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  "description": "The FCC is set to vote on easing the copper retirement process later this month.",
  "path": "/consolidated-looking-to-discontinue-copper-at-45-000-new-england-locations/",
  "publishedAt": "2025-07-10T21:03:13.000Z",
  "site": "https://broadbandbreakfast.com",
  "tags": [
    "_New Hampshire_",
    "_in Vermont_",
    "All Videos from Speeding BEAD Summit",
    "_temporarily waived_",
    "_set to vote_",
    "_request from Lumen_",
    "wire centers",
    "retire all"
  ],
  "textContent": "WASHINGTON, July 10, 2025 – Consolidated Communications is looking to discontinue legacy voice services at more than 45,000 locations in Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont.\n\nConsolidated said the affected customers could be transitioned to a voice over internet protocol (VoIP) service on its fiber network under the company’s Fidium brand. The company said the major wireless carriers also offer standalone voice service in all the affected areas, part of the requirements for federal regulators to greenlight the discontinuance.\n\nOf the total affected locations, 26,027 are in _New Hampshire_, 14,848 are in Maine, and 4,206 are _in Vermont_. Counties near each state capitol are listed in the company’s Tuesday filings, plus several in northern New Hampshire. And other parts of Maine.\n\n\n\n_****FROM SPEEDING BEAD SUMMIT****_\n _****Panel 1: How Are States Thinking About Reasonable Costs Now?****_\n_****Panel 2: Finding the State Versus Federal Balance in BEAD****_\n _****Panel 3: Reacting to the New BEAD NOFO Guidance****_\n _****Panel 4: Building, Maintaining and Adopting Digital Workforce Skills****_\n\n All Videos from Speeding BEAD Summit \n\nConsolidated said it would stop offering legacy voice service in the areas at issue on Oct. 7, 2025, provided it gets the necessary approvals, and that it “has committed to working with its remaining legacy voice customers in the Affected Service Area to enable them to transition to Fidium, or an alternative voice provider, if they choose to do so.\n\nThe Federal Communications Commission needs to approve telecom provider requests to discontinue service and rip up their old copper networks, an effort to make sure swathes of rural areas don’t lose access to essential services. That usually involves showing the incumbent will replace the service with something comparable and/or that another option is available.\n\nISPs for their part are eager to retire their legacy infrastructure as quickly as possible, as it no longer provides competitive broadband service and is costly to maintain – AT&T, which has been particularly aggressive with its copper retirement plan, said in a recent FCC filing it spends $6 billion annually on copper maintenance.\n\nFCC Chairman **Brendan Carr** has made an effort to make the transition easier for providers. The agency _temporarily waived_ a slate of requirements earlier this year, and is _set to vote_ later this month on proposing making many of those changes permanent and otherwise streamlining the rules.\n\n“Our goal can be stated simply: We are aiming to free up billions of dollars for new networks, instead of forcing providers to keep investing in old ones,” he said in a speech in South Dakota Wednesday.\n\nConsolidated’s filings didn’t cite the waivers, but the FCC said in a draft order that it recently used them to approve a small discontinuance _request from Lumen_ for six locations in Colorado. That application was able to point to bundled voice and mobile broadband service from Verizon as an adequate replacement, where under the existing rules a replacement service would have to be standalone voice rather than a bundle.\n\nAT&T filed applications earlier this year to grandfather legacy services across about 25 percent of its copper wire centers. The company has been making a push to retire all of its copper outside of California by the end of 2029.\n\nThe company has said it secured favorable conditions with other state legislators and utility regulators, but California’s carrier of last resort rules make it harder to decommission there. The carrier and other telecom companies and trade groups are still pushing the state to update its rules as part of an ongoing rulemaking.\n\nConsolidated was bought and taken private by Searchlight Capital in December. The company had nearly 400,000 broadband subscribers as of its last earning release in November.",
  "title": "Consolidated Looking to Discontinue Copper at 45,000 New England Locations",
  "updatedAt": "2026-03-11T03:26:24.188Z"
}