IPCS Providers, Advocates Disagree on Accessibility Petitions

A coalition of consumer advocacy organizations opposed petitions for partial waivers of FCC rules requiring correctional facilities to deploy certain forms of advanced telecom relay services (TRS) by Jan. 1. Requests to extend the deadline "substantially harm incarcerated people with disabilities" and advanced forms of TRS are available, Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of the Deaf, National Association of the Deaf, TDIForAccess, Communication Service for the Deaf and United Church of Christ Media Justice Ministry said in a filing Thursday in docket 23-62. The groups opposed individual petitions filed by Securus, Pay Tel Communications, ViaPath and NCIC Inmate Communications (see 2311220052). PayTel urged the FCC to grant its petition, saying providers of incarcerated people's communications services should "be given sufficient time to develop integrated TRS solutions that are reliable, effective, and cost effective." Deploying advanced forms of TRS in correctional facilities "cannot be accomplished if the required third party services are not available for that particular facility," ViaPath said. The current compliance deadline "did not fully take into account the multi-step processes needed for essentially developing a product from scratch through testing and deployment," said Securus.