Pai and O'Rielly Say Next Commission Should Be Less Partisan
Commissioners Ajit Pai and Michael O'Rielly said they're hopeful the Republican-controlled FCC will be less partisan, more transparent about draft orders, more focused on broadband infrastructure, and more open to rolling back outdated rules, a Practising Law Institute conference heard Thursday. Panelists also discussed the broadcast incentive auction, privacy regulation and 5G. There's "a lot of room" to improve FCC operations, O'Rielly said: "I look forward to the next chairman making the FCC a more functional place." Both commissioners have been discussed as candidates to be the next chairman, with most attention focusing on Pai (see 1611140066).
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The next commission should return to a less partisan atmosphere, Pai and O’Rielly said. Pai said he “would like to think” that the next incarnation of the FCC will “return to the five of us being all in together,” with fewer party-line splits. He called consensus in the agency “a grand tradition,” and O’Rielly said he hopes for a “new approach” at the commission.
The next commission should make the content of proposals public before it votes on them, O'Rielly said. He said he has often been lobbied on aspects of proposals that already had been removed from the draft item because the lobbying entity wasn't allowed to know the contents of the draft. "We would all benefit from more thoughtful discussion" of draft proposals that would stem from all parties being informed about the proposal's content, he said. More rules going forward should have sunset clauses, Pai said. That would make it harder for outdated rules to persist past the time they're needed, he said. Pai also said the commission should adopt an online “dashboard” that would allow the public to see the agency’s progress on orders and tasks.
Both members said their agency should do more to make it easier for the nation’s broadband infrastructure to be expanded. The FCC’s shot clocks on infrastructure applications should have “teeth,” Pai said, causing projects to be approved if a locality doesn’t act on them within the allotted time. It’s “encouraging” to see broadband infrastructure spoken about as part of a national plan to improve infrastructure, said Office of Strategic Planning Chief Paul De Sa in a later panel. Since nearly every industry uses broadband, investing in broadband infrastructure has “huge economic benefits,” he said.
Localities can be a barrier to broadband deployment, and the commission’s “route to success” will be to use a combination of “the carrot and the stick” to increase broadband infrastructure, said FCC General Counsel Howard Symons. There’s going to be “vigorous debate” if the stick is necessary, he said. Localities are applying processes designed for the approval of “macro towers” to a recent flurry of applications for small-cell deployment, which is creating a problem, said Wireless Bureau Chief Jon Wilkins.
Symons, Wilkins and De Sa said the incentive auction is a tool that should get more use in repurposing spectrum. “To say the auction demonstrated proof of concept is an understatement,” Symons said. The incentive auction is a tool that allows users to trade different kinds of spectrum in a market based way, De Sa said. Stage 3 reverse auction results came in at $40.3 billion Thursday (see 1612010072).
The U.S. is far ahead of the rest of the world in its approach to unlicensed spectrum and “the 5G space,” Pai said. Policies in other countries intended to protect carriers have held them back in that realm, O’Rielly said. AT&T is “leaning aggressively” into 5G, said Senior Vice President Federal Regulatory Joan Marsh on a later panel. She said the company will field test devices in 2017 and has vendors “lined up” to make 5G devices, but the area is still complicated by regulatory challenges.
FCC privacy regulations are an example of the commission applying “asymmetric regulation” since the rules treat carriers and edge providers differently, Pai said. The order shows how little the agency has thought about privacy, Pai aide Nick Degani said on a later panel. Verizon Chief Privacy Officer Karen Zacharia said the FCC order is too broad in its definition of what constitutes sensitive information.