Ceylon City Council Member John Gibeau shows this Frontier Communications cable intentionally laid across the customer’s propane tank. (Image courtesy: Mark Steil, MPR News)

Frontier Communications technicians decided it would be perfectly safe to drape their telephone lines on top of a propane tank, use overhead tree branches as makeshift telephone poles, and leave phone cables laying on the ground — in lawns, fields, and farms — for up to three years in southern Minnesota.

Minnesota Public Radio found a number of problems with Frontier Communications in a special report outlining years of complaints about the phone company’s performance — or lack thereof — in small communities around the state, including in the town of Ceylon in Martin County, located along the Minnesota-Iowa border.

John Gibeau, a city council member, might tell visitors to be careful of Frontier’s phone cables, some that have laid on the ground in parts of town for years.

“There’s three lines there, that are just laying across the ground,” Gibeau told MPR News. “And they run down for probably another 60 yards.”

Frontier laid out the phone cables sometime ago, but they have never seen a day attached to a utility pole.

In another part of town, a Frontier line technician thought nothing about draping a phone line across the top of a homeowner’s propane tank. At one address, there was no convenient utility pole in sight, so the technician used a few trees in the neighborhood as makeshift poles, distributing the line through the tree branches which help keep the cable above ground so vehicles do not drive over it. Gibeau said Frontier has left it that way for almost three years.

Ceylon, Minn.

Another resident deals with Frontier’s phone line each time he mows his lawn. That is because Frontier just dropped the cable on the grass and left it there. He relocated it to a nearby flower bed to avoid an accidental entanglement with the lawnmower. Other neighbors have done their part, attaching Frontier’s lines to the top of fences and fence poles — anything in sight that can get the cable off the ground where it can be ruined over time.

In all these cases, Frontier has refused to fix the problems, despite repeated calls. But that may be asking for too much. At a hearing recently in Slayton, Frontier customer Dale Burkhardt lost his phone and DSL service after a construction crew accidentally severed the phone cable that serves his farm. More than a year later, Frontier’s repair crews have never shown up to repair the line, regardless of the number of trouble tickets and calls to customer service.

“I still don’t have a landline, I don’t have an internet,” Burkhardt said. “I’m getting a little fed up.”

As Minnesota’s Public Utilities Commission continues a series of public hearings around the state to hear complaints concerning Frontier Communications, regulators are getting an earful. Nearly 400 people have turned out for the hearings so far. Many report Frontier has not fixed their problems, no matter how often customers complain.

Javier Mendoza, Frontier’s vice president of communications, told MPR the company is listening to customers.

“For us, one customer who is out of service is one customer too many,” Mendoza said. “So, we would thank our customers for their patience. We recognize that from time to time we experience service issues and delays. And for those customers that are affected, we apologize to them.”

Frontier Communications scatters its phone cables on residents’ lawns, across a propane tank, and through tree branches as makeshift utility poles, reports Minnesota Public Radio (3:56)

FEMA, in coordination with the Federal Communications Commission, will conduct a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System (EAS) and Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) on Wednesday, Oct. 3, creating a cacophony of alarms and warning tones on cell phones, radios, and televisions from coast to coast.

The WEA test is most likely to be heard… in every school, office, and store as nearly all wireless phones sound off starting at 2:18pm EDT. Two minutes later, radio and television stations, NOAA weather radios, and cable, satellite, and telco TV systems, will deliver EAS alerts to their respective audiences.

This will be the first time FEMA and the FCC will deliver a nationwide WEA test, which will measure the effectiveness of using cell phones to mass deliver emergency alerts and action messages on a nationwide scale. Previous uses included urgent Amber Alerts and weather-related messages, but only to specific localities or regions. The government agencies want to know if America’s cell phone carriers can deliver messages to all of their customers accurately and on a timely basis.

The emergency alert messages have no political connection to the Trump Administration or the White House, and were first envisioned during the Bush Administration. Despite that, some planned to mute their phones or switch them off as a protest against the president, falsely fearing he might use the system to deliver political messages.

Tomorrow’s alerts will consist of the following messages, sent using a unique tone and vibration that is not designed to be muted or silenced:

• WEA: Presidential Alert: “THIS IS A TEST of the National Wireless Emergency Alert System. No action is needed.”
• EAS: (in English and/or Spanish) “THIS IS A TEST of the National Emergency Alert System. This system was developed by broadcast and cable operators in voluntary cooperation with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Federal Communications Commission, and local authorities to keep you informed in the event of an emergency. If this had been an actual emergency an official message would have followed the tone alert you heard at the start of this message. A similar wireless emergency alert test message has been sent to all cell phones nationwide. Some cell phones will receive the message; others will not. No action is required.”

FEMA’s public service announcement about Wednesday’s test. (0:48)

Gov. Brown

Within hours of California’s Gov. Jerry Brown signing the state’s sweeping new net neutrality protection law, Attorney General Jeff Sessions filed a federal lawsuit to block the law, calling it an illegal attempt to bypass the Federal Communications Commission and its chairman Ajit Pai, which the Trump Administration argues has the sole authority over the nation’s internet service providers.

“States do not regulate interstate commerce — the federal government does,” Sessions said in a statement. “Once again the California legislature has enacted an extreme and illegal state law attempting to frustrate federal policy. The Justice Department should not have to spend valuable time and resources to file this suit today, but we have a duty to defend the prerogatives of the federal government and protect our Constitutional order. We will do so with vigor. We are confident that we will prevail in this case—because the facts are on our side.”

The Department of Justice claimed in its lawsuit that California’s open internet protection legislation was blatantly against the public interest because it imposes a host of rules on the conduct of companies like AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, and Charter that are contrary to the administration’s deregulation principles.

“[This new law] unlawfully imposes burdens on the federal government’s deregulatory approach to the internet,” the lawsuit stated. “The United States concluded that California, through Senate Bill 822, is attempting to subvert the federal government’s deregulatory approach by imposing burdensome state regulations on the free internet, which is unlawful and anti-consumer.”

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai wholeheartedly supports the lawsuit, releasing his written comments praising it as part of the Justice Department’s media release.

“I’m pleased the Department of Justice has filed this suit,” Pai wrote. “The internet is inherently an interstate information service. As such, only the federal government can set policy in this area. And the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit recently reaffirmed that state regulation of information services is preempted by federal law.”

“Not only is California’s internet regulation law illegal, it also hurts consumers,” added Pai. “The law prohibits many free-data plans, which allow consumers to stream video, music, and the like exempt from any data limits. They have proven enormously popular in the marketplace, especially among lower-income Americans. But notwithstanding the consumer benefits, this state law bans them.”

The Trump Administration fears the new California law will set a de facto standard of net neutrality protection across all 50 states, because California’s market size makes it difficult for telecommunications companies to apply one standard in California, while maintaining different standards everywhere else.

Sessions

The California net neutrality law restores most of the rules ISPs followed during the Obama Administration, including bans on blocking or throttling internet content and outlawing paid prioritization schemes, which would allow ISPs to charge content providers extra to guarantee their internet traffic was prioritized over other traffic. The new law also covers interconnection agreements between ISPs, which are cited as largely responsible for traffic slowdowns on websites like Netflix and YouTube. Some ISPs have used these traffic exchanging agreements as leverage to seek compensation from internet content companies in return for higher capacity, less congested connections between a content provider and the ISP’s customers. The FCC did not address this issue in its own, now repealed, net neutrality rules.

California’s attorney general promised to defend the new law in court and oppose the Justice Department lawsuit.

“We will not allow a handful of power brokers to dictate sources for information or the speed at which websites load,” said Xavier Becerra. “We remain deeply committed to protecting freedom of expression, innovation and fairness.”

Comcast kicks the door open to the European television market.

Europe is about to get a taste of Comcast, the cable company most Americans abhor, after the Philadelphia-based cable giant won control of Sky, Europe’s largest satellite TV provider.

Comcast, criticized in some circles for overbidding, easily eclipsed 21st Century Fox’s bid to win control of the television provider that is a household name in the United Kingdom.

Sky customers are being groomed to think highly of the deal by Comcast’s PR department, promised a healthy increase in original programming, expansion into more European markets beyond the UK and Ireland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy, and a richer selection of American and European programming owned or controlled by Comcast, which also owns NBCUniversal.

Analysts expect European customers will soon get the bitter taste of what their American counterparts have endured for decades — frequent and steep rate hikes widely expected from Sky’s new owner.

Comzilla

Comcast sees the American television market as saturated, but Europe is wide open for more television services. Comcast believes Sky is not meeting its value potential, giving the company plenty of room for hike rates as new programming and channels are introduced, especially on the European continent. British viewers already benefit from the consolidation of English language global media brands, bringing most American network fare to British and Irish audiences. But there is plenty of room to grow in Italy and Germany, where state public broadcasters are hardly meeting their audience potential and pay television networks are still lacking.

Sky currently has 27 million subscribers across Europe. Just 5.2 million of those subscribers are in Germany, a country with nearly 83 million people. Most are attracted to Sky’s ad-free movie service and sports networks. Sky has traditionally lacked the deep pockets necessary to compete effectively with global streaming providers like Netflix, which have scooped up a considerable amount of foreign language content.

These days, Sky is typically a co-partner in original programming ventures, but it rarely comes away with key ownership rights. Comcast’s ownership of NBCUniversal is expected to dramatically change that, with NBC and Universal Studios capable of aggressively entering the original programming business on behalf of Sky, keeping rights in-house.

European regulators will be watching how the Comcast-owned venture develops. Many countries already have concerns about the American “invasion” of entertainment programming, often a mainstay on the lineups of European networks. Comcast’s involvement will only escalate the amount of American content seen on European televisions, either in its original English, subtitled, or dubbed.

Currently, UK customers subscribing to the full Sky HD package, including the Sky Q set-top box, pay up to $119 a month. In Germany, the smaller “full package” costs $82 a month after promotional pricing expires. Comcast is likely to raise prices significantly over the next few years, possibly reaching $150 a month in the UK and $100 in Germany. In contrast, Netflix is building a giant market share in Europe keeping pricing low. A 4-screen subscription to Netflix currently costs $13 a month in the UK, with Netflix’s new Ultra subscription priced at $19.96 in Germany.

Despite potential price increases, few believe Sky will lose many subscribers, at least as long as it continues to hold the rights to must-have sports programming, notably the English Premier League soccer matches in the UK and Bundesliga matches in Germany, which Sky Deutschland shares with public broadcaster ZDF and Eurosport.

Opening a lead insulated buried cable. Lead can be resealed with solder after repairs.

In the early to mid-1950’s, thousands of landowners between Houston and Dallas/Ft. Worth, Tex. were asked to grant a right of way and easement to what was then known as the American Telephone & Telegraph Co. (AT&T). After winning permission, AT&T buried a 4-6 inch wide copper telephone cable sheathed in lead to connect the two cities — 200 miles apart — together. Almost 70 years later, that cable is coming back to haunt the phone company.

Telecommunications companies have used copper phone wiring for over 100 years to deliver telegraph, telephone, and data services. AT&T’s “trunk lines” often contained dozens, if not hundreds of individual cable pairs used to connect regional long distance calls and distant central switching offices together. To protect the cables, phone companies relied on simple paper insulation until the mid-1950s to keep the cable pairs from making contact with other wires. Buried cables were traditionally sheathed in lead, a very popular and durable insulator that dependably kept moisture out while allowing technicians easy access to the cables within. As the 1960s approached, phone companies began to switch to plastic insulation, but paper and lead-wrapped copper wiring remains in service in some areas to this day, often in large cities.

As with most AT&T-owned underground cables, the one in Texas was wrapped in lead. The company used a network of subterranean concrete rooms and above ground small cinder block buildings for maintenance, offering technicians direct access to the cable and various network equipment. Landowners knew the additional infrastructure belonged to AT&T because the company placed their logo on it.

Ongoing technological advancements eventually allowed AT&T to transition service to fiber optic cables, and by 2010, the Houston-Dallas copper cable was decommissioned. AT&T employees removed its signage, sold the cinder block structures and abandoned the underground vaults.

But AT&T did not remove the cable, which remains unused and buried to this day, allegedly leaching dangerous lead into the ground. Property owners fearing AT&T’s cable may be fouling the soil and groundwater with lead contamination took AT&T to court in 2016, seeking a class action case against the phone company for abandoning its cable and easements.

AT&T’s Environment, Health, and Safety Division offered a presentation at the 2010 International Telecommunications Safety Conference warning about the perils of old lead-sheathed phone cables, claiming “underground cable presents real possibilities for overexposure to lead:”

• Some older metropolitan areas may still have over 50% lead cable.
• Buried cable leaches many compounds to the surface of the insulation: lead carbonate, lead monoxide, lead sulfate, lead chloride, lead dioxide, lead acetate, lead nitrate, and lead sulfide. Many of these compounds do not adhere tightly to the cable and are easily airborne.
• Once in the soil, 83 and 98 percent of the released lead remains intact in the soil within 2 inches of the cables.

In addition to the cost of removing the unused cable, AT&T’s own safety engineers suggest removing old cables can also pose a significant health risk to employees and property owners if not done properly:

• Extraction of cable from underground duct can release unexpected high levels of lead dust.
• Wetting was not capable of controlling dust in many cases.
• Location of employees to cable extraction is important.

Despite the health risks, a judge denied class certification of the lawsuit on Tuesday, ruling each affected property owner will have to bring a separate lawsuit against AT&T.

U.S. District Judge Alfred H. Bennett issued the 11-page ruling against the claimants.

“Plaintiffs present the general retirement of underground coaxial and fiber optic cables, removal of signage/equipment for those cables, and planned release of some easements as class-wide proof that abandonment is a common question for the proposed class,” Judge Bennett wrote. “However, because the class does not deal with one easement, rather hundreds (if not thousands), each class member would need to present evidence of the definite acts revealing AT&T’s intent to abandon the particular easements associated with that member’s property.”

Bennett was also unpersuaded by claims that the abandoned AT&T cable created a presumption of imminent harm, and his ruling stated each property owner would have to provide evidence of the cable’s lead contamination on that owner’s land. In addition, each claimant would have to prove damages, assuming the statute of limitations had not run out years ago.

“Certainly, a separate soil analysis for each property would have to be present, along with evidence pertinent to determine the existence and cause of any contaminates on each of the properties,” Bennett wrote.

The law firm bringing the lawsuit plans an appeal.