2. Background
On October 1, 2009, The Siskiyou Telephone Company (Siskiyou or applicant) filed an application for a general rate increase. On November 23, 2010, we issued Decision (D.) 10-11-007, adopting an all-party settlement resolving all issues.
The adopted settlement included the following items as part of total operating revenues for test year 2011 (D.10-11-007 at Attachment 1):
Line No |
Item |
Adopted Revenues |
1 |
Local Services - CHCF-A |
$4,158,094 |
2 |
Interstate USF |
4,185,573 |
The decision also stated (D.10-11-007 at 5-6, footnote 4):
In the Settlement Agreement, Applicant and DRA [Division of Ratepayer Advocates] estimated that Applicant would receive $4,185,573 in Universal Service Fund (USF) funding for test year 2011. On October 1, 2010, the Commission received 2011 USF funding amount information from the National Exchange Carrier Association, Inc. (NECA) for all the small rural local exchange carriers in California. According to the NECA data, Applicant will receive $4,137,954 in USF funding in 2011. The decreased USF funding amount of $47,619 should be made up by an equal increase in Siskiyou's 2011 CHCF-A [California High Cost Fund-A] funding amount.
In other words, the Settlement preceded the receipt of funding information from NECA, and D.10-11-007 contemplated that our CHCF-A funding resolution would make up the difference between anticipated and actual USF funding. Unfortunately, this did not happen. Specifically, on January 27, 2011, the Commission issued Resolution T-17298. The resolution sets forth CHCF-A support for each of 14 small incumbent Local Exchange Carriers for calendar year 2011, including Siskiyou. The adopted support for Siskiyou, however, was $4,158,094. This is $47,619 less than expected pursuant to D.10-11-007.
On February 14, 2011, Siskiyou filed a petition for modification of D.10-11-007.1 Siskiyou asks that the Commission modify D.10-11-007 to increase its CHCF-A support by $47,619, or provide some other mechanism to recover that amount.
No responses to the petition were filed.
1 On February 28, 2011, Siskiyou filed an application for rehearing of Resolution T-17298. This decision does not address the application for rehearing.
