The FCC Wireless Bureau sought comment Friday on a proposed leasing agreement between AT&T and FTC Management Group. The companies proposed the agreement in July, said a notice in docket 25-138. AT&T and FTC would lease 40 MHz of 3.45 GHz spectrum to each other in the Florence and Sumter, South Carolina, partial economic areas. FTC would also lease AWS-1 and AWS-3 spectrum to AT&T in the Florence market. The swap would mean both companies would exceed the FCC’s “aggregation limit” of up to 40 MHz of spectrum in the 3.45 GHz band in various markets, the bureau said. Comments are due March 28, replies April 11.
The FCC Wireless Bureau officially signed off Friday on Summit Ridge’s closing of the 3.45 GHz relocation reimbursement clearinghouse (see 2503110014). “The 3.45 GHz band transition is complete with both incumbent operators, NBCUniversal and Nexstar Broadcasting, having relocated to the 2.9-3.0 GHz band and been reimbursed for their costs of relocation,” the bureau said in docket 19-348.
Facing a withholding of some USF high-cost support due to an untimely certification, RiverStreet Communications of North Carolina is asking the FCC Wireline Bureau for a waiver of agency rules concerning submitting annual reporting information. In a docket 10-90 request posted Friday, RiverStreet said that initially it inadvertently failed to certify its Q3 2023 data, though that filing was certified weeks later. It said the Universal Service Administrative Co. notified it last month that a portion of RiverStreet's high-cost support payment would be withheld. RiverStreet said the lost money will delay its planned broadband deployment to the unserved and underserved in rural North Carolina. The shutdown of the performance measures module for much of last fall prevented it from certifying when it was supposed to, it said, subjecting it to notably higher penalties.
The FCC Wireline Bureau on Friday set forth procedures for protecting access to proprietary or confidential information filed in a proceeding on the Alternative Connect America Cost Model program (see 2306260044). “Under the Enhanced A-CAM mechanism, electing carriers receive high-cost support calculated based on model-estimated costs in exchange for deploying 100/20 Mbps or faster broadband to locations without such service at the time of the offer and maintaining or improving such service to locations to which the electing carriers already provided at least that level of service,” the bureau said. “While we are mindful of the sensitive nature of some of the information involved, we are also mindful of the general right of the public, and our desire for the public, to participate in this proceeding in a meaningful way.”
The FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau sought comment Friday on a petition by Sorenson Communications and CaptionCall on allowable costs for providing telecommunications relay services (TRS). Comments are due April 14, replies April 28, in dockets 03-123 and 10-51. The redacted petition asks that allowable TRS costs include funds associated with “responding to and defending against FCC enforcement proceedings related to a provider’s compliance with the TRS rules” and "educating members of the U.S. Congress and other policymakers on the TRS program generally and a TRS provider’s operations specifically,” the bureau said. It noted that Sorenson filed a similar petition in 2023.
Senate Homeland Security Investigations Subcommittee ranking member Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., is pressing the FCC's Enforcement and Media bureaus for information on investigations of broadcasters that commission Chairman Brendan Carr has ordered since taking over Jan. 20. The probes thus far focus on broadcasters that have run content critical of President Donald Trump or otherwise face claims of pro-Democratic Party bias. Carr has, in some cases, said the scrutiny is focused on other matters (see 2502110063).
Two FCC facilities are listed among government real estate leases marked for termination by the Department of Government Efficiency, according to the DOGE website. The FCC didn’t respond to requests for comment on the listings, but the leases appear to be Enforcement Bureau field offices in Dallas and Cerritos, California. An internal General Services Administration planning document said those leases would be canceled Sept. 30, according to an Associated Press report. DOGE lists the termination of the Cerritos lease as saving $142,637 a year and the Dallas lease as saving $60,630 a year. The FCC didn’t respond to questions about whether the canceled leases would influence Enforcement Bureau field coverage or involve a reduction in personnel. After then-Chairman Tom Wheeler cut several EB field offices in 2015, FCC Republicans -- including former Chairman Ajit Pai -- voiced their opposition (see 1507160036).
The government defended the FCC in a reply brief in FCC v. Consumers’ Research, the USF case before the U.S. Supreme Court, arguing that Consumers' Research (CR) creates a “straw man” to attack. Public interest groups, led by the Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition, also defended the legality of how the USF contribution factor is calculated. SCOTUS is set to hear oral argument March 26.
The FCC’s “In Re: Delete Delete Delete” proceeding could draw a huge number of response filings and is expected to require numerous subsequent rulemakings to lead to actual changes, said industry officials and academics. “Every single regulated entity will sit on Santa's lap and ask for presents,” said TechFreedom Senior Counsel Jim Dunstan. “It will take months just to sift through all the asks and determine how to proceed.”
The FCC has created an internal, multi-bureau national security taskforce “to promote America’s national security and counter foreign adversaries, particularly the threats posed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Chinese Communist Party (CCP),” said FCC Chairman Brendan Carr in a news release Thursday. Called the Council for National Security, the group will include members from eight bureaus and FCC offices. Carr’s national security counsel, Adam Chan, will lead the group, the release said. It didn't specify which bureaus and offices will be involved, and the agency didn’t immediately respond to questions about the group's makeup or whether it will hold public meetings.