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From MultiChannel News

AT&T Files More Lawsuits Against Ill. Towns
From Multichannel News, May 4, 2006
By Linda Haugsted

Four more Chicago suburbs were sued by AT&T Inc. for delaying plant improvements that will lead to a launch later of the telephone company’s video service.

The new defendants are Itasca, North Aurora, Wood Dale and Geneva. Suits were filed against the Illinois communities May 2 in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. Previously, AT&T sued the communities of Carpentersville, Roselle and Wheaton, Ill., as well as two communities in California.

from: Digital Destiny

Telco/Cable TV lobbying Blitz Costing Nearly $1 Mil Per Week in DC Market/ Big Bucks Spent to Pave Way for Broadband Monopolies

Everyone has seen the TV ads from both the phone and cable lobby urging Congress to support their plans to control the future of the broadband Internet in the U.S. Companies such as Qwest, Comcast, Time Warner, and AT&T want to be broadband barons—with all other content providers and users reduced to serving as merely consuming digital surfs.

By KURT HAUGLIE, Gazette Writer
April 14

OSCEOLA TOWNSHIP — Osceola Township Supervisor Steven Karpiak is concerned that local governments may be about to lose control of cable communication access and franchise fees in their communities if proposed legislation in Lansing becomes law.

The legislation, which is being promoted by telecommunications companies AT&T and Verizon in states around the country, would place the decision about where cable is installed with state government. . .

from: TMC Net

[April 13, 2006]

Swarming Capitol paid off for SBC

(San Antonio Express-News (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Apr. 13--During the 2005 Legislature, the halls of the Texas Capitol were thick with SBC Communications Inc. lobbyists touting the benefits of a bill that would deregulate the phone giant and ease its entry into the video business.

from Maine Townsman, March 2006
By Lee Burnett, Freelance Writer

These may be the good old days of public access TV.

The funding mechanism for public access TV – local franchising – is under attack in Congress. The big telephone companies Verizon, AT&T and SBC want to enter the lucrative home video market without having to negotiate local franchise agreements with every community, as cable TV companies have been required to do. The telcos are pressuring Congress for a national franchising system or, at the very least, a state franchising system.