By Benjamin Yount Illinois Statehouse News
SPRINGFIELD – People who still have a home phone may be on theirs if lawmakers in Springfield okay the current re-write of Illinois’ telecom laws.
The Illinois House and Senate on Tuesday convened a joint legislative hearing on what would be the first update of the state’s telephone laws since 2001, and the first major re-write of the law in almost two decades.
The plan, HB6425, would loosen regulations for companies like AT&T and Verizon which still provide land lines.
AT&T Illinois President Paul LaSchiazza said loosening those rules would open a spigot for new jobs and new investment to flood into the state.
LaSchiazza does not have a price tag for that investment, nor does he have a specific number of jobs that could be created through regulation reform.
But he did tell lawmakers that other states, such as Indiana, Iowa, Missouri, and Wisconsin, have seen growth while Illinois has held flat or lost jobs.
LaSchiazza acknowledged that Illinois has seen some growth, though he says the state is clearly behind.
“I cannot understate the importance of the infrastructure of the 21st Century. Broadband services, access to broadband, advanced telecommunications infrastructure, wireless and wireless broadband. These are the economic tools that will drive Illinois forward.” he said. ”But the law does not deal with wireless phones or broadband Internet services.
Illinois does not regulate either cells phones or the Internet. The law being proposed, with backing from AT&T, would focus on land lines and service.
Susan Satter with the Illinois Attorney General’s Office said that’s the problem. She said loosening regulations could allow telephone companies to essentially abandon customers who don’t want to buy higher-priced cell phone/Internet bundles while also charging them more.
Satter told lawmakers there is a need to update Illinois’ telecom law, but not at the expense of nearly 40 percent of customers across the state.
The proposed re-write does include protections for land line only customers, and requires phone companies to continue service to those customers. But Satter fears other changes would allow the companies to offer poorer service.
Many lawmakers say the time for change has come.
State Sen. Mike Jacobs, D-East Moline, said Illinois has seen smaller companies move their jobs across state lines for years and he doesn’t want one of the state’s biggest companies to do the same.
Jacobs said lawmakers can’t turn back the clock to a time when everyone had just a home phone. He said it’s imperative that the state modernize its laws.
Tuesday’s hearing was just the beginning for the telecom re-write process, though most at the Capitol do expect some changes to the law before the session ends next month.
Beware Greeks bearing gifts. By rewriting Illinois’ utility regulatory structure, the telco’s are simply attempting to maximize their revenues & profits. Nothing more, nothing less.
To do this, they’re selling an ‘elixir’ they believe they can easily convince legislators of: the elixir of broadband. “Yes, ladies, it will even heal lumbago!!”
The problem with broadband is that humans cannot consume unlimited amounts of it. No matter what wonders broadband can deliver, no human can spend more than 24 hours a day consuming it. (That’s similar to how people cannot commute more than ~2 hours each way to a job — there’s not enough hours in the day to fit in that much commute time.)
Yet, the telco spokesmen peddling this elixir want to push aside any & all regulations that might get in their way of selling “unlimited” broadband to gullible consumers willing to fork out $200/month just to be the first on their block to have it.
Try to consume all the broadband you presently have at your fingertips. See if it doesn’t eat into your daily time budget so much that you have give up other activities. That is the practical consequence of each person having a fixed, limited amount of time for their daily activities.
Broadband cannot erase this real-world limit. But the hucksters peddling this telco/broadband elixir don’t want you to catch on to the fact you can’t consume all they want to sell you. That’s because they want you to finance construction of their modern-day Tower of Babble.