{"id":531,"date":"2014-02-04T19:58:20","date_gmt":"2014-02-05T01:58:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/?p=531"},"modified":"2014-02-04T19:58:20","modified_gmt":"2014-02-05T01:58:20","slug":"kansas-law-would-restrict-states-internet-access","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/archives\/531","title":{"rendered":"Kansas Law Would Restrict State\u2019s Internet Access"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The state of Kansas <a href=\"http:\/\/www.dailykos.com\/story\/2014\/01\/30\/1273848\/-Kansas-moves-to-Stop-Broadband-Internet-to-residents?detail=email\">wants to guarantee<\/a> that cities cannot invest in any broadband network technologies and has introduced a bill (Senate Bill No. 304) to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.muninetworks.org\/content\/kansas-legislature-introduces-bill-limit-internet-investment\">guarantee that this will happen<\/a>. \u00a0The language prohibits both networks that offer services and public-private partnerships and open access approaches. Even the supposed protection for the \u201cunserved areas\u201d doesn\u2019t protect these because the definition of access to a connection meeting FCC\u2019s minimum broadband definition includes mobile wireless and satellite access that cannot provide necessary two-way transmitting of information for the Internet. Because mobile wireless is costly and doesn\u2019t work in all rural areas, it is also not a measure of having Internet access.\u00a0 With this guideline, it\u2019s possible that nowhere in Kansas can an area be considered \u201cunserved.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The law reads as follows:<\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a0 \u00a0Except with regard to unserved areas, a municipality may not, directly or indirectly:<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>(1) Offer to provide to one or more subscribers, video, telecommunications or broadband service; or<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>(2) purchase, lease, construct, maintain or operate any facility for the purpose of enabling a private business or entity to offer, provide, carry, or deliver video, telecommunications or broadband service to one or more subscribers.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Basically, the legislature wants to remove the choice of any local area to make decisions about investing in essential infrastructure. A similar approach has also occurred in Georgia where cable and telephone companies want to guarantee that they are competition-free, even in the country\u2019s most rural areas. The end result is that people in Kansas may find themselves with little or no connection to the Internet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The state of Kansas wants to guarantee that cities cannot invest in any broadband network technologies and has introduced a bill (Senate Bill No. 304) to guarantee that this will happen. \u00a0The language prohibits both networks that offer services and public-private partnerships and open access approaches. Even the supposed protection for the \u201cunserved areas\u201d doesn\u2019t [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":532,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-carousel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.glbtrt.ala.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}