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from: Boston Globe

Move toward new cable TV rules may short low-income regions

By Associated Press | June 12, 2006

PHILADELPHIA -- Looking to quickly leap into the business of delivering TV broadcasts, telephone companies are leading efforts to rewrite the rules that for decades have given local governments control over who provides cable television in their areas.

Senators of the 109th Congress
List sorted by state. From: senate.gov

Murkowski, Lisa- (R - AK) Class III
709 HART SENATE OFFICE BUILDING WASHINGTON DC 20510
(202) 224-6665
Web Form: murkowski.senate.gov/contact.cfm

Stevens, Ted- (R - AK) Class II
522 HART SENATE OFFICE BUILDING WASHINGTON DC 20510

from: Broadcasting and Cable

Witnesses Set for Senate Hearing

By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 6/12/2006 1:49:00 PM

The Senate Commerce Commiteee has released its witness liest for a Tuesday hearing on its latest take on telecom reform.

Fourteen witnesses are scheduled to weigh in on S. 2686, in what is the last such gathering, though likely not the last draft of the bill, before a June 20 markup.

Talking Points Memo will be tracking individual Senators and their position on Net Neutrality. Their Tally page is at: TMP Talley

from: TMP Media

(June 12, 2006 -- 12:59 AM EDT)

When the TPM Media offices open up tomorrow morning we're going to start compiling a list (mentioned Friday evening) of where every senator stands on Net Neutrality -- Democrats and Republicans. With help from TPM Readers we already got information on several senators. And it was enough to show us that a lot of them -- including a lot of Democrats -- are just trying to avoid giving their constituents any straight answers on where they stand.

from: USA Today

Control over cable TV shifting
Phone companies want power to go to state, fed level

By Deborah Yao
The Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA — Phone companies are leading efforts to rewrite rules giving local governments control over cable TV in their areas.

Under bills passed or pending in at least 14 states and Congress, pay-TV control would shift to state or federal regulators. That would mean phone and cable companies no longer would have to make individual local franchise deals.

from: MultiChannel News

Stevens Modifies Telecom Bill
By Ted Hearn 6/11/2006

Phone companies could enter cable markets within 90 days under streamlined franchising rules and cable incumbents could opt in to the new licensing regime when existing agreements expire or when phone companies arrive in the market, according to new telecommunications draft legislation from Senate Commerce Committee chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) obtained by Multichannel News.

The Senate Commerce Committee is in hearings for S.2686, the Communications, Consumers' Choice, and Broadband Deployment Act of 2006. The mark-up is now scheduled for June 22nd. This is where the wrongs of COPE can be righted. Once passed out of committee, the full Senate will vote on the Bill, it is then resolved with the House Bill in Conference Committee. See our S.2686 page for more info.

from: The Hill

Telecom group spends big to raise industry profile

By Jim Snyder

The lobbying expenditures of the U.S. Telecom Association (USTA) have risen almost as fast as the TVs that soar through roofs in the group’s ubiquitous ad campaign.

Five years ago, USTA spent just over $2 million on lobbying. By last year that figure had risen to nearly $17 million, making the group the sixth biggest spender on K Street and a major contributor to a revival of telecom and high-tech lobbying.

Telco TV boxes may be coming to a sidewalk near you - and there is likely nothing you will be able to do about it! The loss of local control of 'right of way' under new state video franchising laws means that your local city will have to yield control of public spaces to telephone and cable companies operating under those franchises.

from: Broadcasting and Cable

Capitol Expenses
Telcos, cable in fierce legislative fight for new franchise rules

By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 6/5/2006

Turn on the TV or radio in Washington and, from the barrage of advertising, you’ll know what the telephone companies’ legislative/regulatory priority is: video-franchise reform, video-franchise reform, video-franchise reform. The pitched battle between telcos and cable over streamlining the video-franchising process, and between telcos and companies like Google and Yahoo! over access to the Internet side of that franchising equation, has shaped up to be the battle in Washington over the past couple of months.