'Background: The U.S. Supreme Court today affirmed nationwide guidelines for competitive access to Bell company local networks adopt
ed by the FCC nearly six years ago. Reversing a decision by the 8th Circuit Appeals Court, the Supreme Court specifically endorsed
forward-looking rates for access by competitive carriers to monopoly Bell networks.
The following statement should be attributed to Michael H. Salsbury, WorldCom General Counsel:
“The Supreme Court’s decision in favor of the FCC’s local competition rules is a tremendous victory for consumer and business custom
ers and the competitive carriers such as WorldCom that serve them. This ruling finally ends six years of uncertainty created by Bel
l legal challenges and other stonewalling. The FCC’s rules regarding forward-looking pricing and access to combinations of Bell net
work components – which were designed to break open the Bells’ lock on local customers -- are now the law of the land. The ruling v
alidates MCI’s new all-distance offering, ‘The Neighborhood,’ which depends on the availability of Bell network piece-parts such as
local loops and switching at reasonable lease rates. “
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