The quest for true interoperability dominates our daily work within the Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau.  Interoperability is elusive and exacting.  It must be pursued as a full-time job with full knowledge of the factors that have defeated interoperability in the past.  As it has before, today the Commission took significant and positive steps to ensure the interoperability for the future of public safety communications.

The National Broadband Plan, submitted to Congress in March, 2010, set forth a comprehensive framework for creating a nationwide, interoperable public safety broadband network. As part of this framework, the Plan recommended the creation of an Emergency Response Interoperability Center (ERIC) to ensure nationwide interoperability. In April the Commission established ERIC within the Public and Homeland Security Bureau, where it is already playing an invaluable role assisting the Bureau as it develops rules and requirements for public safety broadband networks. In December, the Bureau adopted ERIC’s recommendations for an initial set of technical requirements to govern the early network deployments of public safety broadband waiver recipients. In developing its recommendations, ERIC has worked closely with the Commission’s federal partners and with the public safety community—including the members of the ERIC Technical Advisory Committee. We thank these individuals and agencies for their tireless efforts.  

With today’s item, the Commission delivers further on the Plan’s vision by adopting an order and further notice of proposed rulemaking on public safety broadband network interoperability. As the Plan recognizes, broadband technologies “will give first responders new tools to save American lives.” However, the transformative potential of broadband will remain unfulfilled if first responders are unable to communicate effectively.  The technical framework advanced in this item will create a baseline for deployment to ensure that public safety personnel are able to communicate when they converge on the scene of an emergency, wherever it may strike. 

The order designates LTE as a common technology platform for the nationwide network. LTE, a 4G broadband communications standard that several commercial wireless carriers are already deploying, has emerged as the technology of choice for public safety broadband communications. Although the Commission does not usually designate technologies, the adoption of LTE for public safety broadband networks is a critical baseline in ensuring that these networks are truly interoperable.  The record on this point was overwhelming.  The public safety community was united in its comments, and it just makes good sense.

The further notice seeks comment on a broad array of issues relevant to achieving public safety broadband network interoperability. It seeks comment first on an architectural vision for the network and on whether high-level principles should be established to guide the network’s development. Another major focus of the further notice is on how to implement a public safety-to-public safety roaming regime. The ability of public safety personnel to roam onto public safety networks outside their jurisdiction is an essential component of interoperability; accordingly, the further notice seeks comment on a host of issues relevant to developing a viable roaming framework for public safety broadband networks.

The further notice addresses many technical components of interoperability, such as network identifiers and system interfaces. It also proposes that public safety equipment and devices undergo testing to ensure that interoperability is truly being achieved.  Other issues addressed in the further notice, such as performance and coverage, are important to ensuring that public safety networks achieve a baseline of operability necessary to support interoperable communications.

Finally, the further notice seeks comment on how to ensure that public safety broadband networks are fully interoperable with Next Generation 911 networks. As we move forward with this proceeding and with the Commission’s comprehensive inquiry into NG911, we must be mindful of how these two proceedings link together.   

I hope that the further notice portion of this action will elicit a wide array of detailed comments on the myriad issues it presents. We look forward to reviewing these comments and to continuing our dialogue with the public safety community, our federal partners, and other stakeholders, whose input is crucial to our developing a regulatory framework for achieving true interoperability.

By Karen Peltz Strauss and Elizabeth Lyle

Today the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau and the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau released a Public Notice that seeks comment on some of the key provisions of the Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010, which the President signed into law on October 8, 2010.

The law’s provisions are designed to ensure that individuals with disabilities have access to emerging Internet Protocol-based communication and video programming technologies in the 21st Century.

The PN seeks comment on the requirement in Section 716 of the Act that service providers of advanced communications services and manufacturers of equipment and software used with those services ensure that their equipment and services will be accessible to people with disabilities, unless not achievable.

The Commission is required to promulgate rules implementing this provision within one year of enactment.  Given the tight statutory deadline, the PN seeks to build a record as quickly as possible to aid the Commission in its rulemaking.

The PN also seeks initial comment on ways to implement new recordkeeping obligations imposed by new Section 717 on entities subject to Sections 255, 716, and 718.  In addition, this Notice seeks comment on the obligation imposed by new Section 718 on manufacturers and service providers to provide access to Internet browsers in telephones used with public mobile services by blind or visually-impaired individuals.

Comments are due November 22 and reply comments are due December 7.  One way to submit comments is via the FCC’s electronic comment filing system (ECFS).  If ECFS is not accessible to you, you may send your comments directly to dro@fcc.gov.  We urge you to help us build this record.

As we are nearing the homestretch on developing the National Broadband Plan, we want to say how much we appreciate the unprecedented input folks have provided for the Plan.   As everyone knows, we have issued a lot of Public Notices -- 31 to be exact -- over the past five months asking for information about a lot of topics key to developing the Plan.  The input has been invaluable, and the process has been consistent with our pledge that data drive development of the Plan.

With our original Feb. 17 deadline to deliver a plan to Congress, we truncated the Commission’s normal process of following the initial comment period with a reply period for many of the Public Notices.  Of course, if time had permitted, we would have preferred giving interested parties the chance to send replies, which often provide a valuable public critique of ideas raised in initial comments.

Now that Congress has kindly granted us a 28-day extension of the plan deadline, to March 17, we are giving the public a final opportunity to reply to any of the comments they have read.  So we’re issuing another Public Notice, which is functioning as an overall last call for comments on the National Broadband Plan.  The deadline will be January 27.  But please send us your replies as soon as possible, or respond on the blog.  Yes, we got an extension, but March 17 is just around the corner – and it’s not a leap year.  Can you tell we're counting down the days?

In addition, we’re using the time to solicit public comment on key privacy issues recently raised by the Center for Democracy and Technology.  Yes, another Public Notice. The initial deadline is Jan. 22, and replies up until the last call: Jan. 27.  Thanks, everyone.

In its December 2 Public Notice requesting comment on the uses of spectrum, the FCC asked:

 

We’re taking a fresh look at how you access video – the full “5-W” analysis – who, what, where, when, why? Who controls how you access video? What video sources are you watching? Where do you watch it? When do you watch it? Why are there so many boxes and remote controls?  Oh, and how should we fix it?

 

 

• How should we think about the way that information about new and existing broadband service is displayed and communicated? 
• Is this information comparable from one service offering to another?
• How do we ensure privacy of consumer information?

• How should we augment existing data to track, measure and report broadband service performance across the nation?
• What are the most useful pieces of performance information for consumers, researchers, service providers and regulators?
• How should performance be measured?
• What are the benefits and what are the costs of measurement?

• How should we increase transparency of broadband services offered for multi-unit residential and commercial buildings?

Answering these questions will help identify ways to educate broadband consumers, a goal everyone agrees is in the best interests of the country. Striking the right balance on depth of information, communication, privacy, display and cost effectiveness will be difficult, but we intend to find the right path. We need your input and thoughts on new ways of thinking that empower consumers.

No, we’re not talking about an android in a transporter. We’re talking about the data that pass through government systems, and the ways in which the public can make use of the data. As access to and adoption of broadband increases, the capacity for the flow of data between government and the public increases, enabling the provision of new services online. With that in mind, we’ve issued a Public Notice seeking your comments, data and analysis regarding data transparency, cloud computing, and online identity.

 

Virtually everyone agrees that the current universal service program is broken.  But how to fix it – that’s the $64 million question.  Oh, make that the $7 billion question and growing.  At the same time, universal service has the potential to help provide affordable broadband everywhere.  But if we are going to make that happen, we can’t explode the size of the fund in the process.   It’s not telephone companies that pay for universal service.  It's you and me and everyone else in America that pays.   We have to decide as a nation what exactly we are trying to achieve with the universal service fund and how we can best direct those resources to benefit consumers.

As part of our data-driven process to develop the National Broadband Plan, we are seeking additional comment in a Public Notice released last week relating to various aspects of universal service and intercarrier compensation We aren’t looking for more general advocacy about the need to reform universal service or intercarrier compensation; we want solid factual analyses and data to help shape the path forward.  For instance, we want to know how changes in the universal service fund contribution methodology will impact consumers, how high-cost funding can be targeted to unserved areas, and what specific steps the Commission could take to make broadband more affordable for low income consumers.  Please file comments using either ECFS Express or our standard submission page if you need to attach a file.   You should note in your comments that you are responding to Public Notice #19.  You can also post comments on Blogband, and they will be included in the record for the National Broadband Plan.