Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Stevens introduced legislation Monday that would make it easier for telecommunications companies to get local video franchises but that ducks the controversial "net neutrality" issue. For details, see our story from Newsbytes, "Bill on Video Franchises Introduced."
Called the "Communications, Consumer's Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006," S.2686 (also being called the "Communications Act of 2006"), the bill would still require phone companies to get local franchises, but would also require municipalities to act on applications within 30 days; if they don't, the application will be automatically granted. Newsbytes says this provision is more restrictive than that in the House bill, which would create a nationwide franchise process.
With regard to net neutrality, Stevens's bill would require the FCC to conduct "an annual study on the flow of information over the Internet and make recommendations."
In his statement of introduction, Sen. Stevens emphasized broadband development as the driving force behind the bill's provisions:
"The overarching theme of the bill we introduce today is deployment of broadband nationwide. Today the United States is less than 16th in adoption of broadband worldwide. We are not only behind most of the developed world, we even lag behind some of the less developed parts of our globe. To address this broadband gap, the bill we introduce today will allow local governments to offer their own broadband service, so long as they do not compete unfairly with the private sector."
The Newsbytes report cites analysts who think it is unlikely that new communications legislation will get enacted this year because of the discrepancies between House and Senate versions.
A copy of the bill is available here in PDF format.
AB -- 5/2/06
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