FCC Revokes California’s Lifeline Verification Authority
Source: Broadband Breakfast | By Jericho Casper
The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday revoked California’s authority to run its own eligibility and verification system for the federal Lifeline program. In an order issued by Wireline Competition Bureau chief Joseph Calascione, the FCC said California law AB 1303 has made it “effectively impossible” for the program’s administrator to comply with federal Lifeline operations and integrity obligations.
In a statement issued Thursday, telecom and regulatory attorney for TURN Alexandra Green said the FCC’s decision will force low-income Californians to go through two separate eligibility checks, one for the state program and one for the federal, a change the group argues will add bureaucracy and ultimately raise the cost of phone service for hundreds of thousands of households. “The FCC’s decision to no longer trust California to do its own eligibility verification means that customers will have to be separately reviewed by each program,” Green said. “The federal government's political disdain for California seems to be the driving force behind this order, which will only result in increasing the cost of phone service in both rural and urban areas,” she added.
