fyi.

Sue Nord, Sr. Director
Government Affairs
713 345-4196

----- Forwarded by Sue Nord/NA/Enron on 04/21/2001 04:22 PM -----

	Allison Navin
	04/20/2001 03:57 PM
		 
		 To: Lara Leibman/NA/Enron@ENRON, Sue Nord/NA/Enron@Enron, Stephen D 
Burns/Corp/Enron@Enron, Mona L Petrochko/NA/Enron@ENRON, Scott Bolton/Enron 
Communications@Enron Communications
		 cc: Linda Robertson/NA/Enron@ENRON
		 Subject: RBOC Sec. 271 Legislative Update

We have some additional information on this as well that we just got wind of 
this afternoon.  The Interlata relief bill that will be introduced on Monday 
or Tuesday by Congressmen Tauzin and Dingell will be nearly identical to last 
year's bill, H.R. 2420.  Tauzin will hold a full committee hearing on the 
bill next Wednesday with invited witnesses to include Verizon, Covad, Highway 
One (a DSL carrier in NY) and McLeod.  We aren't aware of any administration 
types being invited, i.e. Powell or someone from NTIA.  A subcommittee markup 
will likely be scheduled for the following week, with the full committee 
mark-up to occur sometime before Memorial Day, depending on what is happening 
in the Committee with regards to the California situation.

On the Senate side, we are hearing that Senator Sam Brownback will 
reintroduce his RBOC legislation from last year which is more of a RBOC 
friendly bill than Tauzin's in that RBOCs would no longer be subject to 
Federal requirements concerning facilities and equipment carriage of advanced 
communications services.  We understand that Brownback intends to introduce 
his legislation sometime before Memorial Day but that he is actively seeking 
a Democratic co-sponsor, something that he was not able to do last Congress 
either.  Opponents of the bill are working the Senate side to ensure he does 
not find an ally.  We understand that Tauzin has kept in close contact with 
his fellow Louisianan Senator John Breaux on the goings-on in the House and 
that Breaux may be willing to help move things along in the Senate, however 
as Scott stated previously, Senator McCain, as we know, is likely not to take 
an active position on the legislation.  Senators Hollings (Ranking Member of 
the Commerce Committee), Senator Stevens and Senator Lott are all said to be 
against moving forward with any form of 271 relief.  Despite all of the 
Senate activity, the bottom line is that Scott's assessment is accurate - we 
don't see anything moving out of the Senate this year.

Allison

	Scott Bolton@ENRON COMMUNICATIONS
	04/20/2001 02:56 PM
		 
		 To: Lara Leibman/NA/Enron@ENRON, Sue Nord/NA/Enron@Enron, Stephen D 
Burns/Corp/Enron@Enron, Mona L Petrochko/NA/Enron@ENRON
		 cc: 
		 Subject: RBOC Sec. 271 Legislative Update

Federal Sec. 271 Relief Legislation:  Rep. Billy Tauzin, Chairman of the 
House Commerce Committee, is expected to introduce legislation on 4/23 to 
enable ILECs to provide interLATA data services without opening their local 
networks to competitors.  The bill would allow the Bells to transmit data 
across local market boundaries and also allow the RBOCs to deploy 
high-capacity facilities without having to lease or resell them as UNEs. Rep. 
John Dingell, the Commerce Committee ranking member will be a co-sponser.

This bill last Congress had over 200 co-sponsors and made it to committee 
mark-up, but was stifled by then-Commerce Chairman Tom Bliley and supporters 
of AT&T.  This year, Tauzin is expected to push it through his committee 
vigorously and it may come to the House floor for a vote.  However, the 
Senate seems unlikely to take this up in a serious way this year due to Sen. 
McCain's reluctance to follow Rep. Tauzin's agenda and Sen. Hollings' solid 
support of AT&T.  We expect this legislation to create a lot of noise this 
year, but not move through the Senate until next year if at all.