Verizon: Don't Blame Us for Charter Missing Broadband Condition

Verizon denied it unlawfully delayed pole access to Charter Communications in New York state. Charter complained at the New York Public Service Commission that Verizon, plus Frontier and an electric company, kept it from meeting the broadband deployment commitment it made to the New York Public Service Commission when the agency approved the cable provider's buy of Time Warner Cable (see 1707170051). “Verizon has been working cooperatively with Charter to address its pole access needs, and will continue to,” Verizon responded Tuesday in Case 15-M-0388. “Unfortunately, Verizon’s efforts to facilitate access to Verizon’s facilities for Charter were ... consistently met with slow or no action by Charter. It is Charter, not Verizon, who is responsible for its failure to meet its first-year benchmark, and the Commission should dismiss Charter’s complaint and reject Charter’s transparent attempt to deflect the blame for its own failures onto Verizon.”