Verizon California has filed a lawsuit naming the California Public Utilities
Commission and Pac-West Telecomm Inc., which targets small and medium-sized enterprises in the western U.S., as codefendants, Pac-West reported today.
According to Pac-West, Verizon's lawsuit seeks to overturn, in part, a May 2003 decision by the CPUC approving an arbitrated interconnection agreement between Verizon and Pac-West, which was entered into on June 2, 2003. Among other allegations, Verizon claims that the May 2003 decision improperly requires Verizon to pay Pac-West more than $20 million more for the delivery of telephone calls to Internet service providers over the 18 months before May 2003 than is permitted under federal law, according to Pac-West.
Pac-West says it believes the issues raised in this suit are clearly defined in the 1996 Telecom Act, and have previously been tried and ruled in favor of competitive telecom providers. Pac-West says it strongly disagrees with the allegations set forth in the lawsuit and intends to vigorously defend its interests.
