Barry Smith/Carolina Journal News
♦ Wilson, N.C. Asks FCC to Void Municipal Broadband Limits:
“Spiwak said the issue at hand is not whether municipal broadband is good or bad. It’s whether the FCC has the authority to pre-empt state law that regulates municipalities, which are creations of the state.
“The issue is not the question of the merits of municipal broadband,” Spiwak said, which he argues is an issue that should be decided by state legislatures. “North Carolina passed [its] law; Tennessee passed [its] law,” Spiwak said, noting there are grandfather provisions covering municipalities that already had broadband service.
“Now you’ve got a state law that says these are the parameters,” Spiwak said. “Having failed in the statehouse to win the debate, they’re trying to look for other ways to get around it.”
Rep. Marilyn Avila, R-Wake, who sponsored the 2011 bill, said that it doesn’t ban cities from providing broadband service. It merely places some restrictions binding them.
“My first foray into it was the free enterprise end of it,” Avila said, noting that North Carolina has the Umstead Act, which prohibits many state entities from selling goods and services in competition with private enterprise.
By the time she introduced the 2011 bill, Avila said she had done further research and learned that municipalities were issuing debt for broadband and bypassing voters. They did this by issuing Certificates of Participation, a method governments use to borrow money without having to get voter approval.
“Wilson wants to move out into the six counties where they have electric service,” Avila said. “If they borrow the money to go out in those six counties, the only people that are responsible for paying it are the citizens of the town of Wilson,” Avila said.” Barry Smith, Carolina Journal News
http://www.carolinajournal.com/exclusives/display_exclusive.html?id=11352
