State research record

Tennessee pole attachment rules, in writing and dated.

Who regulates the pole you are attaching to in Tennessee, what rate standard applies, where a dispute actually goes and whether cooperative and municipal poles are covered. This is the record we work from, published so you can read it yourself.

Record dated August 21, 2026 · not certified under Section 224(c) · 8 authorities cited
The record

Tennessee

TennesseeTN

Not certified under Section 224(c)Record dated August 21, 2026
Cooperative poles
Cooperative poles sit outside state utility regulation and outside Section 224. Where the cooperative sells broadband, Tenn. Code Ann. 65-25-134 adds a nondiscriminatory access duty, a self imputation rule and a chancery court remedy. A cooperative distributing Tennessee Valley Authority power charges a TVA approved fully allocated cost rate under its wholesale power contract, which is not a rate cap and does not displace the agreement
Municipal poles
Municipal systems are excluded from public utility status and sit outside Section 224, and City of Memphis v. Gilliland held that Section 224(f)(1) is not mandatory on a municipal system. The chapter 52 parity, imputation and remedy provisions run to a franchisee under chapter 59 rather than to attachers generally, and that reading is less firmly established than the rest of this row
Rate standard
For a municipal or cooperative local power company distributing Tennessee Valley Authority power, the TVA fully allocated cost formula, being space allocation times net cost of a bare pole times carrying cost. Investor owned poles run on the FCC cable and telecom formulas
Where a dispute goes
The FCC under Subpart J for investor owned poles. Chancery court in the two statutory cases. Otherwise contract only, in a Tennessee court, with no agency, no commission and no FCC
Confidence
High confidence on non certification, on the cooperative position and the TVA rate mechanism, and on the forum conclusions that rest on Tenn. Code Ann. 65-25-134(h) and on the absence of any Tennessee pole attachment rule; Provisional on the municipal row, including the chapter 52 provisions. Tennessee has no state make ready timeline, no self help right and no application processing deadline, no limitation period was researched, and no Tennessee deadline is stated here

AuthoritiesTenn. Code Ann. 65-4-101(6)(A)Tenn. Code Ann. 65-25-134Tenn. Code Ann. 7-52-60916 U.S.C. 831i47 U.S.C. 224(a)(1)TVA, Determination on Regulation of Pole Attachments (February 2016)City of Memphis v. Tandy J. Gilliland Family LLC, No. W2014-02472-COA-R3-CV (Tenn. Ct. App. Dec. 16, 2015)FCC DA 22-630

Read the chip above as one fact and no more: whether Tennessee has certified under Section 224(c) that it regulates pole attachments itself. It does not settle your pole. Cooperative and municipal poles sit outside federal jurisdiction whether or not a state has certified, so the two owner class lines are the ones that answer the question for the invoice in front of you.

This record is worked from the statute and the order that made it rather than from a summary of one. The confidence line is tied to its source: where a conclusion rests on weaker ground the record says so, because a hedge you can see is what makes the confident answers worth believing. The method is set out in how PoleProof researches and verifies, and how a cleared rule enters an audit is on the methodology page.

Back to the state research ledger · 45 jurisdictions on file

Scope

How to use this, and how to check it

Every conclusion above names the authority it rests on, so you can go read that authority and decide whether you agree. That is the point of publishing the record rather than asserting the result.

This is general information about the rules and it is not legal advice, and it is not a substitute for your own counsel on a specific dispute. PoleProof is not a law firm. PoleProof performs financial and cost review of what you have been billed rather than engineering evaluation of what the pole owner determined was necessary. Rules change, and this record carries the date it was worked so you can see how current it is.

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