said. “The Court finds that the absence of a definition of ‘automated system’ in Section 8(a) of the FTSA does not render that provision unconstitutionally vague when, as here, Defendant’s alleged conduct is clearly encompassed by the statute.” SmileDirectClub should answer the complaint by Sept. 30, Damian said. A tsunami of telemarketing lawsuits is expected as more states like Florida add restrictions beyond what’s in the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act (see 2206100049).

West Virginia preliminarily approved $55.3 million in broadband funds via the American Rescue Plan Act and state cash, Gov. Jim Justice (R) said Friday. The state expects the awarded projects to reach about 17,500 locations and extend 940 miles of fiber, the governor’s office said. Gigabeam Networks was the private partner for three county projects that won about $11.4 million, while Citynet was the partner for two projects that received $29.9 million. Micrologic got about $14 million for another funded project.

The California Public Utilities Commission may vote Oct. 20 on a proposed decision to adopt one-touch, make-ready rules. The agency would implement “a transparent and efficient pole attachment process that vests new attachers with greater options that place them in control of the work necessary to attach their equipment to utility poles and provide consumers with greater telecommunications service opportunities,” said the Friday proposal by CPUC President Alice Reynolds in dockets I.17-06-027 and R.17-06-028. “Nondiscriminatory access to the incumbent utilities’ poles and rights of way is one of the essential elements for enabling facilities-based competition to succeed consonant with California’s goal of providing broadband access to no less than 98% of California households.” In comments last year, carriers supported California adopting OTMR rules, while other groups raised safety concerns (see 2104130053).

The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission voted 3-0 to seek comment on a proposed settlement to resolve an Enforcement Bureau informal investigation of Lumen’s CenturyLink. At a livestreamed Thursday meeting, commissioners unanimously supported the proposed order on a pact between the bureau and the company in docket M-2022-3028754. The bureau opened the probe in response to information from state Rep. Perry Stambaugh (R) and Sens. Judy Ward (R) and John DiSanto (R), “who had received various email complaints relating to service outages and alleged unreliable service by CenturyLink customers,” said a July 18 joint petition to approve the settlement. Hurricane Ida flooding damaged CenturyLink facilities in August 2021, it said. Under the proposed settlement, CenturyLink agreed to pay $45,000 and to complete remedial measures including a quality assurance program and required public service announcements to educate the public on how to report damaged facilities. Comments will be due 25 days after the order's publication in the Pennsylvania Bulletin, said the PUC.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed children’s privacy legislation Thursday. AB-2273, which opponents say would violate free speech and hurt the internet (see 2208120039), would require social media companies with child users to follow “age-appropriate” design principles. The bipartisan Age-Appropriate Design Code Act sets up a working group to report to the legislature by January 2024 on best practices for implementation. “We’re taking aggressive action in California to protect the health and wellbeing of our kids,” said Newsom. California will be “the first state in the nation to require tech companies to install guardrails on their apps and websites for users under 18,” said sponsor Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D) in the same news release. Republican co-sponsor Assemblymember Jordan Cunningham said “protecting kids online is not only common sense, it will save lives.” Newsom signed an industry-opposed bill earlier this week to establish transparency requirements for social media platforms’ content moderation practices (see 2209140050).