KEEPING TELEPHONE SERVICE AFFORDABLE

Universal Service Reform Act Introduced

I have recently introduced legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives to keep telephone service in rural areas such as ours affordable and to provide support for broadband deployment in rural communities. 

For more than 70 years, the United States has been committed to the principle of universal service, ensuring that local telephone service is provided at reasonable and affordable rates throughout the nation, so that residents of hard-to-serve rural areas receive basic local service at a price comparable to residents of easier-to-serve cities. The result of this historic commitment has been a local telephone usage rate of more than 97 percent, an accomplishment which no other nation can claim. 

Currently, traditional telephone providers pay a percentage of their long distance revenues into the Universal Service Fund, which is used to provide essential communications services to millions of customers in rural areas.  Funding is then distributed to telecommunications providers where the cost of service is particularly high, lowering the price of services to their customers. 

Over the last decade, with the introduction and growth of new technology and services, including Internet-based and wireless voice services, the traditional funding mechanism of the Universal Service Fund is under stress. The Universal Service Fund Reform Act of 2007, which I have introduced, would stabilize the fund by expanding the contribution base for financing the fund.

In addition to furthering the Fund's original purpose of providing affordable telephone service to all Americans, the legislation would allow for the first time telecommunications companies to use universal service funds to deploy high speed Internet access services to more rural areas.  The bill would ensure that all Americans have available to them advanced communications services for purposes of e-commerce, homeland security and emergency response, entertainment and education. 

            I look forward to working with my colleagues on the House Energy and Commerce Committee and in the Congress to enact this important measure into law.

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