FCC Head Calls For Negotiations Between Local Phone Companies

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The head of the Federal Communications Commission called Wednesday on the former Bell telephone companies to negotiate with their competitors for the use of their local telephone lines.

Chairman Michael Powell's suggestion came a week after a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down rules designed to foster competition for local telephone service. The judges said the FCC acted improperly by leaving it to state regulators to decide whether to spur competition between the former Bell companies--Verizon, BellSouth, Qwest, and SBC--and others wanting to provide local phone service.

"The commission may not, unlike Huckleberry Finn, recruit somebody else to do the job Congress directed it to do," Powell told the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners.

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