Verizon New Jersey Broadband Scandal Resources

Verizon New Jersey Broadband Resources

Immediate

• On May 27, 2014, the New Jersey Division of Rate Counsel filed with the Superior Court – Appellate Division a Notice of Appeal to halt a stipulation agreement between the NJBPU and Verizon New Jersey (VNJ) to erase a 20+ year plan called Opportunity New Jersey.

• On April 23^rd, 2014, the Verizon New Jersey and the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities NJBPU signed a ‘stipulation agreement’ that they would erase any obligations of Verizon New Jersey leaving about 50% of Verizon New Jersey without upgrades and substituting a service that is the equivalent of DSL – and this would only be required of Verizon only if there is no other company offering a service – including wireless. (NOTE: Included in the appeal as well the transcript of the hearing to accept the agreement.)

• The New Opportunity New Jersey Law, 1993– commonly known as PAR 1.

By 2010, 100% of Verizon New jersey should have had a fiber optic service, capable of 45 Mbps in both directions. Known as Opportunity New Jersey, in 1993 state laws were changed to replace the aging copper wires of the Public switched Telephone Networks, the state utility, with fiber optics. We estimate Verizon NJ collected about $15 billion for these upgrades.

We’ve been tracking ‘Opportunity New Jersey’ since 1991, before  ONJ was implemented in 1993. This same exact deregulatory con happened in almost every state in America.

• FREE REPORT and 8 Reasons to Demand Investigations of Verizon’s Opportunity New Jersey

• NEW NETWORKS: VERIZON RIGGED THE CURRENT PROCEEDING: WE CALL FOR AN INVESTIGATION AND A HALT TO THE STIPULATION AGREEMENT

• Summary of Our Comments, OPRA and Call for an Investigation

• New Networks & Teletruth Comments 1:  A Call for an Investigation of Verizon New Jersey’s Financials, Broadband Deployments and OPRA Requests (Open Public Records Act)

• New Networks Comments 2: Background Information on Verizon New Jersey’s Broadband Commitments and Harms.

• New Networks Comments 3: Full Case Study: Opportunity New Jersey: A Broadband Failure

• DOCUMENT: Verizon New Jersey  and New Jersey Commission Stipulation Agreement to Erase the Broadband Commitments.

• Read the Comments filed by The League of Municipalities, the City of Newark, the NJ Rate Counsel, communities, citizens — and Verizon and their paid-supporters.

Stories

• • HuffPo: Show Me the Money: Verizon Opportunity New Jersey Fiber Optic Overcharging: Over $15 Billion and Counting

  • 100% of Verizon New Jersey Customers Should Have a Fiber Optic, 45 Mbps Bi-Directional Service: You Paid for It – And It’s the Law.

  • Will New Jersey be the First ‘Fully Fibered’ State?

  • Huffington Post: Governor Christie’s New Scandal: Verizon’s Fiber-Optic-“Digital Bridge” Gate.

  • Huffington Post: Calling All Lawyers: Did Verizon New Jersey Commit Fiber Optic Fraud

  • Philly News: Will Verizon be allowed to break its FiOS promise to New Jersey?

  • Newsweek: Telecom Giants Drag Their Feet on Broadband for the Whole Country

  • North Jersey.com More than 1,000 comments filed on Verizon case

  • Harvard Nieman: Broadband Wars: The Battle for New Jersey Has Begun The battle starts in Stow Creek & Greenwich and a Show Cause Order to Verizon New Jersey

  • Harvard Nieman: Angry ratepayers want their broadband; Verizon gives them a can Verizon’s Plan: Close down the copper wires and replace it with more expensive wireless service.

  • Harvard Nieman: The great Verizon FiOS ripoff

  More information:

• The Executive Summary The timeline of events and the issues.

• Are You One of the ‘Have Nots?– Is your community on the list to get ‘upgraded’?

• This is a list of New Jersey municipalities Verizon covers and a list of the towns Verizon has a cable franchise for. The “Haves” are towns which have some of their community wired with fiber; the “Have Nots” have not been upgraded — and most likely will never be. upgraded. In fact, they have the chance of having their current Verizon wired services ‘shut off’ and replaced with a wireless service.

• Municipality Resolution: is Your Community One of the Have Nots?

• Letter to New Jersey Economic Leadership Forum, January 10th, 2014

• New Networks Testimony: Verizon’s Cable Franchise, Oct 1, 2013 New Networks has called for a stop of the renewal of Verizon’s cable franchise and for the state to hold Verizon accountable to fulfill its obligations to wire the entire state of New Jersey with 45 Mbps in both directions.

Opportunity New Jersey Documents

• Broadband Wars: The Battle for New Jersey Has Begun. The original article Huffington Post article about about the mice that roared, Stow Creek and Greenwich, who complained that they had not been properly upgraded to fiber, based on Verizon’s commitments.
• FACT SHEET: Did Verizon Commit Fraud? Every year Verizon was required to submit an annual Infrastructure report and in 2001 claimed to have completed 55% of the state with 45 Mbps (in both directions)  Didn’t exist in 2013, not to mention 2001 as FiOS wasn’t available till 2007.
• This is a cut from the original Opportunity New Jersey regulations established in 1993. It also has an excerpt from the  Verizon New Jersey 2000 infrastructure report.
• Verizon Annual Infrastructure Report 2001. Go to page 29. It clearly shows Verizon’s claim that it fulfilled 55% of the state by 2001.
• Verizon Construction Budgets 1992-2013 This summary outlines that Verizon’s claims to have spent $2 billion for construction for the cable service is probably was charged to customers via higher phone rates, among other issues.

New Jersey Board PU Actions: Stow Creek & Greenwich

• March 12,  2012:  There were two show cause orders  issued by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities against Verizon  The first was on the original Opportunity New Jersey commitments to have 100% of the state upgraded to fiber optics, and the second was about quality of service requirements in the two towns.
• Show Cause Order  “In The Matter Of Verizon New Jersey, Inc.’S Alleged Failure To Comply With Opportunity New Jersey Commitments”
• Show Cause Order  “In the matter of the board’s review of Verizon New Jersey, Inc.’s Service Quality Issues”

• April 12, 2012: Verizon’s Response 1 and  Verizon’s Response 2 Verizon claimed that it had fullfiled all of their obligations and that 100% didn’t mean actual services or even covering all customers.
• May 14, 2012 New Networks rebuttal to Verizon We filed using Verizon’s own data to show that the company had told the State it been completing their obligations year by year – and that the data was ‘made up’—Verizon claimed to have 55% of the state upgraded by 2001 with a 45 Mbps bi-directional service.
• April 29, 2013 Requirement to upgrade Stow Creek and Greenwich, NJBPU. This is the order requiring Verizon to upgrade the towns with fiber optics. If you notice it doesn’t mention the commitments to the rest of the state.

 Cable Franchise

 

• Cable Franchise: New Jersey BPU assessment. This is the last report done by the state about Verizon’s performance and about the cable franchise