Mediacom Appeals to FCC in Fight with West Des Moines

Mediacom has added an appeal to the FCC in its attempts to block the City of West Des Moines, Iowa from building a conduit network in partnership with Google Fiber. Mediacom's Iowa subsidiary filed the FCC complaint under Section 253 of the Communications Act of 1934. 

​As cited in an article in Telecompetitor:

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The filing with the FCC claims that West Des Moines is imposing discriminatory burdens on competitors and denying residents in developing areas of the city and elsewhere access to low-cost broadband choices. The filing claims violation of Section 253 in three ways:

• The city gave Google Fiber a large, exclusive subsidy that distorts communications competition in the market.
• The city granted Google Fiber exclusive rights-of-way access and other significant benefits that enable it to deploy its network far more cheaply and efficiently than other ISPs.
• The design of the conduit network forecloses its use by other providers and prohibits its use by competitors using alternative technologies.

The petition claims that the agreement materialized “shortly after Google’s primary Iowa lobbyist took his seat on the West Des Moines City Council” and that the service provider retained the mayor’s real estate company to secure office space.

The City of West Des Moines has consistently maintained that it has followed the law in its efforts to bring fiber to every home and business in the community, and that following a period of Google Fiber exclusivity, the conduit network will be available to other providers. Construction of the conduit network is underway.