Rules & Regulations of the State of Tennessee
Title 1220 - Tennessee Public Utility Commission
Subtitle 1220-04 - Division of Public Utilities
Chapter 1220-04-06 - Ten Year Master Plan for Technology Deployment by Telephone Companies
Section 1220-04-06-.02 - SCOPE

(1) The Ten Year Master Plan adopted by the Authority represents an aggressive but achievable accelerated deployment of new technology in the local telephone network, with a focus on service capabilities. The added costs are within reason and should be capable of funding from increased operating efficiencies fostered by regulatory reform and from new service revenues, with little, if any, observable effect on the ratepayers in Tennessee.

(2) The Plan takes into account the existing network and current plans, the forecast of new technology for feature enrichment, and the prospect that new applications will quickly evolve once the capabilities are ubiquitously in place.

(3) The Authority, by adopting a Master Plan for Technology Deployment, is integrating the benefits of regulatory reform into the network infrastructure.

(4) The Master Plan meets the Authority's objective of bringing the benefits of technology to all ninety-five (95) counties in the State. It is based on several important definitions, which relate technology deployment to service capabilities required to support specific applications, and which classify the counties in the State according to their demographic makeup.

(5) The Master Plan hereby applies to all telecommunications carriers in the State, including local exchange carriers, interexchange carriers and others. Since interexchange carriers already have adequate capability to meet any service capabilities that would be provided by the local exchange carriers under the proposed Master Plan, and since other (bypass) carriers are well-equipped to deploy whatever technology is appropriate to meet their specialized needs, the Master Plan focuses on the local exchange carriers, which are the principal agencies involved in bringing new service capabilities to the population at large. The unregulated telephone cooperatives have been included in the Plan on a voluntary basis.