Accompanying attachments FSN Main and Reply Briefs CAUSE-PA Statement Number 1 (Direct Testimony of Miller) Statement Number 1-SR (Surrebuttal Testimony of Miller) Statement Number 2 (Direct Testimony of Pinsker) Accompanying attachments CAUSE-PA Main and Reply Briefs PTA PTA Main Brief Certification Order at 5-6. Pursuant to the Certification Order, the Petition is presently before the Commission for decision. D. Legal Standards We note at the outset that any issue that we do not specifically address shall be deemed to have been duly considered and will be denied without further discussion. The Commission is not required to consider expressly or at length each contention or argument raised by the Parties. Consolidated Rail Corp. v. Pa. PUC, 625 A.2d 741 (Pa. Cmwlth. 1993); also see, generally, University of Pennsylvania v. Pa. PUC, 485 A.2d 1217 (Pa. Cmwlth. 1984). Verizon bears the burden of proof in this proceeding, both as the proponent of a rule or order and also pursuant to the terms of Section 3016 of the Code establishing Verizon’s right to file this Petition. 66 Pa. C.S. §§ 332(a), 3016(a)(4). Courts have held
forth by opposing Parties that cable telephony is not universally available throughout each wire center. As noted supra, the OCA contends that each and every customer in a wire center must have access to cable telephony before the wire center is determined to be competitive. We disagree. As Verizon observed, in a competitive market, such as the one that we find to exist in the wire centers in Verizon’s Petition Area, pricing and service quality are set at the margin and not on the circumstances of an individual customer. Therefore, even without personal access to cable service, all customers in wire centers benefit from the competitive pressures created by the widespread availability of cable and wireless service. We are of the opinion that the discipline afforded by competition, coupled with Verizon’s continued commitment to maintaining its COLR obligation, helps ensure that all consumers located in the wire centers subject to the Petition will have access to affordable basic local exchange service. Additionally, businesses such as cable companies, that have no COLR obligation, build out their networks based upon an analysis of whether such deployment is profitable. Consequently, we are reluctant to use a one hundred percent standard because we believe it holds the competitive determination hostage to the cable companies’ proprietary deployment plans. We also acknowledge that it has become increasingly difficult to identify, with precision, the alternative service providers that are present in Pennsylvania, including providers of cable telephony. This is especially true when attempting to identify competitors at the wire center level. Verizon St. 1.0 at Accordingly, we reject the argument that cable service must be one hundred percent available in a wire center for this wire center to be declared competitive. Notwithstanding the above, we also acknowledge the need to be as granular as reasonably possible when determining a cable telephony coverage standard, given the evidence indicating that cable telephony is the primary facilities-based competitor of basic local exchange service for residential customers in many of the wire centers in Verizon’s Petition Area. Therefore, we will consider cable telephony as sufficiently
negative option (“contact us if you do not accept the website terms…”) may form the basis of constructive knowledge by the customer. Affirmative acceptance by the customer will not be required, although Verizon may wish to do so to ensure proper contract formation. While rates will not be regulated in competitive wire centers, we shall require Verizon to maintain at the Commission price lists for basic local exchange service, including dial-tone and usage rates, and to file changes upon one day’s notice as we have done with other competitive services. In the event of a change in local service rates in a competitive exchange, Verizon shall be required to give thirty days’ advance notice to retail customers receiving such service. This same thirty days’ notice of a retail price change shall be given to CLECs purchasing discounted local service in competitive wire centers. C. Verizon’s Petition for Waiver of Regulations in 52 Pa. Code Chapters 63 and Chapter 64 In its Petition, Verizon requests a waiver until December 31, 2025, of the following Subchapters of Chapter 63 of the Commission’s Regulations found in Title 52 of the Pennsylvania Code: B (Services and Facilities); C (Accounts and Records); E (Quality of Service); F (Extended Area Service); and G (Public Coin Services). Verizon also requests an eleven-year waiver for the entirety of Chapter 64 of the Commission’s Regulations. 1. Legal Standard for Waivers a. Positions of the Parties i. Verizon
government-created money flow from one company to another” through the historic development of access rates, the existence of which Verizon has in the past consistently admitted, further proves the existence of a subsidy, which while not a problem then is now that carriers compete and must be eliminated under Chapter 30. Id. at 2, 5-8. AT&T contends that the logic of those Parties that oppose revenue-neutral access to local rebalancing is puzzling. In AT&T’s view, because such rebalancing is revenue-neutral, Verizon should not object. Further, AT&T asserts that the impact on local rates would not “genuinely impact either affordability or universal service, especially given Verizon’s remarkably low local exchange rate.” Id. at 3. According to AT&T, “Verizon simply wants it both ways: to maintain monopoly subsidies while it enjoys the benefits of expanded competitive classification. That is contrary to Pennsylvania law.” Id. at 4. In response to criticism of other Parties regarding the lack of cost support, AT&T contends that neither Verizon nor the OCA identifies any state that has required a cost study or required a stand-alone cost test to prove a subsidy. AT&T further contends that this Commission “can take notice that reciprocal compensation and switched access involve materially the same network functionality, yet the FCC (prior to adopting found that a reasonable reciprocal compensation rate was $0.0007 cents per minute.” AT&T R.B. at 8. AT&T asserts that a simple comparison of rates “indicates that the access rate is being used to subsidize local service[.]” Id. In response to the OCA’s argument that access rates must exceed the stand-alone cost of access service before they can provide a subsidy, AT&T contends that from an economic perspective, a subsidy exists when the price of a product X is insufficient to cover its incremental cost, but the firm prices its other products sufficiently to cover their incremental costs and the other firm costs. AT&T concludes that there is no doubt that Verizon’s originating access rates are priced above incremental costs and a subsidy is provided. AT&T R.B. at 9-10.