BILL ANALYSIS                                                                                                                                                                                                    



                                                                       



           ------------------------------------------------------------ 
          |SENATE RULES COMMITTEE            |                  SB 1375|
          |Office of Senate Floor Analyses   |                         |
          |1020 N Street, Suite 524          |                         |
          |(916) 651-1520         Fax: (916) |                         |
          |327-4478                          |                         |
           ------------------------------------------------------------ 
           
                                         
                                 THIRD READING


          Bill No:  SB 1375
          Author:   Price (D)
          Amended:  5/12/10
          Vote:     21

           
           SENATE ENERGY, U.&C. COMMITTEE  :  10-0, 4/20/10
          AYES:  Padilla, Dutton, Corbett, Florez, Kehoe, Lowenthal,  
            Oropeza, Simitian, Strickland, Wright
          NO VOTE RECORDED:  Cox

           SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE  :  Senate Rule 28.8 


           SUBJECT  :    Telephone corporations:  residential telephone  
          service:  911
                        calls

           SOURCE  :     AT&T
                      Verizon
                      Frontier

           DIGEST  :    This bill requires local telephone corporations  
          to provide every subscriber of tariffed residential basic  
          exchange service, rather than every existing and newly  
          installed residential telephone connection, with access to  
          911 emergency service.  This bill also deletes the  
          requirement in existing law which requires telephone  
          corporations to inform subscribers of the availability of  
          911 emergency services in a manner determined by the Public  
          Utilities Commission, and instead requires telephone  
          corporations to inform residential subscribers who have  
          received notice of suspension or disconnection of service  
                                                           CONTINUED





                                                               SB 1375
                                                                Page  
          2

          for nonpayment of certain information, including options to  
          avoid suspension or disconnection of service and the  
          availability of 911 emergency service.

           ANALYSIS  :    According to the author's office, this bill  
          aims to update the requirement that all California  
          residences have access to 911 emergency service in  
          recognition of the increase in telephone subscribers who  
          are abandoning landline service in favor of wireless or  
          other technologies.

          (The author's office has indicated that there are  
          provisions in the bill that can be considered work in  
          progress.)

           Access to 911  - Current law enacted in 1994 requires all  
          landline telephone corporations, to the extent permitted by  
          existing technology or facilities, to provide every  
          residential telephone connection with access to 911  
          emergency service regardless of whether an account has been  
          established.  The law prohibits any corporation from  
          terminating this "warm line" service for nonpayment of any  
          delinquent account.  The intent of this law is to ensure  
          that people can always call 911 from their home even when  
          they just move in and regular phone service has not started  
          yet or when regular service has been discontinued because  
          they cannot afford to pay their telephone bill.  The law  
          also requires telephone corporations to inform subscribers  
          of the availability of warm line service in a manner  
          determined by the Public Utilities Commission (PUC).  

          The bill does the following:

          1.Requires LECs to provide 911 access to every subscriber  
            of tariffed basic residential exchange service, thereby  
            eliminating the requirement in current law that every  
            connection have "warm line" access to 911 before an  
            account is established and after disconnection for any  
            reason.

          2.Retains current law prohibiting LECs from terminating 911  
            access for disconnect due to nonpayment.  (AT&T aims to  
            limit this to 90 days or some other specified period  
            after disconnect for nonpayment but the Public Safety  

                                                           CONTINUED





                                                               SB 1375
                                                                Page  
          3

            Answering Point (PSAPs) are not yet in agreement.)

          3.Requires LECs to inform residential subscribers facing  
            disconnection for nonpayment of options for Lifeline and  
            other low-cost services with 911 access.

           Benefit and Cost of Warm Line Service  - While the warm line  
          requirement is intended to enhance public safety, no data  
          or reports of actual emergency calls being placed on warm  
          lines have been identified.  Telephone corporations, 911  
          service administrators, the PUC, and the State of  
          California 911 Emergency Communications Office have been  
          asked to provide this information, including any data or  
          reports related to an apparent surge in false or "phantom"  
          911 calls in southern California that peaked in early 2009.  
           

          A state 911 report dated July 2009 reports that 25 million  
          calls are placed in California each year, and about  
          two-thirds of those calls are made on wireless telephones.   
          Calls to 911 on warm lines are a tiny fraction of all 911  
          calls.  The State of California 911 Emergency  
          Communications Office, which is within the Office of the  
          State Chief Information Officer, reports the following  
          total number of 911 calls transmitted on warm lines  
          statewide for recent months:

          1.March 2010 - 11,039
          2.April 2010 - 13,728

          It is unknown, however, how many of these were phantom  
          calls or were made by a person in a real emergency because  
          that requires examining data from individual PSAPs.  

          These 2010 numbers are higher than the numbers of calls  
          made on warm lines identified in a PUC study in 2009, which  
          found the following number of calls on warm lines  
          statewide:

          1.January 2009 - 8,602
          2.February 2009 - 10,208
          3.March 2009 - 9,155

          The PUC study tried to determine how many calls were  

                                                           CONTINUED





                                                               SB 1375
                                                                Page  
          4

          phantom or real by examining dispatch records at PSAPs.   
          Although dispatch records did not reveal conclusively what  
          calls were real people calling 911 in a real emergency, the  
          PUC study was able to draw the following conclusions:

          1.A majority (58 percent) of the warm lines generating 911  
            calls did so only once, confirming that warm lines per se  
            are not problem lines.

          2.Excessive repetitive calling from the same line to 911  
            accounted for almost 6,000 false calls a month but was  
            limited to only 569 problem warm lines.

          3.At least three percent of calls made on warm lines  
            resulted in a transfer to a secondary PSAP for fire or  
            emergency medical response, indicating these were not  
            phantom calls.  This percentage of calls does not include  
            calls dispatched by primary PSAPs for police,  
            police/fire, or other emergencies that require law  
            enforcement presence.

          Thus, the limited data available on 911 calls made on warm  
          lines reveals that some warm line calls are phantom and  
          some are calls made in a real emergency.

          Note:                                             The  
          findings section of the bill could give the impression that  
          most                                              call on  
          warm lines are phantom according to the Senate Energy,  
          Utilities, and Communications staff.  An amendment making  
          reference to the PUC findings could clarify that  
          impression.

          Telephone corporations (and their ratepayers) incur the  
          cost of maintaining the facilities for warm lines and the  
          telephone number associated with each line that registers  
          at the local PSAP if a 911 call is transmitted on the line.  
           The companies claim that these costs have increased  
          because of rapid growth in the number of warm lines as  
          subscribers discontinue landline service and transfer to  
          wireless, cable, or VoIP service.  The PUC reports that the  
          total number of landline access lines in California has  
          decreased from 24.77 million in 2001 to 20.25 million in  
          2008.  When customers abandon wireline service, the wire to  

                                                           CONTINUED





                                                               SB 1375
                                                                Page  
          5

          the residence remains as a warm line.  The total number of  
          warm lines statewide is now at about 2 million, up from  
          about 150,000 in 2005.

          AT&T is working on language to remove the requirement to  
          maintain the embedded base of about two million warm lines.  
           Some PSAPs want LECs to be required to keep existing warm  
          lines if the prior subscriber was disconnected for  
          nonpayment, but AT&T claims its records do not allow it to  
          determine retrospectively if the reason for disconnect was  
          nonpayment.

           AT&T Complaint Case  - Current law generally requires  
          telephone corporations to maintain warm lines indefinitely.  
           In 2005, the Utility Consumers' Action Network filed a  
          complaint with the PUC challenging AT&T's then-existing  
          policy of providing warm line service for only180 days  
          after billed service was discontinued.  The PUC found that  
          AT&T's policy violated the warm line requirement and  
          imposed a penalty of about $1.7 million.  AT&T appealed the  
          PUC decision, and on May 24, a California Court of Appeal  
          upheld the penalty and nearly all of the PUC's findings.   
          The court held that the PUC erred in finding that AT&T  
          violated the warm line requirement for new residential  
          units when there was no request for warm line service and  
          in finding that AT&T violated customer notice requirements  
          but concluded that these errors did not require any  
          reduction in the penalty

           "Phantom" 911 Calls  - Telephone corporations and the 911  
          County Coordinator Task Force report that PSAPs sometimes  
          receive 911 calls that are triggered by damaged or aging  
          lines, weather, or other causes.  Not knowing whether there  
          is a real emergency, public safety officials respond to the  
          homes where these calls originate, thereby draining local  
          government resources and making those responders  
          unavailable for other public safety duties.  They claim  
          that the incidence of phantom 911 calls is increasing as  
          customers abandon landline service and the number of  
          existing warm lines continues to grow.  

           Related Legislation
           
          AB 424 (Torres) establishes an education campaign to  

                                                           CONTINUED





                                                               SB 1375
                                                                Page  
          6

          instruct the public on the appropriate use of the 911  
          emergency number system.  This bill is in the Senate Energy  
          and Public Utilities Committee.
           
          AB 2545 ( De La Torre) creating parity in the funding of  
          the 911 emergency response system between users of  
          post-paid service and prepaid service.  This bill is in  
          Senate Rules awaiting assignment to a committee.

           FISCAL EFFECT  :    Appropriation:  No   Fiscal Com.:  Yes    
          Local:  No

           SUPPORT  :   (Verified  5/26/10)

          AT&T (co-source) 
          Verizon (co-source) 
          Frontier (co-source)
          CALCON
          California State Sheriffs Association
          CALTEL
          PORAC
          SureWest

           OPPOSITION  :    (Verified  5/26/10)

          911 County Coordinator Task Force
          CALNEA
          TURN

           ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT  :    AT&T indicates this bill is  
          designed to find a solution to the problems created by  
          aging warm lines and phantom 911 calls.  A warm line is a  
          telephone connection for which there is no customer  
          account, but which allows a person to make an outbound call  
          to 911.

          AT&T states, "Current law, Public Utilities Code Section  
          2883, requires local telephone companies to provide  
          telephone connections with access to 911 emergency service  
          - to the extent it is permitted by existing technology.   
          Section 2883 also prohibits disconnecting warm line service  
          for nonpayment of an account.  Due to changes in the  
          telecommunications industry, however, what was intended as  
          a public safety benefit has become a public safety burden  

                                                           CONTINUED





                                                               SB 1375
                                                                Page  
          7

          that also imposes costs on the state, local governments and  
          companies.  Today, customers switch carriers with relative  
          ease, taking their phone numbers with them and receiving  
          911 service from whomever is their current provider.  No  
          company owns the customer or the telephone connection  
          inside the house.  Today, a warm line provisioned in 1995  
          could be connected but the customer has no landline phone  
          to plug into it because they have gone all wireless.  Or,  
          the warm line could be connected only to the outside of the  
          house because the jack and inside wiring now is being used  
          by a new service provider the customer has chosen.  Or, the  
          warm line could be connected to an abandoned building.  Or,  
          the warm line could be not connected to anything at all  
          because the building no longer exists and no one called to  
          tell the warm line provider.  Once a customer leaves the  
          original company providing the warm line, there is no  
          practical way to determine what  happens to that warm line  
          down the road.  A warm line could remain unused for years.   
          These unconnected or duplicative warm lines provide no  
          benefit, but due to water, weather and animals they can  
          short, sending a "phantom" 911 call to a public safety  
          agency.  While the public safety agency knows that a 911  
          call is coming from a warm line, it does not know if it is  
          a phantom 911 call or a real one - without expending 911  
          operator time and dispatching law enforcement officers.   
          Answering and checking out a phantom 911 calls can delay a  
          response to a real emergency thereby posing a public safety  
          risk."

           ARGUMENTS IN OPPOSITION  :    TURN believes the bill as  
          amended would element warm line service to those customers  
          who voluntarily disconnect wireline service for any reason  
          and, although this may not be the intent for the existing  
          two million warm lines in California.  TURN supports  
          language that maintain warm lines for customers  
          disconnected for nonpayment with no time limitation and  
          which expands the customer notice requirements.  They urge  
          that all interested stakeholders be included in any further  
          discussions which take place on the bill since they were  
          not included in the May 12 amendment discussion.  
           

          DLW:nl  5/26/10   Senate Floor Analyses 


                                                           CONTINUED





                                                               SB 1375
                                                                Page  
          8

                         SUPPORT/OPPOSITION:  SEE ABOVE

                                ****  END  ****










































                                                           CONTINUED