Federal Communications Commission (FCC)

A week after Hurricane Katrina, tales of satellites’ role are mounting. It won’t be long before regulators and Congress are further assessing the sector’s place in emergency communications, industry officials said. One thing is clear: the satellite industry never has been so busy in the Gulf of Mexico. Satellite phones and fly-away VSAT earth stations are playing a greater role than usual in relief work because of Katrina’s wide path and subsequent floods, officials said. Demand for satellite capacity is high enough that Defense Dept. officials said this week they're making military satellite bandwidth available for civilian communication purposes in Miss.

As FCC Chmn. Martin and Comr. Copps visited the Gulf Coast Thurs., the Commission issued an agenda for its Sept. 15 open meeting devoted to “presentations” on Hurricane Katrina’s impact on communications. No action is expected.

The FCC and members of Congress urged the wireless industry to maintain service to Hurricane Katrina victims who can’t pay their bills. The FCC gave wireless service licensees with hurricane-affected customers until today (Sept. 8) to submit a report verifying “compliance with the standard industry practice of maintaining service to people displaced by Hurricane Katrina despite failure to pay bills.” Reports should describe the grace period or other relief licensees are providing, the agency said.

House Commerce Committee Chmn. Barton (R-Tex.) hopes to put DTV legislation on a “fast track” behind concerns about interoperability during Hurricane Katrina, but the crisis will make it impossible to meet the Sept. 16 budget reconciliation deadline that would include a DTV measure, he told us Wed. He made his comments after a full-day hearing on the impact of the hurricane focusing mainly on oil prices and emergency response times. The committee put together a discussion draft in May and a mark-up is expected to be scheduled for some time in the next 2 weeks, sources told us.

The FCC’s E-911 order was an important step in regulating E-911 services for VoIP providers, but legislation is needed to ensure public access to emergency services, witnesses said Thurs. in prepared statements at a Senate Commerce Committee field hearing in Great Falls, Mont. “It is important that we move quickly,” said Sen. Burns (R-Mont.). “This is a problem which we need to fix very soon.” Burns, who presided over the hearing, is sponsor of a bipartisan bill (S-1063) introduced in May (CD May 19 p1) that would mandate E-911 access for VoIP providers. The bill, which would provide liability relief for emergency call-takers, would require a national plan for implementing next generation E-911 systems.

FCC Comr. Copps sees the new Commission as strongly committed to public safety and homeland security. “With our new Chairman [Martin]… I am very hopeful we will make real progress here,” he told public safety officials at the APCO conference late Thurs. “He [Martin] strikes me as deeply committed to public safety and homeland security -- and you've seen some indications of that already,” Copps said.

Rural and national wireless carriers clashed over whether the FCC’s analysis of the economic impact of intermodal local number portability (LNP) requirement on small carriers is adequate. Calling the analysis “severely deficient,” rural companies and organizations said the agency’s initial regulatory flexibility analysis (IRFA) failed to address the compliance burdens that small carriers will face as a result of the Intermodal LNP Order and to recognize that costs to carry out intermodal LNP substantially outweigh its benefits some places. National carriers argued the opposite.

Industry and consumer groups pledged support for an FCC “Strategic Plan” in comments released last week, but many weren’t shy about pushing favorite regulatory issues. Under the 1993 Govt. Performance & Results Act, the FCC must devise a plan outlining its future direction. In its July 5 release of a draft 2006-2011 plan, the FCC asked for comments by Aug. 5 and last week released 19 comments filed on the plan.

The telecom mega-mergers’ progress in the states saw 2 major developments: N.J. regulators approved the AT&T- SBC merger with only one significant condition, but the Verizon-MCI merger hit a rough spot in Va., with the commission staff urging denial or major conditions unless the companies can show detailed specifics of how the deal would benefit Va. citizens.

Caption providers have seen their business grow as a Jan. 1, 2006, deadline nears for non-exempt new programming to be captioned in the top 25 markets. “Our business has naturally been growing by 50% to 75%,” said Jay Feinberg, dir.- mktg. services at the National Captioning Institute. His and other captioning services, such as Vitac and Caption Colorado, have noticed more business as a result of the deadline, executives said.