The Florida Public Service Commission unanimously approved a staff recommendation to certify the state's authority to reverse preempt the FCC on pole attachment complaints, at a livestreamed meeting Tuesday (see 2205250053). The PSC's rules take effect Wednesday. PSC Senior Attorney Kathryn Cowdery told commissioners the FCC informed staff last week there are orders on circulation pending action that would "resolve AT&T's pending pole attachment complaints" against Florida Power and Light.
Though right-to-repair advocates expect the tech lobby “will continue to fight” freedom of repair legislation in the states, “we don’t see a legal challenge” to New York’s Digital Fair Repair Act as “viable,” emailed Elizabeth Chamberlain, iFixit director-sustainability. The New York Assembly, on a 145-1 vote, sent the legislation to the desk of Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) Friday (see 2206030034). New York senators approved the legislation 59-4 earlier in the week. “The Digital Fair Repair Act passed with a veto-proof majority in both houses,” said Chamberlain Monday. “It’s overwhelmingly favored by the electorate,” she said. A recent Consumer Reports poll found 84% of Americans “support legislation exactly like this,” she said. “We expect many more states to follow New York and a legal challenge in all these places would be futile. We welcome productive dialogue with manufacturers to inform future regulations.”
Louisiana’s legislature passed a broadband mapping bill. The Senate voted 35-0 Sunday to concur with House amendments to SB-455. Under the bill, ISPs would have to submit to the state broadband office the same deployment information they give the FCC. House amendments limited the broadband office to hiring no more than one full-time employee for the mapping project, said a summary. A House-Senate conference committee made recommendations Monday to resolve disagreement between the chambers on another broadband bill (HB-1080). The agreed-upon bill would include raising minimum broadband speeds to 100/20 Mbps from 25/3 Mbps and set a procedure to privately fund broadband.
New York state will regulate social media. As expected, Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) signed a bill Monday, passed last week by the legislature, to require social platforms to provide reporting mechanisms for hateful conduct (see 2206020063). Tech and civil liberties groups say the law is unconstitutional, comparing it to litigated Texas and Florida laws that prohibit content moderation (see 2206020063). The law "sends a strong message to social media platforms ... that they must take real action to protect New Yorkers from the spread of dangerous hate speech and misinformation both online and offline," said sponsor Assemblymember Patricia Fahy (D) in the governor's announcement about signing several bills to strengthen gun laws. NetChoice and the Computer and Communications Industry Association sued those two states. “Because the law was rushed through without the normal period for public comment, we are still reviewing it to decide on our next steps," said NetChoice Counsel Chris Marchese.
Verizon will act to prevent Legionnaire’s disease, under an agreement with New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) announced Thursday. A 2019 investigation “found that since 2017, there were at least 225 alleged violations of city and state laws at 45 of Verizon’s cooling tower locations throughout the state, with the company failing to conduct testing, address positive test results, and clean and inspect the cooling towers by required deadlines,” said the AG office: Under the New York pact, Verizon will adopt official policies and procedures and pay a $118,000 penalty. While Verizon doesn't admit to wrongdoing, "the settlement avoids protracted litigation and is in the best interest of all involved,” a spokesperson said.
Minnesota will award $95 million in broadband grants through a request for proposals announced Thursday by the Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED). It’s the highest amount ever for the Border-to-Border Broadband Infrastructure grant program, said DEED. Applications are due Aug. 4.
Attorneys general from 40 states, Washington, D.C., and Guam "affirm[ed] their commitment to making a good faith attempt" to sign agreements with the FCC to coordinate efforts to curb illegal robocalls, in a letter to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel Thursday (see 2205190056). "We believe these information sharing agreements represent an important continuation of the progress made to date in combatting robocalls," the letter said. The AGs asked the FCC to directly contact states that haven't signed memorandums of understanding.
Louisiana’s privacy bill might be dead after not getting a House vote Tuesday. The House had thrice delayed voting on HB-987 (see 2205250032) but this time didn’t set a new date to call the bill. Louisiana legislators are to adjourn Monday. Sponsor Rep. Daryl Deshotel (R) didn’t comment Wednesday.
More California broadband and social media bills passed their chambers of origin Wednesday. The Assembly voted 76-0 for AB-2702 to set a goal for the California Advanced Services Fund (CASF) public housing account to provide internet connectivity to all public housing residents by Dec. 31, 2025. They voted 74-0 for AB-2749, opposed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (see 2205240048), to revise the CPUC’s review process for CASF grant applications. Assemblymembers voted 48-18 for AB-2748 to add digital equity requirements to the state’s video franchising law, including a prohibition on “denying equal access to service to any group of potential residential subscribers because of the income of the residents in the local area in which the group resides.” And the Assembly voted 51-18 for AB-2751 to require the California Department of Technology to create a net equality program requiring state agencies to make contracts only with ISPs that offer affordable internet to eligible households. It would define affordable service as at most $40 for 25 Mbps download and 3 Mbps upload speeds. The Senate voted 30-9 for SB-1018, which would require social media platforms with at least 1 million monthly users to annually disclose content moderation efforts.
The West Virginia Public Service Commission won’t reduce a $2.2 million penalty for service quality failures by Altice’s Suddenlink Communications (see 2202090063). Altice argued the PSC’s penalty calculation should start from the date when escalated complaints increased in 2019 rather than Dec. 21, 2015, when Altice acquired Suddenlink. “There is sufficient evidence to hold that since the take-over, Suddenlink” has failed to provide safe, adequate and reliable service, the PSC said in an order Wednesday in docket 21-0515-CTV-SC-GI. “Suddenlink should be penalized for its actions from the day Altice acquired it.” The PSC agreed to modify the order to allow the company to make payments to customers on a rolling basis. Altice didn't comment Thursday.