New York City sued Verizon Wireless over the carrier’s failure to complete its FiOS network that was promised to all households in the city by 2014. According to a contract signed in 2008, the largest wireless carrier in the United States was supposed to provide approximately 3.1 million households in New York City with access to its FiOS broadband service by 2014, but even today, the network is only available to around 2.2 million households. Due to that state of affairs, the City of New York decided to sue the Big Red over breaching their contract. The lawsuit against Verizon was filed with the New York Supreme Court and accompanied by a strongly worded statement from Mayor Bill de Blasio.
In a release published on Monday, de Blasio criticized Verizon for “breaking the trust” of all residents of New York, adding that the city is done waiting for the wireless carrier to deliver on its overdue promise. The Mayor of New York concluded his statement by saying that no one can get away with breaking a promise given to New York Citizens. The New Jersey-based Internet service provider refuted de Blasio’s accusations and labeled them as being politically motivated and misinformed. Verizon is claiming that the current administration is wrongly interpreting several clauses signed by the former mayor Michael Bloomberg, adding that it has fulfilled all of its contractual obligations by installing fiber cables near every New York City residence. While close to a million households still can’t be connected to Verizon’s FiOS network, the wireless carrier is claiming that it wasn’t required to connect them in the first place, only pass fiber cables in their vicinity.
Finally, Verizon is accusing New York City landlords of inhibiting its efforts to deliver the service to all households in the city by refusing the company access to buildings. The current administration already responded to those allegations by highlighting how the wireless carrier asked for exclusive service agreements for multi-family residential housing, which is a violation of the rules enacted by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC). If this dispute actually ends up in court, it may lead to a legal saga that will take years to be concluded.