FCC Commissioners Regularly Travel; Carr Leads the Pack

Carr and other current and former commissioners said travel is an important aspect of the job for seeing how current policies are playing out, what needs communities might have, and what alternative approaches are being tried elsewhere in the U.S. or globally. The regulators often invoke their trips when discussing items they are voting on and otherwise talking about the consequences of and reasons for FCC actions. Carr told us the birth of his third child over the summer would curtail his travel.

Behind Carr was Chairman Ajit Pai, who logged seven days out of the area during Q1. Being out of the Washington, suburban Maryland and Virginia area could be a point of pride for Pai, who at the agency's September meeting noted he had now been to all 48 contiguous states as chairman. Pai's office emailed us that the digital divide trips are a means to getting a firsthand assessment of the issue and of solutions.

While traveling, Pai discusses what the agency is doing, his office said. "He also talks with people on the ground to learn about their perspectives." It said trip itineraries are made up of invitations, including from members of Congress; speaking at events; meeting with state and local officials; and setting up visits with local businesses, or in the case of telehealth issues, hospitals. It said his flights and hotels are booked in coordination with the FCC’s travel office.

Carr's Travels

Carr logged an overnight trip to Texas Feb. 4-5 for stops including opening of an Ericsson tower crew training site with Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Texas, (see here), keynoting the National Association of Tower Erectors' annual conference (see here), and stopping at an FCC field office and at Cable One.

At the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Spain Feb. 23-25, Carr had scheduled meetings with Marcelo Claure, Sprint executive chairman. The commissioner took part in a roundtable discussion on digital single markets in Europe and on the future of the telecom industry, and in meetings with delegations from Brazil, Australia and Japan, and with T-Mobile top officials. T-Mobile is buying Sprint.

The GOP FCC member was in the Bay Area Feb. 26 for a 5G panel (see here) and farm and manufacturer stops to discuss issues like connectivity and IoT (see here). March 18-22 was a trip to Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia, including a stop at the Chattanooga Volkswagen plant with Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., (see here), a telehealth roundtable with Blackburn, a telehealth tour at ProMedica in Toledo, Ohio, with Rep. Bob Latta, R-Ohio, a stop at the University of Dayton Research Institute, a WISPAmerica discussion in Cincinnati, a tour of the Cincinnati Veterans Affairs Medical Center on telehealth, a look at small-cell deployments, a ride-along with a Cincinnati Fire Department station, and stops in Kentucky, including Bluegrass Cellular headquarters in Elizabethtown and at Amazon's facility in Shepherdsville with Rep. Brett Guthrie, R-Ky. March 24-29, he was in Africa as part of a U.S. delegation discussing connectivity and 5G issues with regulators there (see here).

Pai's Q1 trips were Feb. 4-6 in New Orleans. That travel included stops at Ochsner Health (see here) and a New Orleans public service answering point (see here), plus a stop at an FCC field office, lunch with Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., an NTCA board meet and greet, and a fireside chat with the 2019 Rural Telecom Industry meeting. Feb. 25-March 1, he was in Spain for MWC. There was a March 7 trip to Camden, New Jersey, and Wilmington, Delaware, for a visit to healthcare provider ChristianaCare (see here), a talk at the Princeton University Federalist Society, and a stop at the Seaford, Delaware, 911 Center.

March 18-20, the FCC chief was in the Atlanta area for a meeting with retired NBA great Dominique Wilkins about telehealth (see here) and stops that included Chick-fil-A headquarters and Techstars Atlanta, a business and tech startup done in partnership with Cox Communications, and a talk with the Georgia Chamber of Commerce. Pai spent March 25-27 in California's Bay Area, including stops at farms and wineries to discuss connectivity issues and agriculture (see here and here). The Spain trip included meeting with his Jordanian counterpart, Ghazi Al-Jobor, (see here), Portuguese officials (see here) and GSMA Latin America (see here).

Other Commissioners

Geoffrey Starks, who was sworn in Jan. 30, logged days in Kansas City, Feb. 28 through March 2, and a trip to Las Vegas March 20 and 21.

A Kansas native, Starks tweeted his trip there was for a variety of digital divide-related visits accompanied by Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D-Mo. His itinerary included a breakfast meeting with the Kansas City Urban Summit, a meeting with the Kansas City Coalition for Digital Inclusion, and a stop at Connecting for Good (see here). His Las Vegas trip included a stop at the Las Vegas 911 center (see here) and a telehealth discussion at Desert View Hospital in Pahrump, Nevada, with Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev. (see here), and a visit to the Veterans Affairs Southern Nevada Healthcare System (see here).

Jessica Rosenworcel had two out-of-town work trips during the quarter: Barcelona's MWC and a March 9 overnight in Austin for South by Southwest, where she was a speaker.

Mike O’Rielly spent the least time on the road. There was one-day trip to northwest Ohio March 21, where he and Latta took part in a broadband roundtable at Defiance College. He flew back to the D.C. area that night.

Community Visits

Former and current commissioners told us travel is a means to see how agency policies play out in local communities and what needs those communities have. It also can be information gathering about how localities, states or other countries tackle particular issues, they said.

Former Commissioner Mignon Clyburn said that “I came from every encounter … more enriched about who I was from a regulatory standpoint and what" she "made a commitment to do."

Former Commissioner Rob McDowell said it's important for commissioners “to get out beyond the Beltway to learn,” and all five seem to like to do that. “You can learn so much from going to rural America ... to see how universal service funds are deployed,” he said, citing his first trip as commissioner to rural Alaska. He said given how closely foreign regulators scrutinize what the FCC does, "it's important to explain what we're doing. ... Sometimes, just showing up shows the U.S. is serious."

Being out of town could easily dominate schedules. "If you said yes to everything that came ... you would literally never be [at the FCC]," Clyburn said. Carr said he built trip itineraries out of invitations or major events and then would look for other opportunities for stops that connect to FCC issues such as telehealth or communications infrastructure. He said he didn't see time spent traveling cutting into the time needed for meetings and other work at the commission.