The FCC approved by unanimous vote Wednesday an NPRM that could add another 195 MHz to the spectrum open for Wi-Fi and other unlicensed use in the 5 GHz band. The notice also proposes changes to FCC rules and equipment authorization procedures for devices used in the band. FCC officials told us more harmonization of the 5 GHz band could be helpful to industry and consumers.
The federal government’s broadband initiatives must continue, said FCC commissioners Thursday at the Federal-State Joint Conference on Advanced Services. But such programs need more accountability and a sharper focus, they said. Panelists emphasized the importance of digital literacy, and telco executives promoted a message of grassroots outreach in encouraging broadband adoption. “We are going to approach adoption with a little more nuance than we have in the past,” Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, the conference’s new federal chair, told the summit. The FCC will be looking at “how to quantify how much can be saved when services migrate online and how citizens and consumers can help by sharing in those savings,” she said, describing an intention to look at the accountability of sustainable broadband programs to find out which are “truly sustainable” and strengthen the successes.
Pressure is growing on FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski to say something, anything, about his plans for the future, now that the second term of the Obama administration is underway. Last week, Genachowski was peppered with questions in the news conference after the commission meeting, but said nothing about his departure plans (CD Feb 1 p11). Also on the rise is pressure on the administration to appoint the first-ever woman to chair the FCC, one of the most high-profile of the independent federal commissions, following the departure of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis.
NAB still supports some FCC broadcast ownership deregulation for those getting an overcoming disadvantages preference (ODP), while nonprofits that oppose other types of deregulation shared those concerns with aides to Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, ex parte filings in docket 09-182 say. Shared service agreements and other contracts “between putatively separate stations” should be addressed in coming ownership rules, as a draft order’s focus on just joint sales agreements (JSA) continues to be “puzzling” to SSA foe Free Press, an official at the group reported telling an aide to Clyburn (http://xrl.us/bobd2n). “News co-production and ’sharing’ arrangements seem more likely to allow for control or influence over another licensee’s programming than do JSAs.” Clyburn has been considering whether some JSAs may be beneficial, as she and Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel have concerns about deregulating other ownership rules before the agency conducts barriers-to-entry studies (CD Jan 18 p1). NAB continues to be willing to discuss with the FCC and others “practical steps” to implement an ODP, the association reported executives told Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake and an aide to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski (http://xrl.us/bobd27). It said that NAB, which backs ownership incubator programs to provide deregulation for various media assets, wouldn’t oppose such a “program that was initially limited to radio,” as the Diversity and Competition Supporters coalition has sought. Clyburn’s aide was also lobbied against deregulation by Georgetown University’s Institute for Public Representation, which also is against consolidation (http://xrl.us/bobd27).
Lobbying on FCC media ownership rules continues, as what’s expected to be the final comment cycle (CD Dec 29 p1) before a draft order is recirculated ended Jan. 4. Those seeking more deregulation than is in the draft circulated Nov. 14, including the Newspaper Association of America, reported in docket 09-182 visiting the agency in recent days (http://xrl.us/boa4d8). Meanwhile the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters and Independent Telephone & Telecommunications Alliance continued seeking more regulation than is in the draft. Commissioner Robert McDowell said Wednesday (http://xrl.us/boa4d4) that the agency shouldn’t limit joint sales agreements, something the draft does for JSAs. (See separate report above in this issue.) Media General wants exemption from any restrictions on JSAs where the station brokering ads for the other broadcaster in the agreement provides local news and information to its partner, CEO George Mahoney wrote in a handwritten letter to an aide to Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, a copy of which is in the docket (http://xrl.us/boa4va). With the agency “poised to conclude” JSAs “should be deemed attributable ownership stakes,” the commission should “take the additional step of ensuring” that those and any other sharing deals that allow coordinated retransmission consent negotiations for multiple stations in a market don’t “harm competition and consumers,” ITTA told (http://xrl.us/boa4gz) the aide to Rosenworcel. There’s a “complete lack of any potential harm” that “liberalization of the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership rule” would have on ownership diversity, a lawyer for NAA reported telling an aide to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski. NABOB Executive Director Jim Winston told Genachowski’s aide of its continued opposition to ownership-rule relaxation without developing a record on the potential impact on ownership opportunities for minorities and women, and said doing so wouldn’t meet the requirements of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ 2011 remand of the last media ownership order (http://xrl.us/boa4f8). It would “be very difficult for a standalone radio station to compete with a radio group of multiple stations in a market if that radio group owner also owned the daily newspaper,” Winston reported a month late that he and other NABOB directors told Commissioner Mignon Clyburn. The draft order has been said to allow common ownership of radio stations and daily newspapers within a market. Because auto advertisers like to buy ads in the automotive sales supplements that dailies run weekly, “it would be very difficult for a standalone station to compete with a combined daily newspaper-radio combination,” Winston and executives from Access.1 Communications, Inner City Broadcasting and Taxi Productions told Clyburn. The notice covered no arguments not made in previous on-time filings by the association, so its lateness didn’t prejudice any party, Winston wrote (http://xrl.us/boa4gt).
The FCC Public Safety Bureau report on June’s derecho wind storm, which knocked out phone service for 3.6 million people in the mid-Atlantic and beyond -- many unable to reach 911 for several hours -- made demands of telcos among its recommendations. The Public Safety Bureau released the 56-page document Thursday after starting an investigation in July (CD July 20 p5). Four 911 centers in northern Virginia lost 911 access completely, prompting a close look at Verizon’s role and backup power generator failures there. FCC recommendations include provisions on backup power and audits and preface a rulemaking notice intended to strengthen emergency communications.
Addressing Internet Protocol interconnection must be a priority, and the FCC should monitor the market and stand ready to act in the case of market failure, commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Jessica Rosenworcel said Thursday at the Practicising Law Institute telecom policy conference. Clyburn applauded the creation of the Technology Transitions Task Force (CD Dec 11 p5), and proposed that it recommend addressing the IP interconnection issues raised in last year’s USF/intercarrier compensation order, and “fully evaluate” the framework to ensure voice traffic continues to be exchanged between providers. Rosenworcel said the commission “must monitor IP-to-IP interconnection and stand ready to act to ensure that network providers negotiate in good faith."
Partisan strife flared in a House Communications Subcommittee hearing Wednesday over the FCC framework for the spectrum incentive auction. Republican lawmakers and FCC commissioners sparred with Democrats over how the government should acquire and reallocate some of the nation’s most valuable airwaves. Partisan differences over how much spectrum should be preserved to protect licensed spectrum and be used for lower-power unlicensed activities played out in recent days in commissioners’ prepared testimony (CD Dec 12 p7). Democrats separately expressed disapproval of a draft order that would relax media cross-ownership rules (CD Dec 12 p5), which they said would have a negative impact on media diversity and localism.
In what many observers view as a sleeper order with important long-term implications, the FCC Wednesday approved launching a rulemaking aimed at opening the 3550-3650 MHz band for shared use and use by small cells. The spectrum is now set aside for high-powered military radar and fixed satellite service earth stations and satellites. The NPRM proposes that the band be reallocated under a three-tiered “Citizens Broadband Service” under Part 95 of the commission’s rules.
Republicans and Democrats on the House Communications Subcommittee are likely to spar Wednesday over two particular issues raised by an FCC September notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM): the allocation of unlicensed spectrum and bidder eligibility requirements, according to planning memos. The subcommittee’s majority memo, published this week, said the FCC runs the risk of “short changing” first responders if the commission decides to give away much of the spectrum that is cleared in connection with the forthcoming broadcast incentive auctions. The memo also urged the commission against “picking winners and losers” by excluding parties from the auction. Subcommittee Democrats shot back Tuesday with a minority memo that said Republicans are seeking to “reopen issues that were resolved in the legislation.”