Bill Text: CA AB1409 | 2013-2014 | Regular Session | Enrolled
Bill Title: Public utilities: voice communications: Moore Universal
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)
Status: (Vetoed) 2014-03-06 - Last day to consider Governor's veto pursuant to Joint Rule 58.5. [AB1409 Detail]
Download: California-2013-AB1409-Enrolled.html
BILL NUMBER: AB 1409 ENROLLED
BILL TEXT
PASSED THE SENATE SEPTEMBER 11, 2013
PASSED THE ASSEMBLY SEPTEMBER 12, 2013
AMENDED IN SENATE SEPTEMBER 6, 2013
AMENDED IN SENATE JULY 10, 2013
INTRODUCED BY Assembly Member Bradford
MARCH 13, 2013
An act to amend Section 1904 of, to add Sections 881, 881.5, and
1001.7 to, and to repeal Section 1906 of, the Public Utilities Code,
relating to public utilities, and declaring the urgency thereof, to
take effect immediately.
LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL'S DIGEST
AB 1409, Bradford. Public utilities: voice communications: Moore
Universal Telephone Service Act.
(1) Under existing law, the Public Utilities Commission has
regulatory authority over public utilities, as defined. Existing law
allows the commission to charge and collect a fee of $75 for filing
each application for a certificate of public convenience and
necessity, or for the mortgage, lease, transfer, or assignment of a
certificate.
This bill would instead require the fee to not exceed the
reasonable costs to the commission for filing these applications. The
bill would authorize the fee in an amount not to exceed $500 and
would authorize the commission to adjust this fee based on the
Consumer Price Index.
(2) Existing law establishes the Public Utilities Commission
Utilities Reimbursement Account in the General Fund and generally
provides that all fees and charges collected under the Public
Utilities Code, except penalties, from each public utility be paid
into the fund. Other existing law provides that specified fees,
including, but not limited to, the fee for filing each application
for a certificate of public convenience and necessity, 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 General Fund.
This bill would repeal the provision that requires certain fees to
be paid at least once each month into the State Treasury to the
General Fund.
(3) Existing law, 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 is required to establish
periodically, taking into account advances in telecommunications and
information technologies and services. Pursuant to the act, the
Federal Communications Commission has established and revised a
lifeline program that is available for qualifying low-income
consumers.
The Moore Universal Telephone Service Act establishes the
Universal Lifeline Telephone Service program in order to provide
low-income households with access to affordable basic residential
telephone service. Existing law establishes the Universal Lifeline
Telephone Service Trust Administrative Committee Fund in the State
Treasury. The Moore Universal Telephone Service Act requires the
commission to annually 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.
This bill would require the commission to adopt rules by June 1,
2014, authorizing an alternative provider of voice communications
service to voluntarily participate in the state lifeline program
pursuant to the Moore Universal Telephone Service Act. The bill would
require that the rules, among other things, not prevent or delay any
alternative provider of voice communications service from
participating based on the technology utilized to provide service and
provide reimbursement to all participating lifeline providers on a
nondiscriminatory basis. The bill would prohibit the commission, in
exercising its delegated authority under federal law to designate
eligible telecommunications carriers, or in exercising its authority
to authorize an alternative provider of voice communications service
to participate in the state lifeline program, to deny a request to be
designated as a lifeline provider based on the requesting entity
providing any Voice over Internet Protocol or Internet Protocol
enabled service. The bill would provide 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.
(4) 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 commission a certificate that the present or future
public convenience and necessity require or will require that
construction.
This bill would prohibit the commission from denying or revoking a
certificate of public convenience and necessity 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 Voice over Internet Protocol service or any
other unregulated service.
(5) Under existing law, a violation of the Public Utilities Act or
any order, decision, rule, direction, demand, or requirement of the
commission is a crime.
Because the provisions of this bill would be a part of the act and
would require action by the Public Utilities Commission to implement
its requirements, and because the bill would expand the class of
lifeline providers, the bill would impose a state-mandated local
program by expanding the scope of a crime.
The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local
agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the
state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that
reimbursement.
This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this
act for a specified reason.
(6) This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately
as an urgency statute.
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:
SECTION 1. Section 881 is added to the Public Utilities Code, to
read:
881. (a) By June 1, 2014, the commission shall adopt rules that
are applicable to all lifeline service providers, including providers
using alternative technologies. The rules shall do all of the
following:
(1) Not prevent or delay any alternative provider of voice
communications service from participating based on the technology
utilized to provide service, including any Voice over Internet
Protocol or Internet Protocol enabled service, notwithstanding
Section 710.
(2) Provide reimbursement to all participating lifeline providers
on a nondiscriminatory basis.
(3) 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 pursuant to the
federal lifeline program.
(b) The commission shall not, in exercising its delegated
authority under federal law to designate eligible telecommunications
carriers, or in exercising its authority under this section 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 Voice over Internet Protocol or Internet Protocol
enabled service.
SEC. 2. Section 881.5 is added to the Public Utilities Code, to
read:
881.5. Notwithstanding Section 270, a lifeline provider,
including a lifeline provider that is not a telephone corporation,
shall be eligible for reimbursement from the Universal Lifeline
Telephone Service Trust Administrative Committee Fund.
SEC. 3. Section 1001.7 is added to the Public Utilities Code, to
read:
1001.7. The commission shall neither deny nor revoke a
certificate of public convenience and necessity 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 Voice over Internet Protocol service or any
other unregulated service. This section does not expand the
commission's existing jurisdiction over any service or affect any
provision of Section 710. This section does not give any telephone
corporation any new rights or powers.
SEC. 4. Section 1904 of the Public Utilities Code is amended to
read:
1904. The commission shall also charge and collect the following
fees:
(a) Except as otherwise provided in Section 1036 for filing each
application for a certificate of public convenience and necessity, or
for the mortgage, lease, transfer, or assignment thereof, an amount
not to exceed five hundred dollars ($500). The commission may adjust
this fee based on the Consumer Price Index. The fee charged and
collected pursuant to this subdivision shall not exceed the
reasonable costs to the commission for filing the application.
(b) For a certificate authorizing an issue of bonds, notes, or
other evidences of indebtedness, two dollars ($2) for each one
thousand dollars ($1,000) of the face value of the authorized issue
or fraction thereof up to one million dollars ($1,000,000), one
dollar ($1) for each one thousand dollars ($1,000) over one million
dollars ($1,000,000) and up to ten million dollars ($10,000,000), and
fifty cents ($0.50) for each one thousand dollars ($1,000) over ten
million dollars ($10,000,000), with a minimum fee in any case of
fifty dollars ($50). No fee need be paid on such portion of any such
issue as may be used to guarantee, take over, refund, discharge, or
retire any stock, bond, note or other evidence of indebtedness on
which a fee has theretofore been paid to the commission. If the
commission modified the amount of the issue requested in any case and
the applicant thereupon elects not to avail itself of the commission'
s authorization, no fee shall be paid, and if such fee is paid prior
to the issuance of such certificate by the commission, such fee shall
be returned.
SEC. 5. Section 1906 of the Public Utilities Code is repealed.
SEC. 6. No reimbursement is required by this act pursuant to
Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California Constitution because
the only costs that may be incurred by a local agency or school
district will be incurred because this act creates a new crime or
infraction, eliminates a crime or infraction, or changes the penalty
for a crime or infraction, within the meaning of Section 17556 of the
Government Code, or changes the definition of a crime within the
meaning of Section 6 of Article XIII B of the California
Constitution.
SEC. 7. This act is an urgency statute necessary for the immediate
preservation of the public peace, health, or safety within the
meaning of Article IV of the Constitution and shall go into immediate
effect. The facts constituting the necessity are:
In order to ensure that persons qualifying for the lifeline
program have access to the lifeline program and alternative voice
communication technologies necessary to live in a modern society,
including the ability to communicate with social services and first
responders, and to ensure that a telecommunications provider can
provide those services, it is necessary to the health and safety of
the state that this act take effect immediately.
