Consumer, Civic, CTC, and other many-hatted persons met in Chicago on Weds. Dec. 15th to strategize and enumerate the issues of Illinois' pending telecommunications legislation "rewrite" from our perspective. The group will meet again in Chicago early in January to coordinate the first of what we expect will be several community action/education events. CTCNet Chicago offered to coordinate one in Chicago in partnership with the other groups, with a tentative date of January 13th. We'll further flesh out the content in the early-January meeting.

We anticipate many more such community gatherings on the rewrite issue in around the State.

I'm not speaking for the group now, but expressing my take on some of the important issues from a consumer, civic and CTC perspective (not exhaustive):

Some things are worth fighting for:

Preserve and extend the consumer/civic protections established at the last rewrite.
* Why not extend them? Cable, Wireless Phones. E.g. adequate disclosure of coverage, service quality, contract terms; reasonable rights to cancel contracts.
* Put the teeth back in oversight agencies, ICC

Preserve the options for communities to address their communications needs and to pursue their economic interests
* Preserve or affirm the rights of Muni's, whether or not we think a Muni should venture into establishing infrastructure, leave them the option
* Muni's and others should not require ILEC permission. Claim of "unfair, subsidized competition" is red herring.

Establish an E-Champion that addresses human dimension of ICT
* development of human capacity, demand side factors
* facilitate future of eGov by preparing citizens of all ages
* integrate ICT issues and development across state agencies
* Establish regional/local eChampions, perhaps in coordination with regional planning councils

Establish Community Representation and Participation as Official State ICT Policy
* Regional Representation as well as Rep. from Community Serving entities, Rural perspective
* State should consult community technology body before puchasing or implemeting technology ventures

Establish State mechanisms to collect important data on Quality of Service and Penetration of Service
* We have a blank map, and therefore have no data by which to hold the incumbents accountable for service gaps
* Such information is essential for accountability, but also for planning
* We need data on availability: price, capacity, quality
* Establish mechanism for community forums on ICT isssues: telephony and other services... Quality, access, price, capacity.

Raise the bar on Essential Services
* Maintain telephony as basic, with need for universal access
* In a future of increased convergence of media technologies, with eGov extended to more, Internet
Access-and requisite digital literacy- should be universally available at a reasonable cost for relatively high capacity
* The threshold for broadband is laughably low, per FCC definition

Call Them on the issue of Competition.
* The Senator asked (the ILECs) do you want them (Cable) to be more like you, or do you want to be more like them, in terms of regulation... We need to point out that there really isnt much by way of competition.
* Although we can't do much to regulate cable from the State level, but we can extend consumer watchdog efforts and consumer protections in the Cable, Wireless Cell Phone and Package deals marketed to consumers. Expand CUB's mandate to reflect this.
* Doesn