The Honorable Byron Dorgan
United States Senate
SH-713 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
Dear Senator Dorgan:
As a member of the so-called "Farm Team" during the deliberations over the Telecommunications Act of 1996, you and your colleagues worked hard to ensure that the legislation would protect rural America's interests. The recently released "Recommended Decision" by the Federal/State Joint Board on Universal Service, however, raises serious concerns whether rural America will be protected as you intended.
The Recommended Decision proposes to cut universal service support for all rural small businesses. Multi-line rural small businesses will lose all support immediately. Support for single-line rural small businesses will be cut initially by an undefined amount with a complete elimination of such support suggested for the future. Although only very rough estimates of the impact of these cuts are available, the impact of a total elimination of support for small businesses is estimated at between $1-3 billion annually.
Rural businesses are not the only ones that will face higher telephone costs. Rural town halls, police stations, churches, school boards, nursing homes and state rural health centers will also face significant rate increases as a result of the Joint Board's recommendations.
Nothing in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 mandates these cuts. In fact, the legislative history clearly suggests that most Senators believed they were protecting all Americans - rural and urban alike - by passing the Act. The Joint Board, however, has recommended cutting one of the chief rural support programs that the Act was to protect.
The Joint Board's proposed decision is likely to cause significant rate increases for small rural businesses and discourage growth. Higher rates would also limit small rural institutions' access to advanced telecommunications services like the internet, tending further to isolate rural America - precisely the opposite of Congress' intent in passing the 1996 Act. Ultimately, the Joint Board's recommendation could have a serious adverse impact on the economic structure of rural America.
The FCC will be making the key decisions on this issue in the near future. I urge you to consider the attached materials and express your concerns over this part of the decision to both the Joint Board and the Commission. If you have any questions regarding this vital issue for rural America, please feel free to contact me or David Zesiger of my staff at 202/205-6532.
Sincerely,
Jere W. Glover
Chief Counsel
Enclosures
Same letter send to:
Honoralbe Ted Stevens
Honorable J. Robert Kerrey
* Last Modified: 6/14/01