“911 networks are under attack” FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler told members of the Senate Commerce Committee Thursday. He told lawmakers during an oversight hearing for the agency, unless more funds are devoted to upgrading the nation’s 911 call centers, service quality will degrade.
That’s because call centers were designed to handle wireline calls. Someone calls 911 some 241 million times a year. However, 70 percent of those calls come from cell phones, “technology the system was not designed for,” said Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel. “911 is the first number I taught my children,” said the Commissioner, who has visited nearly two-dozen 911 call centers. “It’s the number we know by heart but hope we never have to use.”
The FCC has put in place policies to facilitate text-to-911, she said. Commissioner Ajit Pai discussed a bill he hopes Congress passes that would make 911 a default setting on all phones, including cell phones and multi-line telephones that businesses use.
The Chairman’s proposal to “unlock the box,” meaning consumer’s set-top boxes, was also a big topic of discussion. Wheeler recently revised the proposal to make it more clear that any apps multichannel video program distributors (MVPDs) provide to consumers must honor contracts between programmers. Three commissioners — Pai, Rosenworcel and Michael O’Rielly —still oppose the proposal in its current form.
Senator Ed Markey (D-Massachusetts) lifted a set-top box with a chain around it to make his point that consumers need to be freed from monthly rental payments, saying the average household spends $2,300 a year to rent the device. Holding up an Amazon Fire TV Stick, he said the question is how to make the transition. “We did it with the black rotary dial phone. You don’t have to rent that anymore.”
“This debate is about consumers paying exorbitant rental fees in perpetuity, when they could buy a box.” Markey and several other lawmakers, both Democrats and Republicans, urged the commissioners to find a solution so they can vote on the item at the commission’s next planned public meeting on September 29.
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