Month: September 2014

Broadband missing on California's new enhanced infrastructure list

3 September 2014 by Steve Blum
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A deal to give local governments more infrastructure financing options finally came together in the closing hours of the California legislature’s 2014 session. Assuming Governor Brown signs senate bill 628 – likely, considering that his staff was deep in the negotiations that led to it – it’s good news overall for local governments. The measure gives local agencies the ability to create enhanced infrastructure financing districts that can issue bonds to build public facilities and earmark the future tax revenue the project is expected to generate to pay the money back.… More

Future of broadband subsidies in hands of California's governor

2 September 2014 by Steve Blum
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It’s up to California governor Jerry Brown, to decide whether or not to double labor costs and effectively cut broadband construction subsidies from the California Advanced Services Fund in half by requiring all projects it funds to follow union work rules and pay scales.

In lopsided votes that included both democrat and republican support, the California senate and assembly approved assembly bill 2272 last week. According to its author, assemblyman Adam Gray (D – Merced)…

AB 2272 codifies a decision already handed down by the department of industrial relations [DIR] to pay prevailing wage on projects funded by the California Advanced Services Fund.

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Comcast's lobbying is extraordinarily aggressive according to one of its peers

1 September 2014 by Steve Blum
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Comcast is a particularly nasty competitor at the political level, according to comments filed by CenturyLink with the FCC regarding the proposed mega-merger with Time-Warner (h/t to Fierce Cable for the pointer). Although CenturyLink claims to be the “third largest telecommunications provider in the United States”, it also points out that it’s relatively small player in TV terms – 215,000 subs in 12 markets, it says – due in part to Comcast’s unique influence and combative stance with local governments…

Comcast has been uniquely and extraordinarily aggressive in seeking to delay CenturyLink’s entry into new markets.

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