Commerce Department IG Report to Congress IDs FirstNet, Spectrum Among Challenges
Key Commerce Department challenges include addressing FirstNet’s “adequacy of funding, effective consulting, internal control, and staffing and other organizational issues” and addressing an increasing demand for spectrum, Deputy Inspector General David Smith said in his office’s semiannual report to Congress,…
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Communications Daily is required reading for senior executives at top telecom corporations, law firms, lobbying organizations, associations and government agencies (including the FCC). Join them today!
released this week (see 1605310058). Smith is now the acting inspector general, and the Senate Commerce Committee held a nomination hearing last month for the administration’s nominee for a permanent IG (see 1605100057). The IG’s report referred to President Barack Obama’s directive to make 500 MHz of spectrum available by 2020. “To meet the 2020 deadline, NTIA needs to incorporate the lessons learned from its research and development activities into actual strategies that lead to results -- as well as identify the availability of, and more efficient use of, radio frequency spectrum,” the 64-page IG report said. “Also, the termination of the Federal Spectrum Management System presents a challenge to NTIA’s capability to manage spectrum, it will still be in need of a technological system that can modernize, automate, and integrate key spectrum management functions.” In the course of an audit, the IG “found FirstNet’s process to inform federal agencies about the benefits” of its network “and its initial efforts to address federal agency challenges reasonable given the limitations on federal consultation mentioned throughout our report.” The IG recommended the FirstNet CEO “identify and document non-subjective performance indicators and milestones and define and document how each will be measured”; “identify steps to mitigate the risk of low federal participation in FirstNet’s Federal Stakeholder Engagement Plan,” and “perform and document analysis of federal consultation and outreach efforts, including analyses specific to the 14 agencies that compose the Emergency Communications Preparedness Center.” There's an ongoing audit of FirstNet’s “processes for entering into, monitoring, and closing its interagency agreements,” the IG noted. Five of nine broadband stimulus grant recipients IG reviewed “had excess equipment, $3.5 million in total, including equipment outside the needs of completing the grant projects,” the report said. “Also, we found that NTIA’s processes for identifying and disposing of [Broadband Technology Opportunities Program]-funded excess inventory were inadequate for effective management of these awards.” It found that $600,000 “may have been improperly disposed,” it said. The IG report also said five entities were debarred for three years after allegations that an unnamed stimulus grantee “misused and mismanaged grant funds and that a whistleblower employee of the subrecipient was terminated for disclosing the misuse and mismanagement.”