Opinion ID: 185358
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Trigger Level Selection

Text: 52 Petitioners' objections to the specific collocation thresholds established by the FCC are no more than policy differences with the Commission. Like any agency, the FCC must provide a rational basis when setting a number for a standard, but it is not held to a standard of perfection. The standard for reviewing such determinations was outlined in WJG Telephone Co. v. FCC: 53 It is true that an agency may not pluck a number out of thin air when it promulgates rules in which percentage terms play a critical role. When a line has to be drawn, however, the Commission is authorized to make a rational legislative-type judgment. If the figure selected by the agency reflects its informed discretion, and is neither patently unreasonable nor a dictate of unbridled whim, then the agency's decision adequately satisfies the standard of review. 54 675 F.2d 386, 388-89 (D.C. Cir. 1982) (citations omitted); accord NARUC, 737 F.2d at 1141. 55 Petitioners are correct that the Commission may not evade review of its decision-making merely by asserting that the thresholds were policy determinations. See San Antonio v. United States, 631 F.2d 831, 852 (D.C. Cir. 1980) (That a decision involves a policy judgment does not excuse the [agency] from articulating fully and carefully the methods by which, and the purposes for which, it has chosen to act.) (internal quotes omitted). Yet the FCC is not required to identify the optimal threshold with pinpoint precision. It is only required to identify the standard and explain its relationship to the underlying regulatory concerns. The FCC notes that this court is generally unwilling to review line-drawing performed by the Commission unless a petitioner can demonstrate that lines drawn ... are patently unreasonable, having no relationship to the underlying regulatory problem. Cassell v. FCC, 154 F.3d 478, 485 (D.C. Cir. 1998) (internal quotations omitted). The relevant question is whether the agency's numbers are within a 'zone of reasonableness,' not whether its numbers are precisely right. Hercules Inc. v. EPA, 598 F.2d 91, 107-08 (D.C. Cir. 1978). Indeed, just last term we held that the Commission has wide discretion to determine where to draw administrative lines, and appellants point to nothing suggesting that the agency abused its discretion in drawing the line[s] where it did. AT&T Corp., 220 F.3d at 627. 56 The FCC made a predictive judgment that the amount of collocation required for each trigger will be sufficient to constrain anticompetitive practices by incumbent LECs. The FCC also looked at areas where there was substantial collocation to determine whether that correlated with substantial involvement in competitive transport facilities. See, e.g., Order p p 81, 95. For example, the FCC reviewed evidence that collocation in approximately eighteen percent of wire centers corresponded to over 2,000 miles of competitive fiber facilities. See id. p 95. The FCC also notes that there are reasons to believe that, if anything, collocation underestimates competition in relevant markets as it fails to account for the presence of competitors that ... have wholly bypassed incumbent LEC facilities. Id. Weighing these factors, the FCC concluded that its collocation triggers were sufficiently protective of the public interest. This is precisely the sort of rational legislative-type judgment the FCC is empowered to exercise and we are required to respect. 57