UPDATE In June, the FCC invited public comments on how to establish clear standards for determining how utilities and attachers must share pole replacement costs. The agency wants to streamline its pole attachment rules before billions in broadband grant dollars are distributed.
Crown Castle recently filed reply comments to emphasize the importance of rules that fairly allocate the cost of pole replacements and provide a timely and reliable dispute resolution process. “Commenters, except for pole owners and their associations, broadly support a cost allocation methodology that would better simulate an efficient market and more fairly allocate the cost of pole replacements,” says Crown Castle.
The towerco and other commenters proposed cost allocation methodologies that account for the incremental cost of replacement caused by the attacher as well as the benefits utilities receive from the new pole.
Crown says: “Pole owners—who have been reaping the benefits of unjust cost shifts—instead argue that shifting any of the cost of pole replacements to the utility would lead them to end their longstanding practice of voluntary pole replacements when there is a lack of capacity. The utilities warn that a parade of horribles will follow any cost allocation rule that assigns to them even a portion of the cost of pole replacements.”
The company calls these fears “overblown and misguided.” Pole attachment issues —including delays and unreasonable demands by pole owners—are interfering with broadband deployment nationwide, according to the towerco. It notes that for attachers, planned deployments “are often forced underground or abandoned as a result of unreasonable utility policies.”
Crown recommends the FCC adopt a cost-sharing mechanism for pole replacements that more clearly allocates costs between “cost causers” and beneficiaries. Crown Castle agrees with NCTA that allocating all of the cost of replacing poles to attachers “dramatically increases the cost of deploying broadband facilities.” According to Crown Castle, NCTA and others correctly explain that assigning all of the cost of a pole replacement to the new attacher “inappropriately incentivizes pole owners to delay replacements until an attachment request is made.”
The company notes that utilities oppose any new cost allocation methodology and would prefer to assign the full cost of pole replacements to attachers.
By Leslie Stimson, Inside Towers Washington Bureau Chief
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