Rural Counties Oppose AT&T Calif. Relief Request

The California Public Utilities Commission shouldn’t relieve AT&T of carrier of last resort and other obligations until it completes a proceeding to establish service-quality standards for non-wireline telephone services, Rural County Representatives of California said Monday. AT&T cited VoIP alternatives in its request for relief. “Until the Commission equitably measures and treats new and evolving telephone and broadband services, it is premature to force existing customers to abruptly relinquish their current services for known inferior options, especially higher-priced ones, when they do not provide equivalent protections of plain old telephone service (POTS),” RCRC said in docket A.23-03-003.