Copyright 2000 Federal News Service, Inc.
Federal News Service
July 20, 2000, Thursday
SECTION: PREPARED TESTIMONY
LENGTH: 1125 words
HEADLINE:
PREPARED TESTIMONY OF DAVID COLE SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT OF OPERATIONS SUPPORT
CENTURYTEL
BEFORE THE HOUSE COMMERCE COMMITTEE
HOUSE TELECOMMUNICATIONS, TRADE AND CONSUMER PROTECTION
SUBCOMMITTEE
SUBJECT - INDEPENDENT TELECOMMUNICATIONS CONSUMER
ENHANCEMENT ACT OF 2000; HR 3850
BODY:
SUMMARY OF TESTIMONY
CenturyTel, Inc. is a leading provider of
integrated telecommunications services to more than 2 million customers in
mostly rural and small metropolitan markets in 20 states, including Louisiana,
Wyoming, Ohio, Mississippi, Tennessee, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Texas.
CenturyTel urges passage of H.R. 3850 as a common-sense way to reduce and
eliminate outdated and duplicative regulatory burdens for the nation's midsize
and smaller incumbent local exchange carriers. In doing so, H.R. 3850 will free
up resources for CenturyTel and other carders to use to launch competitive
ventures and deploy digital subscriber line (DSL) broadband
Internet access technology to Americans living in rural areas and small towns
nationwide.
Two portions of H.R. 3850 are of particular importance to
CenturyTel: First, section 4/285 and 5 streamline the FCC's review of mergers.
Extended merger review processes at the FCC delay the pro-consumer effects of
small and midsize company mergers, and add unnecessary, but substantial,
compliance costs. Second, section 284, addressing participation in price cap
regulation and the National Exchange Carrier Association (NECA) common line
pool, would help to bring the well-recognized benefits of price cap regulation
to midsize company customers across the nation. Although price caps regulation
won't work for all of our companies, we should be allowed to adopt price caps to
the maximum extent feasible for our companies. In addition, section 284 would
streamline approval processes for acquisitions of lines from Bell operating
companies that are existing rural and small town telecommunications markets.
CenturyTel urges the Committee to press forward with the regulatory and
FCC reform proposals reflected in H.R.3850 to facilitate growth of carriers like
CenturyTel outside of their traditional local exchange regions and to accelerate
the deployment of services such as DSL Internet access to rural
and small town Americans nationwide.
*********
STATEMENT OF
DAVID COLE
Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee.
Thank you for your interest in the issues we are discussing today and thank you
for inviting CenturyTel to participate.
My name is David Cole. I am
Senior Vice President of Operations Support for CenturyTel, headquartered in
Monroe, Louisiana. CenturyTel is a leading provider of integrated
telecommunications services in mostly rural and small metropolitan markets.
We serve small markets throughout Louisiana, Ohio, Mississippi,
Tennessee, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Texas. We also serve Pinedale, Big Piney,
Farson and Medicine Bow in Wyoming and we are especially appreciative of the
leadership of Ms. Cubin, Mr. Pickering, Mr. Gordon and Mr. Barrett in
introducing HR. 3850.
Many of our markets may be rural and small, but
our customers demand and deserve the highest quality telecommunications services
available. I am proud to say that CenturyTel has made the commitment to serve
these markets by working to provide the same variety of high-quality services
that are available here in downtown Washington.
We have already deployed
broadband digital subscriber line service in Ohio, Wisconsin, Texas, Montana,
and Washington state, and we plan to spend about $20 million
more to make DSL service available to over 40 percent of our
telephone customers this year. I want to spend just a few minutes today on some
of the provisions of this legislation that are most important to CenturyTel:
merger review and price cap and pooling waivers.
Last summer,
CenturyTel, by itself and in partnership with Spectra Communications Group and
Telephone USA of Wisconsin, signed agreements with GTE to purchase approximately
460,000 access lines in Arkansas, Missouri and Wisconsin. These are exchanges
that GTE no longer wanted to serve, and that closely complement CenturyTel's
existing operations.
Once we are able to begin serving these exchanges,
we plan to spend millions of dollars upgrading the facilities in these states
and launching new services, including dial-up and broadband Internet access, but
also including some very common services that these customers currently cannot
access. These new services include the offering in these communities - for the
first time, in many cases - of voice mail, call waiting, caller ID, and other
services that you and I have enjoyed for years.
Today, as we speak,
three of the four acquisitions we filled at the FCC this past spring involving
more than two hundred twenty thousand access lines are still waiting for FCC
approval. One of these transactions will create the nation's first
African-American-owned local exchange carrier, operating in Missouri.
These past few months have been expensive ones for CenturyTel. We have
assembled a team of well over 100 employees to make these transactions a
reality. Both companies are ready to close and all state approvals have been
received; however, we and our future customers still wait. In order to complete
these transactions, we must also seek and obtain Commission approval for a set
of rule waivers, including waivers of the price cap, common line pooling, and
study area boundary rules. These waivers are routinely granted to all applicants
because they raise no substantial policy or legal issues. Although routine, the
process normally takes a number of months to complete, and the FCC has no
established deadlines within which to complete its review.
Therefore, we
have been unable to close on any of these transactions, largely because of
regulatory delays at the Commission. Rapid approval of transactions like this -
and there will be more of them if the RBOCs divest more rural properties - are
in the best interest of consumers.
Apart from the transactional context,
the Commission's rules prohibiting CenturyTel to elect price cap regulation for
individual operating companies are outdated and deny the benefits of price caps
to hundreds of thousands of midsize carrier customers nationwide. Although price
caps regulation won't work for all of CenturyTel's companies, it would make
sense for some. However, the Commission's current rules prevent us from
implementing price caps in this manner.
CONCLUSION In conclusion, Mr.
Chairman and members of the Committee, I urge you to press forward with the
regulatory and FCC reform efforts reflected in the legislation before you today.
The changes it would make are essential to permit carriers like CenturyTel to
compete in today's new world of telecommunications, and to deploy
DSL Internet access and other advanced communications services
to our customers.
Thank you again for the opportunity to appear before
you today, and I look forward to responding to your questions.
END
LOAD-DATE: July 22, 2000 
