BILL ANALYSIS Ó
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|SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | AB 1409|
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THIRD READING
Bill No: AB 1409
Author: Bradford (D)
Amended: 9/6/13 in Senate
Vote: 27 - Urgency
SENATE ENERGY, UTILITIES & COMMUNIC. COMMITTEE : 6-1, 6/18/13
AYES: Padilla, Corbett, DeSaulnier, Hill, Wolk, Wright
NOES: Fuller
NO VOTE RECORDED: Cannella, De León, Knight, Pavley
SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE : 4-2, 7/1/13
AYES: De León, Hill, Lara, Steinberg
NOES: Walters, Gaines
NO VOTE RECORDED: Padilla
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 50-21, 5/16/13 - See last page for vote
SUBJECT : Public utilities: voice communications: Moore
Universal Telephone Service Act
SOURCE : Author
DIGEST : This bill requires the Public Utilities Commission
(PUC) to update the Moore Universal Service Lifeline Program to
include rules that allow all providers to participate, including
wireless and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) providers, as
specified.
Senate Floor Amendments of 9/6/13 (1) strike the Public
Utilities Code clean-up provisions; (2) retain the provisions
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that adjust the PUC fee for a certificate of public convenience
and necessity (CPCN) to $500; (3) add an urgency clause; and (4)
change the author of this bill to Assemblymember Bradford.
ANALYSIS :
Existing law:
1. Permits the PUC to charge and collect an application fee of
$75 for a CPCN, or for the mortgage, lease, transfer, or
assignment of a certificate.
2. Establishes the PUC Reimbursement Account in the General
Fund (GF) and generally provides that all fees and charges
collected under the Public Utilities Code, except penalties,
from each public utility be paid into the GF.
3. Provides that specified fees, including, but not limited to,
the fee for filing each application for a certificate of
CPCN, or for the mortgage, lease, transfer, or assignment of
a certificate, are required to be paid at least once each
month into the State Treasury to the GF.
4. States that the federal Telecommunications Act of 1996,
establishes a program of cooperative federalism for the
regulation of telecommunications to attain the goal of local
competition, while implementing specific, predictable, and
sufficient federal and state mechanisms to preserve and
advance universal service, consistent with certain universal
service principles. Under the Act, universal service is an
evolving level of telecommunications services that the
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is required to
establish periodically, taking into account advances in
telecommunications and information technologies and services.
Pursuant to the Act, FCC has established and revised a
lifeline program that is available for qualifying low-income
consumers.
5. States that the Moore Universal Telephone Service Act (Moore
Act) establishes the Universal Lifeline Telephone Service
program in order to provide low-income households with access
to affordable basic residential telephone service.
6. States that the Moore Act requires the PUC to annually
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designate a class of lifeline service necessary to meet
minimum residential communications needs, to set the rates
and charges for that service, to develop eligibility criteria
for that service, and to assess the degree of achievement of
universal service, including telephone penetration rates by
income, ethnicity, and geography.
7. States that the Public Utilities Act prohibits any telephone
corporation from beginning the construction of, among other
things, a line, plant, or system, or of any extension
thereof, without having first obtained from the PUC a
certificate that the present or future public convenience and
necessity require or will require that construction.
This bill:
1. Eliminates the $75 fee for filing an application and instead
permits the PUC to raise the fee to an amount not to exceed
$500.
2. Requires that the PUC by, June 1, 2014, shall adopt rules
that are applicable to all lifeline service providers,
including providers using alternative technologies. The
rules shall do all of the following:
A. Not prevent or delay any alternative provider of voice
communications service from participating based on the
technology utilized to provide service, including any VoIP
or Internet Protocol enabled service, as specified.
B. Provide reimbursement to all participating lifeline
providers on a nondiscriminatory basis.
C. Establish a process to expeditiously review requests
from any alternative provider of voice communications
service to participate in the lifeline program, which may
be an advice letter process, and may allow a provider to
seek, in a single consolidated request, authorization to
be a lifeline provider under this section and designation
as an eligible telecommunications carrier (ETC) pursuant
to the federal lifeline program.
1. States that the PUC shall not, in exercising its delegated
authority under federal law to designate ETC, or in
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exercising its authority to authorize an alternative provider
of voice communications service to participate in the state
lifeline program, deny a request to be designated as a
lifeline provider based on the requesting entity providing
any VoIP or Internet Protocol enabled service.
2. Provides that a lifeline provider, including a lifeline
provider that is not a telephone corporation, is eligible for
reimbursement from the Universal Lifeline Telephone Service
Trust Administrative Committee Fund.
3. Prohibits the PUC from denying or revoking a certificate of
CPCN applied for by or issued to a telephone corporation that
provides retail or wholesale telecommunications services on
the grounds that the telephone corporation also provides
(VoIP) service or any other unregulated service.
4. States that this is an urgency statute necessary for the
immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety
and shall go into immediate effect.
FISCAL EFFECT : Appropriation: No Fiscal Com.: Yes
Local: Yes
According to the Senate Appropriations Committee, potential
minor revenue increases in the low tens of thousands of dollars
to the Public Utilities Commission Utilities Reimbursement
Account (special) for increased fee revenues on CPCN
applications.
SUPPORT : (Verified 9/9/13)
California Association of Competitive Telecommunications
Companies
California Cable and Telecommunications Association
COX Communications
OPPOSITION : (Verified 9/9/13)
Public Utilities Commission
ASSEMBLY FLOOR : 50-21, 5/16/13
AYES: Achadjian, Alejo, Ammiano, Atkins, Bloom, Blumenfield,
Bocanegra, Bonilla, Bonta, Bradford, Brown, Ian Calderon,
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Campos, Chau, Chesbro, Cooley, Daly, Dickinson, Eggman, Fong,
Frazier, Garcia, Gatto, Gomez, Gordon, Gray, Hagman, Hall,
Roger Hernández, Jones-Sawyer, Levine, Lowenthal, Medina,
Mitchell, Mullin, Muratsuchi, Nazarian, Pan, Perea, V. Manuel
Pérez, Quirk, Rendon, Skinner, Ting, Torres, Weber,
Wieckowski, Williams, Yamada, John A. Pérez
NOES: Bigelow, Chávez, Conway, Dahle, Donnelly, Fox, Gorell,
Harkey, Jones, Linder, Logue, Maienschein, Mansoor, Nestande,
Olsen, Patterson, Quirk-Silva, Salas, Wagner, Waldron, Wilk
NO VOTE RECORDED: Allen, Buchanan, Beth Gaines, Grove, Holden,
Melendez, Morrell, Stone, Vacancy
JG:k 9/9/13 Senate Floor Analyses
SUPPORT/OPPOSITION: SEE ABOVE
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