Sean Stokes

Experience

1. Partner,

   Keller and Heckman LLP

   Nov 2020 — Present · Washington, DC, US

   Sean represents clients nationally on a wide range of communications matters including broadband, cable television, wireless communications, right-of-way management, pole attachments, barriers to community broadband initiatives, and public-private partnerships. He counsels clients in developing and negotiating agreements involving access to poles, conduits, dark fiber, and towers. He has represented clients in complex negotiations developing city-wide fiber-to-the-home networks. He has assisted in the creation of public-private broadband consortia seeking federal and state broadband funding.Sean has advised clients in numerous cases involving complex factual, legal, and policy issues, multiple parties, and large amounts in controversy. His clients include national and state utility associations, and numerous public and private entities. He collaborates with multi-disciplinary teams of legal, financial, engineering, and other technical experts, assisting clients in making comprehensive broadband plans.Representative engagements:• Negotiated dozens of agreements for infrastructure access, including pole attachments, conduit leases, dark fiber IRUs, and wireless siting• Developed legal, regulatory, and legislative strategies to remove barriers to broadband entry• Negotiated public private broadband partnerships • Assisted clients in obtaining federal broadband funding • Represented a major utility trade association before the FCC and in the appeal of the FCC’s Small Cell Wireless Order before the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit• Assisted a capital city in developing an innovative wireless right-of-way siting ordinance • Authored model pole attachment agreement for APPA• Brought successful petitions to FCC on behalf of two public power utilities to preempt state laws that posed barriers to municipal broadband initiatives (FCC decision subsequently overturned for lack of preemptive authority)• Assisted clients with regulatory compliance

Skills

• Strategy
• Program Management
• Government
• Leadership
• Broadband
• Contract Negotiations
• Telecommunications
• Strategic Planning
• Contract Negotiation