FCC NEARING SECONDARY MARKETS RULES AND FURTHER NOTICE, MULETA SAYS
In the next 2 months, the FCC will move ahead with a long-awaited rule and further notice designed to facilitate secondary markets for spectrum, Wireless Bureau Chief John Muleta told reporters Mon. The Commission proposed rules in 2000 that focused on an array of wireless services, but didn’t include broadcasting and public safety, Deputy Chief Peter Tenhula said at a bureau news briefing. Those other areas, including regulatory relief for transactions involving broadcast and public safety spectrum, have been examined since then by the Commission’s Spectrum Policy Task Force. Commercial wireless issues considered long ripe for review will be part of the order, while new areas will be part of a further notice, officials said.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
In other areas, Muleta said the agency planned to hold fast to an upcoming wireless local number portability (LNP) deadline that’s the subject of an industry challenge that will be heard today (Tues.) by the U.S. Appeals Court, D.C. Muleta declined to comment on the court challenge, which CTIA and Verizon Wireless filed after the agency declined to grant a Verizon request for forbearance on LNP. The deadline for carriers implementing LNP is Nov. 24 in the top 100 Metropolitan Statistical Areas. “One thing we are firm on is that the date is Nov. 24,” he said. In a briefing that covered the status of wireless policy areas, Muleta said rules for high-speed public safety operations at 4.9 GHz were due out in the next month or 2 and that the Bureau was likely to act on 800 MHz reconfiguration this summer.
The Commission’s proposed rulemaking on secondary markets outlined steps the agency might take to remove regulatory barriers to the development of secondary wireless markets, which former FCC Chmn. William Kennard had described at the time as a way to alleviate the spectrum “drought.” The proposal sought feedback on issues such as the impact of leasing, whether lessees should be subject to build-out and other requirements faced by the original licensee and whether leasing should involve only excess capacity or the right to “raw” spectrum. Among other issues are how to update the Intermountain Microwave test, a 40-year-old case interpreting Sec. 310(d) of the Communications Act for evaluating wireless ownership transfers. The case has been interpreted to mean that a licensee must keep relatively tight hands-on control of licensed property, which in turn has made spectrum leasing difficult. The task force’s recommendations last fall also touched on secondary markets, including letting public safety operators lease spectrum when it isn’t being used for emergencies.
The earlier rulemaking excluded broadcasting and public safety, Tenhula said. The task force developed those ideas and received feedback on factors such as technological advances in software defined radio, he said. Tenhula, the task force’s director, said there already was broadcast flexibility in areas such as supplementary ancillary services on digital spectrum. “So how can secondary markets fit into that?” he asked. The task force also raised the possibility of allowing public safety users to lease underutilized spectrum under a system that would allow them to reclaim it on a priority base if it were needed for emergencies.
Muleta said the Commission would release “in the next month or 2” an order on licensing and service rules for the 4.9 GHz band, which it has allocated to public safety operations. Last year, the FCC earmarked 50 MHz in that band to public safety uses such as high-speed digital technologies, which could be used for data networks and video transmissions. “Hopefully in that item you'll see some innovations in how that spectrum could be used by public safety groups,” Muleta said.
The bureau expects to be close “to making some final cuts” in 800 MHz reconfiguration in the summer, Muleta said. The Commission has before it several versions of a proposed realignment of that spectrum to mitigate interference to public safety users, including a plan by Nextel, the Industrial Telecom Assn. and public safety groups. “Because of the extensiveness of the record, I can’t accurately predict when all the dotting of the i’s and crossing of the t’s on the item will be done,” he said. “I think we have enough information that the bureau can make some cuts.” The key priority guiding the FCC is to reduce or eliminate interference to public safety users in that band “very quickly,” he said.
Muleta said the bureau expected to have a recommendation developed by summer in a rulemaking on hearing aid compatibility and digital devices. He said he couldn’t speak to the timing of when the FCC would act: “It’s very important to us and we are working on it.”