After nearly two years, momentum appears to be finally growing for a group of South Jersey towns calling for the state to investigate Verizon New Jersey over claims of inadequate service that officials say reflects the company's continual discrimination of predominantly less dense, rural and disadvantaged areas in the state.
After nearly two years, momentum appears to be finally growing for a group of South Jersey towns calling for a state investigation into claims that Verizon New Jersey has discriminated against less dense, rural and low-income areas of the state by providing inferior network coverage compared to more populated and affluent regions.
Recently, 16 municipalities from Gloucester, Cumberland, Salem, and Atlantic counties filed a petition with the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities -- the agency in charge of overseeing Verizon's operations -- to ensure the telecom company did not abandon their basic landline telephone service.
Recently, State Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D-Gloucester County) expressed support for the group's initiative. Also giving his support was state Sen. Jeff Van Drew (D-Cape May County), who said over the weekend that he is scheduled to speak with the president of the BPU about the group's concerns.
"Certainly I've spoken to the president of the BPU," Van Drew said, "I'm going to be speaking to him more. I've spoken to Verizon (and) the need is everywhere."
Though there is still a long process ahead with no guarantee for success, South Jersey officials are more hopeful than ever by the recent endorsements from around the state.
The New Jersey League of Municipalities recently issued a statement also declaring its full backing of the group's initiative.
Greg Facemyer, a committeeman in Hopewell Township -- a small, rural community in Cumberland County -- has been at the forefront of the battle against Verizon. He said the group is very hopeful in recent days saying, "It now appears the rest of the state is starting to hear the issues" being experienced in South Jersey.
He continued, "The momentum is caused by the number of affected communities," which he added "clearly speaks volumes that Verizon has (ignored) rural, poor, urban areas."
But Verizon on Monday called the group's claims "baseless and false" and maintained that it has spent millions of dollars to improve the copper network in South Jersey that has helped "to maintain the reliability of telephone service ... especially those with critical service needs like hospitals, fire and police departments."
How the matter eventually plays out remains to be seen, but Facemyer said the group's ultimate goal is for the state Legislature to take some form of regulatory action.
Sweeney said he would like to see some form of administrative action taken as "all communities should have access" to high-speed fiber-optic broadband.
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But what any administrative or regulatory action would look like remains unclear.
The first step, however, is for the BPU to review the petition.
BPU spokesman Greg Reinert would not discuss the ongoing matter other than to say, "We have the petition and staff is reviewing (it) ... Eventually the board will rule on the petition."
Facemyer said there could be a public hearing in the future which would involve each side presenting their cases before the BPU. The BPU would ultimately give a final decision.
Sweeney acknowledged just how frustrating the entire situation has been for the areas in South Jersey -- and North Jersey too, where officials have been dealing with their own set of issues with Verizon.
In a report by NJ Advance Media in September, officials in Newark and Jersey City alleged that Verizon has been exploiting a loophole in state law that has left "tens of thousands of low-income households" without access to Verizon's superior fiber-optic Internet service (Fios), the report says.
Sweeney said he believes Verizon's ultimate goal has been to minimize the amount of fiber-optic cable it installs so that it can maximize its profits.
But he said: "Just because we are less populated doesn't mean" these communities shouldn't have access to fiber.
After the BPU reached an agreement with Verizon in April that hindered the chance of less dense, rural communities in the state from ever being able to acquire Fios, the South Jersey towns sought to ensure the maintenance of the one reliable telecommunications service they had -- their basic copper landline telephone systems.
The South Jersey communities raised concerns that Verizon was allowing their copper landline infrastructure to erode to push customers onto alternative and cheaper wireless platforms like Voice Link -- a wireless-based home telephone service that officials say is vastly inadequate and subject to outages during storms.
According to the petition, the towns' deteriorating landlines have impacted the "safety of residents who are using landline telephone service ... which are directly linked to physicians, hospitals or fire and police stations."
The petition also alleges that Verizon used money intended for the maintenance of towns' copper landline systems to build out fiber in more affluent areas in the state.
Verizon has repeatedly denied this while arguing that the company has not received the amount of complaints that township officials claim residents in their communities have had.
However, in the petition the towns allege Verizon has "manipulated its customer complaint records to such an extent that underreporting has occurred" and that "Verizon has discouraged, or diverted reporting ... or has failed to accurately record reporting of service problems."
Verizon also denied this saying that "there is no evidence presented in the petition to substantiate the claim."
Spencer Kent may be reached at skent@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @SpencerMKent. Find the South Jersey Times on Facebook.
