Panel weighs bill to require consumer notice, 9‑1‑1 board alerts as phone service moves from copper to fiber

The House Energy and Digital Infrastructure committee heard testimony on draft committee bill 26‑0726 on the transition from copper-based voice service to fiber and on proposed consumer‑notification and consumer‑protection measures.

Barbara Neal, executive director of the Enhanced 9‑1‑1 Board, told the committee she reviewed draft 1.2 and urged the committee to add the board to the statute’s list of entities that must receive written notice when a carrier transitions a customer’s service. “I don’t see that here and I didn’t see it anywhere else in the in the draft. So, I think that would be helpful if the information came to us as well,” Neal said, arguing the board needs timely information to coordinate with the Department of Public Service and first‑response agencies.

Neal warned that the outage data the board receives from originating voice and electric providers are town‑level only and do not provide the address‑level granularity needed to determine whether alternative services are available at a particular location. “They are at that town level that we are not getting reports down to the specific address level, for example,” she said, noting the limitation when officials try to assess impacts on individual households.

Committee members pressed the bill’s language on alternative services and technical support, and debated whether agreed language from an interagency memorandum of understanding (MOU) — which DPS and providers are negotiating — should be incorporated into statute. Several members said a statute would offer a longer‑term, enforceable fallback if an MOU proves time‑limited, while others suggested using MOU wording to avoid contention over technical details.

The committee discussed steps to protect consumers during power outages caused by the shift to fiber. Members and staff said customers need clear education that fiber‑based optical network terminals (ONTs) depend on local power and that in many cases “you may need battery backup, period.” The committee asked DPS and providers for recommendations about how battery backup might be funded or supported for low‑income customers.

The bill would require carriers to provide written notice to state entities and consumers at the time of a transition; the committee discussed clarifying that notice may include both mailed and email communications and that price parity be preserved so customers are not charged more for an equivalent basic voice service after conversion. Members also asked the Department of Public Service to include transition metrics in its annual report and to provide a one‑time 2027 report assessing whether a statewide program should help low‑income customers purchase batteries and how it should be funded.

The committee did not take formal votes on the bill during the hearing. Members asked staff to collect MOU language from DPS and consolidated providers and to return with clarified statutory language on notifications, outage reporting, and price protections. Neal and other witnesses said they would send written comments to the committee for the record.

Next steps: chair staff will request MOU language and timing from DPS staff (Hunter) and asked Maria to monitor and report back on technical issues; the committee planned to reconvene later in the day for additional hearings.