WASHINGTON-In a policy paper presented to the Rural Task Force on universal service,
Western Wireless Corp. reiterated that rural local exchange carriers should not get special treatment from
regulators.
Gene DeJordy, executive director of regulatory affairs for Western Wireless, is the only wireless
representative on the rural task force. Western competes with rural LECs, offering service in Regent, N.D., and to an
area that Nevada Bell would not serve because it was too expensive for the LEC.
The policy paper says competition
in rural America has been slower-some say it’s even non-existent for residential customers-to develop than in urban
areas because rural LECs are able to collect universal-service subsidies.
Indeed, while the FCC is expected to put in
place new universal service rules for areas served by large incumbent LECs, it does not plan to delve into the rural
areas until well after the turn of the millennium.
Changes to the universal service program are necessary because the
Telecommunications Act of 1996 required the FCC and states to replace the existing implicit subsidies exclusively
going to ILECs with a competitively neutral system of subsidies available to any company that would serve a particular
area.
