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DAVID CONNELL
It's a little late for a vote, but U.S. Rep. Paul Gilmore, R-Ohio, and House Telecommunications Subcommittee Chairman Billy Tauzin, R-La., will introduce a bill to get the ball rolling on reforming the Federal Communications Commission. The pair are introducing the bill now in order to get an early start on FCC reform next year, Tauzin told Cable World in an interview earlier this month.
"Obviously, we're not going to act on it this year, but we're going to file a bill before we leave so people can start thinking about what will be in a good FCC reform bill," Tauzin said.
The bill, he added, should reorganize the commission so it is not in its current bureau system, but instead reflects "a modern converged and merged Internet world." Tauzin said he also would like to redefine the FCC mission to reflect a competitive telecommunications market and always favor competition over regulation.
The pair of lawmakers may also merge their reform bill with legislation proposed by Rep. Chip Pickering, R-Miss., and Rep. Richard Burr, R-N.C., that would put limits on the commission's ability to review telecommunications mergers. The Burr-Pickering bill would limit the amount of time the FCC could review mergers and prohibit it from requiring consent agreements on companies facing commission review.
The legislation also would force the commission to provide reasons for a denial of license transfers and allow companies to sue the FCC when they think it has made a bad decision.
"I think we need to include that in it or have it as a separate package," Tauzin said of the Burr-Pickering legislation. "I mean, AOL and Time Warner are going through it right now. The agencies are over there saying, `You're in the room, and you're not getting out of the room until you agree to what we want you to agree to.' What's awful about it is they may have to agree to some things competitors may not have to abide by. That's what's so wrong about this process."
At press time, Gilmore and Tauzin had yet to introduce the FCC reform legislation, but House staffers say the lawmakers would do so by the end of October.
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