(Washington, DC) - The Competitive Broadband
Coalition (CBC) today announced that the Montana Telecommunications
Association has officially joined as an association member.
The Montana Telecommunications Association (MTA)
represents independent telephone companies, cooperatives, and other
telecommunications service providers doing business in Montana.
Montana's independent rural telephone companies provide service
covering over 80 percent of the state's geography, or nearly 120,000
square miles. These companies are developing the infrastructure to
expand their products and services, investing over $70 million in
1998 alone and increasing on their nearly 5,000 miles of fiber
plant.
Joining with the other members of the CBC, they
will fight to maintain a competitive market place, as was envisioned
in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, to deliver innovations and
new technologies to Americans everywhere.
In a prepared statement, Geoff Feiss, Managing
Director of the MTA, and David Rubashkin, Managing Director of the
CBC, had the following to say, “We look forward to working together
to protect the tenets of The Telecom Act of 1996. The 1996 Act has
delivered more competition, more investment in broadband and telecom
technology, more jobs, and more consumer benefits. We must fight to
see that this continues.”
“Legislative efforts (Tauzin-Dingell, HR 2420;
Goodlatte-Boucher, HR 1685 and HR 1686; and Brownback, S 877), led
by the Bell monopolies to repeal the Act’s crucial market opening
provisions would discourage competition in local telecommunications
markets and dramatically slow the deployment of broadband services
to rural America. Because of the dangers that could result from
these bills, we ask Congress to join us in our opposition and reject
them.”
# # #
The Competitive Broadband Coalition members
include the Association of Communications Enterprises (ASCENT), the
Association for Local Telecommunications Services (ALTS), AT&T,
the Commercial Internet eXchange Association (CIX), CompTel
(Competitive Telecommunications Association), Cable & Wireless,
Information Technology Association of America (ITAA), Montana
Telecommunications Association, Personal Communications Industry
Association (PCIA), Sprint, Touch America and WorldCom. More
information can be found at http://www.competitivebroadband.org/1041/home.jsp
