Expanding Lifeline and Link-Up programs to spur broadband adoption by those who can’t afford it should be part of comprehensive Universal Service Fund revamp legislation, said House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher, D-Va. At a hearing on the FCC’s adoption recommendations made in the National Broadband Plan, Boucher said he wants to work with Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., to integrate her adoption-focused USF bill with his own comprehensive USF bill. Boucher urged the FCC to accelerate its process to finalize details on an intended pilot program, saying the time frame for introducing his bill with Rep. Lee Terry, R-Neb., is “fairly near term.”
Adam Bender
Adam Bender, Senior Editor, is the state and local telecommunications reporter for Communications Daily, where he also has covered Congress and the Federal Communications Commission. He has won awards for his Warren Communications News reporting from the Society of Professional Journalists, Specialized Information Publishers Association and the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing. Bender studied print journalism at American University and is the author of dystopian science-fiction novels. You can follow Bender at WatchAdam.blog and @WatchAdam on Twitter.
House Communications Subcommittee leaders want to engage industry on net neutrality and adopt a consensus proposal as law, even as the FCC moves to make rules on its own. Chairman Rick Boucher, D-Va., wants to legislate based on industry consensus, he said at a subcommittee broadband adoption hearing and a conference of the Computer & Communications Industry Association. At the hearing, Ranking Member Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., said he’s “100 percent behind” Boucher in the belief that Congress should get involved. But some other legislators questioned the speediness of doing net neutrality on Capitol Hill.
The long-awaited satellite TV reauthorization easily passed the House in a voice vote Wednesday. The bill (S-3333), which would reauthorize direct broadcast satellite distant-signal licenses until through 2014, passed the Senate last week, and now only needs the president’s signature to become law. Democrats and Republicans praised the bill on the House floor before the vote, and there were no objections. After it passed, Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., who was presiding over the House, was heard commenting to an aide, “That was smooth.” The license was originally set to expire at the end of last year, and several extensions had been required.
"Small businesses have much at stake” in the way network neutrality plays out at the FCC, said Chairwoman Nydia Velazquez, D-N.Y., of the House Small Business Committee. But at a hearing Wednesday, small-business executives touched only lightly on the matter. Most instead emphasized the need for continued government support for broadband deployment and adoption efforts.
Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., and FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn rallied supporters of Title II reclassification of broadband Internet services Tuesday at the Free Press Summit. It’s a “big lie” that the government wants to take over the Internet, Dorgan said. Clyburn urged the audience to dispel that and other myths she said lobbyists for big businesses in the industry are spreading. She also said the FCC needs to involve consumers outside Washington more in the Comcast-NBC Universal deal and other matters.
As the FCC considers the future of media, it may need to “modify” the public-interest standard, how the commission enforces it or “how stations fulfill it,” said FCC Media Bureau Associate Chief William Freedman in a panel at the Free Press Summit on Tuesday. “As long as stations are being allowed to use the people’s airwaves, I continue to believe that there should be some quid pro quo, and that’s public service.” It’s easy to “get lulled into a false sense of security” because there are so many stations, TV channels and websites, he said. But just having a large number of sources doesn’t guarantee diverse, “antagonistic” and “vital” news and information, he said. Freedman encouraged interested parties to file comments. Currently “everything is on the table” in the FCC’s proceeding and there are “no preconceived notions about the outcome,” he said. One of the biggest problems keeping public broadcasters from taking chances and reaching new audiences is a fear of upsetting major donors, said Maxie Jackson, president of the national Federation of Community Broadcasters. He cited a “strong need” for regulation to promote diversity.
Rep. Cliff Stearns, R-Fla., plans to offer a net neutrality bill “this week,” he told us in a written statement Monday. A draft of the House Communications Subcommittee ranking member’s bill, circulated among industry lobbyists Monday, would bar the FCC from regulating “information services or Internet access services absent a market failure.” That’s slightly different from a previous draft (CD Feb 25 p11), which would only have prevented the commission from regulating information services. FCC Chairman Genachowski last week proposed reclassifying Internet access services under Title II of the Communications Act. As in the previous draft, before regulating, the FCC would have to send Congress a report showing evidence of a market failure causing “specific, identified harm to consumers by preventing a substantial number of consumers nationwide from accessing a substantial amount of lawful Internet content, applications, and services of their choice on a continuing basis.”
The FCC will have to be lithe as a circus performer to pull off Chairman Julius Genachowski’s so-called “third way” for regulating broadband, said officials from industry and a free-market think tank at a Progress & Freedom Foundation event Friday morning. And the approach would create significant market uncertainty if applied, they said. Genachowski revealed his plan to seal the commission’s broadband Internet authority on Thursday (CD May 7 p1).
Democrats and Republicans in Congress divided sharply on FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s plan to cement the commission’s broadband authority. (See separate story in this issue.) Democrats stood by the FCC chairman, while Republicans accused him of partisanship. The GOP called reclassification -- even lightly applied -- a mistake. House and Senate Commerce Committee Chairmen Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., urged Genachowski on Wednesday to pursue “all viable options,” including reclassification (CD May 6 p1).
The House Small Business Committee plans a broadband hearing Wednesday at 1 p.m., a committee spokesman confirmed Thursday. Small businesses are expected to testify on how broadband creates jobs and helps the economy.