AgdaPkt 2006-07-10 - Laserfiche WebLink

Browse Search

AS 2987 Continued from Page 1... The league and the Califomia State Association of Counties (CSAC) strongly opposed the amendment. We question whether the California Constitution wiU allow the Legislature to pass a statute authorizing the abrogation of a local contract. We believe that the matter will quickly become the subject of a lawsuit if a cable company attempts to implement these provisions. The abrogation amendment was one of a number of amendments taken by the committee during a three hour hearing on June 29, during which the committee took up and discussed in detail most of the issues identified with the bill. A number of issues appear to be largely resolved to the satisfaction of almost all parties - although most people have yet to see the actual language of the agreements they approved in principle. There are a few outstanding issues that were not resolved. These will be worked on during the July break, and amendments presented when the bill is heard in Senate Appropriations in August. Several members of the committee - including Chair Martha Escutia and Sans, Kevin Murray and Joseph Simitian, who were the most active of the Energy Committee members in terms of asking questions and pressing for answers - are also members of Appropriations. The following is a summary of the actions and status of the issues with the bill. Abrogation of existing franchise agreements. The committee accepted an amendment allowing cable companies to opt out of their franchise agreements 10 days atter a competitor comes announces that they have received a franchise to deploy service in the cable company's service territory. The argument put forward by cable is that this occurs under "limited circumstances. (when a competitor comes to town), is likely to occur only rarely, will protect consumers from unequal levels of fees, and will have a "de minimis" impact on local agencies. Verizon and AT&T signed off; the League and CSAC will strongly oppose. Fee v. tax. The issue is whether the franchise fee should be imposed by locals or by the state. Amendments drafted by Legislative Counsel were taken to clarify that this is a state-imposed fee that will be paid to local agencies for the use the public's right of way. The League and CSAC agreed to this language, although we also proposed a contingency provision stating that if state- imposition is found invalid, the fee may be imposed locally, That provision is still in play, but the committee didn't adopt it, and Nunez said he'll consider it Definition of general revenues. Agreement was reached in part: references to "Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. will be deleted, as requested by the League. Further work on the question of "bundling" services - another league suggestion - was accepted in principle but language will be the subject of more discussion. The committee members and Speaker Núi'lez agreed that the goal should be to keep local governments whole, Local control over rights-of-way. Amendments were taken to clarify that local agencies retain full authority over the time, manner and place of use of ROw. Non-discriminatlon/Build-out. Most of the discussion focused on these provisions, with the committee agreeing that additional amendments were needed to strengthen build-out requirements. Nunez said he would be offering amendments that among other things will provide that build-out requirements are only triggered when the telcos reach a 30% market share. However, he didn't provide written amendments to the public, so the details are unclear. Senators Murray and Escutia had big problems w~h the 30% figure, questioning whether the telcos are likely to reach that figure. After much discussion the committee moved on, so we assume (in the absence of seeing any language) that for now the provision remains the same, with one exception: the committee was adamantly opposed to allowing telephone companies to 9A Page 1 a 2