Baker Wants Focus on Satellite, Not Broadcast, Spectrum For Now
FCC Commissioner Meredith Baker wants more attention given to satellite spectrum repurposing or incentive auctions, and less for now to broadcasters’ spectrum, she suggested in a recorded interview that was to have aired over the weekend and run again Monday. Speaking on C-SPAN’s The Communicators, she renewed her call for a comprehensive approach to spectrum policy. It must go beyond the recent conversations about redeploying TV stations’ airwaves for wireless broadband and focus on satellite and other areas, she said last week.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
If your job depends on informed compliance, you need International Trade Today. Delivered every business day and available any time online, only International Trade Today helps you stay current on the increasingly complex international trade regulatory environment.
"We need to give them a chance,” Baker said of broadcasters’ efforts to roll out mobile DTV and increase HD programming. “This is being portrayed as a fight between broadcasting and broadband, and there is a place for both of them,” she said. “I sort of wish we'd started with is the incentive auctions for the satellite spectrum, because it’s clear that we have too much satellite spectrum and not enough terrestrial spectrum. It’s an easier discussion, because it’s more ripe. The broadcasters are still just beginning to find out what their business models will be” for new services.
Baker “recognizes that broadcasting has a bright future,” an NAB spokesman said. The industry will offer mobile digital broadcasts, HD programming and multicasting, he said. A Satellite Industry Association executive didn’t immediately reply to a message seeking comment.
"We're in a place where we're quickly approaching spectrum exhaustion” in the U.S., and some frequencies may come from broadcasters and government users, Baker said. “We need to work cooperatively for more spectrum. But we keep talking about broadcasters and incentive auctions, and what I think we really need is a more comprehensive spectrum policy” that looks at increasing efficiency and making other changes, Baker said. The interview is at http://xrl.us/bifkrz.
On changing the Universal Service Fund so some money is used for broadband deployment, the FCC commissioners “all agree that some reform is needed,” Baker said. “We all agree on the high-level talking points.” The commission’s National Broadband Plan last year offered a comprehensive way to go from funding voice to broadband over 10 years, “a reasonable glide path,” but “the devil’s in the details,” she said. “We need to work together to find consensus” starting with the rulemaking notice on USF tentatively set for a vote at the Feb. 8 FCC meeting (CD Jan 20 p6), she added. “Of course, intercarrier compensation is the other part of the equation,” she said. “It’s going to take us a while” with complex issues “and there’s a lot of ingrained people who are providing voice to rural areas right now,” Baker said. “We can’t endanger that as we move forward on the broadband plan.”