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Rural Universal Services Equity Act of 2005

Introduced: February 3, 2005 See on congress.gov
 Everywhere this bill has been 3 steps
Introduced
In committee
Reported out
Passed House
Passed Senate
To President
Became law
Feb 3, 2005
Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. (text of measure as introduced: CR S986)
Feb 3, 2005
Sponsor introductory remarks on measure. (CR S985-986)
Feb 3, 2005
Introduced in Senate
 Plain-English summary Congressional Research Service

Rural Universal Service Equity Act of 2005 - Requires the Comptroller General to report to Congress on the need to reform the high cost support mechanism (with respect to universal telephone service) for rural, insular, and high cost areas.

Amends the Communications Act of 1934 to require the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), in calculating Federal universal service support for eligible telecommunications carriers that serve such areas, to revise its support mechanism for high cost areas to provide support to each wire center in which the incumbent local exchange carrier's average cost per line exceeds the national average by such amount as the FCC determines appropriate for the purpose of ensuring the equitable distribution of universal service support throughout the United States. Requires: (1) the FCC to ensure that no State receives less Federal support than it would have received, up to ten percent of the total support distributed, under the FCC's previous support mechanism; and (2) the total amount of support for all States to be equal to the total support calculated under the support mechanism in existence before enactment of this Act.

States that nothing in this Act shall affect the support provided to rural telephone companies.

What's happening now February 3, 2005

Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. (text of measure as introduced: CR S986)

 Committees of jurisdiction 1