East Side May Split Area Code Regulators, Industry Mull Division As Growth Starts To Strain 509 Prefix

Eastern Washington may have a second area code by early 2002.

Regulators and telephone industry officials will meet today in Bellevue, Wash., to begin assessing options for dividing the 21-county area, which has sprawled under a single area code - 509 - since 1957.

Western Washington, meanwhile, has been split and resplit into four area codes as service providers have raced to keep up with demand for Internet, wireless and other telecommunications innovations. A fifth area code will be added there in February.

Slower-growing Eastern Washington has been able to make do with one area code, but the private company that administers telephone numbering in North America determined early this year that within area code 509, all 675 assignable dialing prefixes will be exhausted by mid-2002.

A new code, its number not yet determined, could trigger one of the biggest changes in everyday habits of Eastern Washington residents since the imposition of mail ZIP codes in 1963.

One alternative would mandate 10-digit dialing for all local calls.

Two plans would isolate northeast Washington from the rest of the region. One would split the area along a north-south line, another along an east-west line.

Calls across a boundary would require 10-digit dialing.

The maps on the table today were prepared by NeuStar Inc., a Washington, D.C.-based company under contract to the Federal Communications Commission.

The company notified the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission of the pending area code split in February.

The commission will have the final decision on any change.

Glenn Blackmon, the commission’s assistant director for telecommunications, said the state will challenge the need for a split, and some of the proposed outlines.

“All three of their splits have drawbacks in terms of dividing local areas,” he said.

One would separate Kennewick from Pasco and Richland. Three of the plans separate southern Spokane County from the city and areas to the north.

Blackmon said those defects have been pointed out to NeuStar, whose spokesman was unavailable for comment Wednesday.

“We think they’ll be able to sort that out fairly easily,” he said.

Questions regarding the need for any change at all are more fundamental.

Blackmon said extraordinary demand for numbers from newcomers to the telecommunications business caused NeuStar to miscalculate the date that available prefixes would be exhausted.

Numbers have been distributed in lots of 10,000, he said, even if a company has no need for anywhere near that many.

Two companies, Electric Lightwave Inc. and Connect!, obtained more than 100,000 numbers, Blackmon said.

Lots have since been reduced to 1,000.

He estimated that less than half the allocated numbers are in use. Increasing that portion to 60 percent or 70 percent would push the deadline for a new area code out at least a couple of years, he said.

Blackmon said Spokane County accounts for 75 percent of the demand for new numbers in Eastern Washington, a fact likely to cause resentment if rural areas are forced to make the area code change.

“The typical result is the biggest city gets to keep the existing area code,” he said, using Seattle and Portland as examples.

Terry Vann, executive director of the Washington Independent Telephone Association, said the industry will also question NeuStar’s projections.

Just last fall, he said, no one anticipated a need for another area code until 2003 or 2004.

If zooming number demand in Spokane is creating a problem, Vann said, then a solution should focus on the city alone.

He said the industry will resist any push by NeuStar to reach a decision today, and officials will insist consumers get plenty of education and opportunities to testify on whatever plan emerges, he said.

“It’s especially important that the public be involved in the process,” Blackmon said.

When the 360 area code was carved out in Western Washington five years ago, there was considerable outcry and some litigation, he said.

Subsequent splits have passed with relatively little controversy, he said, although a new plan that would overlay a second code over some areas has upset consumers. Under that plan, existing customers keep their area code, but new customers are assigned the new area code.

Overlays are cheaper for business but more confusing for residential customers, Blackmon said.

Officials at Sterling Financial Corp. and Washington Mutual Bank, both of which have extensive statewide operations, said alarm reprogramming and other measures needed to adapt to a change are inexpensive.

“It was kind of a nonevent,” said Sterling Senior Vice President Heidi Stanley. “We had few customer complaints.”

“It seems like these area code changes happen all the time,” Washington Mutual spokesman Dave Kuhlman said. “It’s something you get used to.”

Gary Gardner, executive director of the Washington Association of Internet Service Providers, said new codes are generally a boon to members because more lines make adding customer connections easier.

“It’s technologically not a problem for us to implement,” he said.

Gardner said that if there’s a drawback, it’s the inability to determine where the person you’re calling is when area codes overlap.