The California Public Utilities Commission should modify an April decision on rules for the state’s $2 billion last-mile federal funding account, consumer advocates said in a Thursday petition. The CPUC should bring back a proposal in an earlier draft requiring grant recipients to offer a generally available low-cost broadband plan, said the CPUC’s independent Public Advocates Office, Center for Accessible Technology and The Utility Reform Network in docket R.20-09-001. The decision to remove that requirement “cuts against Commission’s assurances that broadband would not just be deployed to unserved and underserved communities, but would also be affordable to low-income customers in those communities,” they said. The CPUC made last-minute revisions to its proposed decision after industry groups sought changes days before the vote (see 2204210046).

The Arizona Corporation Commission directed staff to create a memo and proposed remedy order on Frontier Communications’ June 11 outage. At the West Virginia Public Service Commission, Frontier agreed to a settlement with 911 officials over outages in that state. Arizona commissioners grilled the company at a livestreamed meeting Tuesday about its response to the gunshot-caused outage, and earlier problems (see 2206280065). After discussing legal options in closed executive session, including a possible order to show cause (OSC), commissioners decided they will vote at their July 12-13 meeting on a proposed remedy order. Chairwoman Lea Marquez Peterson (R) said it would require Frontier to (1) quickly interconnect with the state's Comtech 911 system, (2) provide an emergency response plan, (3) actively pursue state and federal funds for network redundancy and diversity, (4) give a biweekly status update on Frontier’s progress getting funds, (5) identify areas that lack redundancy and diversity and provide a hierarchy of priorities for vulnerable areas and (6) have high-level, senior executives attend emergency town hall meetings in St. Johns, which experienced the June 11 problems. ACC Utilities Director Elijah Abinah said staff is considering July 14 for a St. Johns town hall. Peterson added, “We would like this to include enforcement provisions.” Saint Johns Police Chief Lance Spivey and Assistant Fire Chief Jason Kirk said they would have preferred the commission consider stronger enforcement action in the form of an OSC. The West Virginia PSC posted a Frontier 911 pact Tuesday in four dockets including 22-0274-T-C. Frontier agreed to “review and update its change management policy to assure regular, preventative maintenance routines,” improve network card tracking and inventory management, standardize a process for individualized route diversity education for county 911 officials, give PSC staff the West Virginia part of its FCC 911 reliability certification report and give county 911 directors documents on using Frontier’s rerouting tool, upon request. Before it can take effect, West Virginia commissioners “would have to approve, reject or modify the settlement,” a PSC spokesperson emailed Wednesday.

The final state approval needed for Apollo’s buy of Lumen’s ILEC assets could happen Wednesday. The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities included the deal on an agenda released Tuesday for its 10 a.m. meeting. Apollo/Lumen also still needs FCC approval.

Hawaii Gov. David Ige (R) plans to partly veto a bill passed by the legislature to require the University of Hawaii and state broadband office to convene a working group to determine governance for operating, maintaining and overseeing broadband assets, the governor’s office said Monday. SB-2076 appeared on a list of 30 bills that Ige intends to veto, though he has until July 12 to make final decisions. SB-2076, which also would appropriate funds for three full-time positions for the broadband office and the university’s broadband effort, is one of two bills “being considered for line-item vetoes of specific appropriations, including the over-appropriation of federal funds,” said the governor’s office: Hawaii “must operate within the federal Maintenance of Effort (MOE) requirements contained in the American Rescue Plan Act.” Also, Ige plans to veto HB-1980, which would permit but not require Medicaid, health insurers and others to cover telephonic behavioral health services. “While the intent of this bill is appreciated, its wording is vague and may allow insurance providers to restrict access to telephonic services,” the governor’s office said. “This could especially impact patients in rural and underserved areas, those with limited digital skills, or those with limited access to reliable internet service.”

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost (R) warned 10 VoIP companies that are alleged by the state to support possibly illegal robocallers. “If further investigations find that your customers continue to engage in illegal activity and you continue to assist and facilitate such activity, our office may pursue enforcement action,” Senior Assistant Attorney General Erin Leahy wrote in letters released Tuesday. The AG office didn't disclose the recipients’ names "because they are part of an ongoing investigation," a spokesperson said.

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) will consider signing a bill to establish a state broadband office. The state Senate voted 20-5 Friday to pass HB-2678. The House passed it 46-13 in February (see 2202240041).

NTIA gave a $10.5 million broadband grant to Michigan State University, the agency said Monday. The grant will fund middle-mile fiber expansion across 74 counties and is expected to help reach more than 120,000 unserved locations, including about 16,500 unserved households, NTIA said. It’s the final award from the broadband infrastructure program, which provided 14 awards totaling $288 million, the agency said.

California’s tribal land transfer policy (TLTP) doesn’t apply to wireless companies, CTIA said in Friday reply comments at the California Public Utilities Commission. The CPUC is considering updates to the 2019 policy, which directs investor-owned utilities to give tribes notice and a right of first refusal in property sales, in docket 22-02-002. “Applying the TLTP to wireless providers could hinder investment and rapid deployment of 5G networks, and would advance none of the core goals of this proceeding,” wrote CTIA: And it’s unlawful. Extending the TLTP to all telecom carriers would conflict with previous CPUC decisions that exempted certain carriers, agreed Verizon.

Gunshots damaged Frontier Communications fiber and caused an Arizona outage June 11, the company told the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) in a Friday letter in docket T-02115A-21-0198. “The incident that impacted Frontier's Internet and Verizon's wireless service in Navajo and Apache Counties on June 11 was the direct result of an intentional criminal attack on Frontier's fiber optic facilities executed in a manner to cause an extended disruption to services," the carrier said. “The perpetrator or perpetrators must be brought to justice.” Frontier disagreed with the Arizona Association of Chiefs of Police, which filed a June 20 letter that referred to the outage as a network failure. “Gunshot blasts damaged Frontier's fiber cable on a route between Holbrook and Snowflake, Arizona, in multiple locations, over a three-mile area. The pattern of damage indicates that this was neither a network ‘failure’ nor a foolish incident of vandalism.” Frontier urged the commission to consider increasing the state 911 surcharge or repurpose state USF for increasing network redundancy in rural areas. The ACC plans to consider the Frontier outage docket and possible state USF changes at its Tuesday meeting, said an agenda.

The California Public Utilities Commission is meeting with ISPs that didn’t provide all broadband data requested for a state map (see 2206170059 and 2206160065), a CPUC spokesperson emailed Monday. “We are meeting with the non-compliant providers with a goal of addressing their concerns so the data collection can be completed.” Cox, Comcast, Charter, Verizon and AT&T in separate June 17 responses to the CPUC’s June 10 noncompliance letters offered to meet with the agency. “The addresses of our customers and services they purchase cannot be made publicly available without causing serious harm,” said AT&T. “Customers also expect their information about the services they purchase will not be made publicly available.” Comcast worries that giving address-level data would violate customers’ “privacy rights in contravention of state and federal law,” it said. Others raised similar privacy concerns.