Martin to Resign, Leaving Key Issues on the Table
FCC Chairman Kevin Martin will resign from office, he told colleagues and the public Thursday at the end of the commission’s monthly meeting. His last day will be Tuesday, inauguration day. Like the previous three chairmen, he'll become a senior fellow at the Aspen Institute. Martin didn’t alert his fellow commissioners of his announcement before he made it, we've learned.
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Michael Copps, the FCC’s senior member, is expected to be named acting chairman, based on length of service, commission and industry sources said. How long he will hold the position is unclear.
Failing to get business to commit to building out a public-safety broadband network was the biggest setback of his tenure, Martin said. “That’s the biggest thing that’s left undone,” he said. “I also regret we haven’t made progress on cable rates.”
Before letting his son Luke tap the gavel in an honorary close to his term, Martin thanked his family, current and former staffers and other commissioners for their work. Former aides Catherine Bohigian and Sam Feder attended the meeting, and so did Martin’s wife, Catherine, and their other son. Asked if he expected to be walking through the corridors of Congress, he said, “I don’t have any plans to. Not unless they call me to come up there.”
Under FCC rules, all items circulated by Martin will remain on circulation. His votes, including on an order to set up an auction for the AWS-3 band, won’t count. The FCC hasn’t been very active since November, its last meeting of substance. So with the departure of Commissioner Deborah Tate earlier this month, the acting chairman and three-member commission will confront many matters.
Martin had a special word of thanks for Copps. “In the last eight years, we haven’t always seen eye to eye, but when he gave his word on something it was rock solid,” Martin said.
Copps replied that he sometimes disagreed with Martin on major issues before the commission, but at other times found room for agreement. With Martin’s departure, Copps is the last left of the four commissioners appointed early in the presidency of George W. Bush. “This is not the time or place to revisit things divisive,” Copps said. “Sometimes Kevin confounded commission-watchers by putting forward very original ideas that those who didn’t know him might never have expected. This made some folks happy, some unhappy and others occasionally frantic. But it could also be refreshing.”
Martin was a “prolific” chairman, Commissioner Robert McDowell said, joking that Martin’s wife is expecting their third child since Martin became chairman. “Have you decided on a name yet?” McDowell started to ask, before cutting himself off with a dig at Martin’s reputation for secrecy: “Anyway, you're not going to tell me.”
Martin leaves less than a month before the scheduled DTV switch-over, amid criticism from his colleagues about how the commission has handled public outreach for the change. Martin said he wishes the FCC had been able to award contracts to grassroots groups to help sooner, but it had to wait for money from Congress. “We weren’t able to begin the contracting process until we actually got the money,” he said. He said he doesn’t think Congress should put off the Feb. 17 analog cutoff. (See separate report in this issue.)
The FCC’s call center has been running at capacity taking calls about DTV, Martin said. The commission will spend another $10 million on an outside contractor to handle additional calls, he said. That, along with industry efforts, should be enough, he said.
Martin left some wireless issues on the table as well, foremost among them rules for a 700 MHz D-block auction. “D block was a disaster that he was anxious to walk away from,” an FCC official said Thursday. Another big issue is a proposed free broadband service in the AWS-3 band. “There are lingering issues with respect to competition and concentration and whether or not there should be a spectrum cap,” said a wireless industry attorney. “There’s handset exclusivity and this still pending Skype petition” as well as E-911 location accuracy rules to be wrapped up.
Martin’s departure could affect the voting line on a forbearance petition by Feature Group IP due Wednesday the 21st (CD Jan 13 p5). Martin circulated two draft orders on the petition, one granting and the other refusing relief. An FCC official told us that Martin had voted in favor of the draft that grants relief but hasn’t voted on the other. Since Martin leaves Tuesday, his vote won’t count if other commissioners wait until Wednesday. Historically, the FCC has waited until the last day and sometimes the last hour to release forbearance orders.
Perhaps the biggest wireline issues left unresolved by Martin concern intercarrier compensation and the Universal Service Fund. Martin last year proposed major overhauls for the programs but failed to win support from other commissioners. The commission released an order on ISP-bound traffic compensation, but it’s under appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Other unfinished business include proceedings on pole attachments and local number porting and requests by competitive carriers on the forbearance process, special access and other issues.