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.
A storm of protest greeted a European Commission (EC) move to regulate online audiovisual (AV) services. The plan would apply the 1989 TV without Frontiers (TVWF) directive to Internet TV programming and “non-linear"(on- demand) services. But in comments submitted in advance of a major AV conference to occur later this month, telcos, ISPs and media groups panned the idea, saying it’s overkill and would hamper efforts to boost Europe’s economy.
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.
Ethics charges dogged current and former state commissioners in Fla. and Minn. A short-handed Fla. Ethics Commission deadlocked 3-3 on whether there’s enough substance to ethics charges against 4 current and former PSC members to warrant full hearings. Three ethics panel members were absent. Meanwhile, a Minn. state agency representing the public interest said a former Minn. PUC member committed an “egregious” violation of state ethics laws by soliciting a job from a telecom carrier during the final weeks of his term on the PUC. Fla. PSC Comrs. Braulio Baez, Rudy Bradley and Terry Deason and former comr. Lila Jaber face ethics charges related to their attendance at the 2002 conference of the Southeastern Assn. of Regulatory Utility Commissioners in Miami Beach, partly supported by regulated telecom and energy utilities. The complaint alleges their attendance constituted receiving a gift from regulated utilities because they accepted generally-available free meals and discounted registration fees for regulators. The Fla. legislature this year passed a law to clarify ethics rules by allowing PSC members to attend conference events and meals open to all registrants, and to accept conference discounts available to all regulators. Attorneys for the plaintiffs argued the conduct was legally unethical in 2002 and laws passed afterward can’t apply unless the legislature says so. Attorneys for the 4 PSC members said the legislature clearly meant to clarify an ambiguity in ethics rules regarding conference attendance, so an explicit retroactivity provision wasn’t required. In Minn., meanwhile, the state Dept. of Commerce said former Comr. Greg Scott clearly violated state ethics laws when he solicited a job from telecom carrier Integra Telecom in April, 2 months before his term was to end. Scott joined Integra in June as vp-regulatory affairs. He left Integra Aug. 23, amid widespread publicity about the ethics charges. The Commerce Dept., acting as public advocate, said Scott’s violation was clear cut and some kind of punishment was in order. But Scott’s attorneys and Integra said they followed all applicable laws. Scott’s attorneys said contacts between the PUC member and Integra were lawful because they didn’t relate to pending cases involving Integra. Integra said it did nothing wrong because it didn’t hire Scott until after he left the PUC. Meanwhile, Scott’s ethics troubles expanded last week after Qwest asked a federal court to suspend or set aside a $25.9 million fine assessed in a complaint case involving competitor AT&T because of suspicious communications between Scott and an AT&T attorney during the complaint case. Scott’s attorneys denied wrongdoing.
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.