High-Cost Universal Service Support, Jurisdictional Separations, and Coalition for Equity in Switching Support Petition for Reconsideration

In this document, the Commission addresses an inequitable asymmetry in its current rules governing the receipt of universal service high-cost local switching support (LSS) by small incumbent local exchange carriers (LECs). Since the adoption of the current rules, incumbent LEC lines have begun to decrease, and, as a result of the one-way rule, many small LECs that have lost lines receive less support than other LECs with a similar number of lines that face nearly identical circumstances. By modifying the Commission's rules to permit incumbent LECs that lose lines to receive additional LSS when they cross a threshold, the Commission will provide LSS to all small LECs on the same basis. The Commission also dismisses the petition for reconsideration filed by the Coalition for Equity in Switching Support in the jurisdictional separations freeze proceeding.