Advocates, Providers Welcome Inmate Calling Draft; Some Changes Sought

Inmate calling services providers and consumer advocacy organizations welcomed a draft NPRM and order the FCC will consider during the commissioners' open meeting Thursday that would begin implementation of the Martha Wright-Reed Just and Reasonable Communications Act of 2022. Advocates sought some clarifying language in the final item, and ICS providers sought additional language in the draft on how the agency should establish just and reasonable rates.

Consumer advocacy organizations United Church of Christ Media Justice Ministry, Worth Rises, Telecom for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, along with the Wright Petitioners, welcomed the draft and sought minor clarifications, in separate meetings with aides to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and Commissioner Geoffrey Starks. TDI sought clarifying language about accessibility requirements for electronic messaging and interoperable videoconferencing services. The United Church of Christ Media Justice Ministry asked the FCC to "seek comment broadly on the scope of its preemption authority." Worth Rises asked the FCC to seek comment on whether "safety and security" is different from "security and surveillance."

Worth Rises, TDI and the Samuelson-Glushko Technology Law & Policy Clinic at Colorado Law raised similar issues in separate meetings with aides to Commissioners Nathan Simington and Brendan Carr. “We do feel like all the offices were receptive as they were slight and clarify edits,” emailed Worth Rises Executive Director Bianca Tylek.

NCIC Communications asked the FCC to include a question about whether ICS calls should be exempt from Universal Service Fund fees. “USF fees on ICS calls result in higher-than-necessary rates for many people least able to afford them and frustrate Congress’s intent to cause the commission to set just and reasonable ICS rates,” the provider said in a letter posted last week in docket 12-375. NCIC noted the maximum rate for a 15-minute call from all prisons increased from $2.10 to $2.76 as a result of the Q1 2023 USF contribution factor.

The FCC should "clarify that it intends to resolve the pending issues" in its current docket, Securus told aides to all commissioners in separate meetings per an ex parte filing posted last week. The draft item would establish a new docket, 23-62, to address the issues. There's "no legal or procedural bar" to adopting permanent ICS rates in the current docket and addressing existing issues under consideration before the 18–24-month deadline Congress gave the FCC to implement the Martha Wright-Reed Act, the provider said.

The draft “signals that it is likely to preempt higher state rates, but may allow states to set their own, lower intrastate rates, potentially without regard to the Martha Wright-Reed Act’s standards,” Securus said. It asked the FCC to seek comment on the law’s impact on the commission’s “impossibility analysis that currently preempts higher, but not lower, state rates for indeterminate calls.” Securus also raised concerns about whether the draft takes a "balanced approach" and sought language that would seek comment on how to "give effect to both the fair compensation prong and the just and reasonable prong of the ratemaking standard."

Some advocates raised concerns about Securus' suggestions. The provider is "arguing for increases in the FCC’s rate caps and trying to block states from instituting rates caps lower than the FCC’s," Tylek told us. It's “remarkable and unfortunately predictable” that Securus is “seeking to eliminate state efforts to adopt intrastate rates lower than existing federal caps,” emailed Cheryl Leanza, policy adviser for the UCC Media Justice Ministry: “This kind of advocacy confirms Securus’ predatory business model -- no name change or advisory councils can wash it away.” Securus didn’t comment, although it told the FCC it "looks forward to working with" the commission as it implements the Martha Wright-Reed Act to "ensure that intrastate and interstate rates ... comply with the dual goals of fairly compensating providers and assuring just and reasonable rates for consumers."