In the Matter of: ) ) FORUM ON A NEW FCC ) FOR THE 21ST CENTURY ) Pages: 1 through 118 Place: Washington, D.C. Date: June 2, 1999 Before the FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION Washington, D.C. 20554 In the Matter of: ) ) FORUM ON A NEW FCC ) FOR THE 21ST CENTURY ) Commission Hearing Room Federal Communications Commission Washington, D.C. Wednesday, June 2, 1999 The parties met, pursuant to the Notice of the Commission, at 10:10 a.m. BEFORE: WILLIAM E. KENNARD Chairman APPEARANCES: MARILYN PRAISNER, The Local and State Government Advisory Committee (LSGAC) ANDY SCHWARTZMAN, Media Access Project (MAP) JEFF KRAMER, AARP SUSAN GRANT, National Consumers League (NCL) DEBRA BERLYN, Competition Policy Institute (CPI) CHIP SHOOSHAN, Strategic Policy Research, Inc. (SPR) SUSAN PARNAS, National League of Cities (NLC) DEBORAH RIGSBY, National League of Cities (NLC) JENELL TRIGG, The Telecom Opportunity Institute (TTOI) ERIC MENGE, Office of Advocacy, U.S. Small Business Administration LEE RUCK, The National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisors (NATOA) JANE LAWTON, Cable Administrator for Montgomery County, MD KAREN PELTZ STRAUSS, National Association of the Deaf (NAD) and Council of Organizational Representatives on National Issues Concerning People who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing (COR) MAUREEN LEWIS, Alliance for Public Technology (APT) STEVE PICOU, Louisiana Music Commission MIKE TRAVIESO, People's Counsel for State of Maryland JOANNE KUMEKAWA, The Office for the Advancement of Telehealth (OAT) CLAUDE STOUT, Telecommunications for the Deaf (TDI) ALAN DINSMORE, American Foundation for the Blind SCOTT MARSHALL, American Foundation for the Blind GWENDOLYN WOODARD CHARLES CRAWFORD KEVIN MCCARTHY, U.S. Conference of Mayors MIKE BRACY, Low Power Radio Coalition BRAD RAMSEY, National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) DAVID NEWBERGER, Campaign for Telecom Access AL SONNENSTRAHL, Consumer Action Network of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Consumers (CAN) MARCUS JOHNSON, CEO, Mormos Entertainment Group, Inc. P R O C E E D I N G S (10:10 a.m.) MS. BROWN: If everyone could take your seats, that would be helpful. Good morning, everyone. I'm Kathy Brown, Chief of Staff here at the FCC. Chairman Kennard is at a conference this morning. There's a huge delegation from Africa here in town to talk about telecommunications globally. And he's giving a speech this morning about his own opportunity initiative, his development initiative for Africa, which is really quite fascinating. And I just read his speech, and I was tempted to take pieces out of it and read it to you, because it was so moving to me about how he translates this whole notion of community and his talks about his father being an architect and building buildings that tried to embody the essence of the community and how he sees his job in the telecommunications area also as building communities. And it seemed fitting this morning we would, at the same time, be talking with our colleagues who represent citizens and consumers before this agency and who are very much, all of you, involved in this telecom revolution, evolution here in Washington and across the country, while at the same time he's talking about the international and global implications of the very things we're doing here. So, it's an exciting time in our field. I will try to talk a little slower. I think I'm going to stress our interpreter. So, Claude, I'll try to go real slow. You know, when you're from New York, you tend to go too fast. So I will try to remember that I should go slower. Well, we have engaged in our own internal dialogue and have engaged in external dialogue about the future of the telecom industry, environment, and then how the FCC can equip itself for the future, what, and who is the FCC. As we go into the 21st Century into a very new and different world, most of us who have been around for awhile have come out of monopoly regulation. Many of you, even on the consumer side, have dealt with companies that one really knows as one company in an area that you got to know and love and hate and work with. But life is very different now, and it will become even more different as we go forward, as technology is changing, as the very structure of this industry changes. The question, then, becomes what's the appropriate role of government? How does government, through the FCC, through its regulatory bodies relate, oversee the industry, industries that are converging and going worldwide? And how does it relate to the citizens and the consumers of the goods and services offered by those industries, and indeed, offered by the government itself? Because we, too, are offering services in the form of information and access to government, et cetera. So, when Congress this year talked about initiating a reauthorization process, we saw this as a wonderful opportunity for us to do an analysis that we could present to the Congress and try to give our best thinking with the input of the folks we serve, the industry, consumers, the sort of regulatory community at large, and try to amass a plan, a five-year strategic plan, for the agency that would reflect our changing times. And that's -- we've asked and convened a number of these forums. Two weeks ago, we sat with members of the industries that we regulate, today, with all of you. In two weeks, then, we have an academic group that will talk a little bit to us about organization and efficiency and some things that they can bring to the table. And then, we will also convene our own internal discussions with our own staff. So that is the format -- the form of our public input attempts. Today, what we will do is try to structure our discussions with the questions that we've given all of you, try to give everybody an opportunity to speak. There are three, sort of, general questions that we've put out to you, and we will try in about two hours to get through it. I'm expecting that the chairman, when he's through with his speech across town, across the river, will come and join us at the end, so that he can get a sense and a flavor of our discussion. So I'm hoping about noon that he will join us. Some housekeeping thoughts. Today's forum is being captioned on the Internet and carried live through real audio from our FCC web site, "www.FCC.gov/real audio/dot." We will take any questions and participation, as well as if anything comes in, you can stop us. And I'll try to remember to look back. Otherwise, you can just toss a piece of paper over here. E-mail comments can be made to new FCC -- by the way, that's our site for any public input -- "new fcc@fcc.gov," so that if you want to give us anything after today, certainly, feel free to E-mail us. And for transcription purposes, it would be very helpful before anyone speaks if you would give your name. And it would, probably, be helpful if you identify your organization or your interest so folks sort of understand your perspective. And then, I think we'll try each to speak one at a time. If you'll speak into the microphones, that will be helpful. Try to speak a little slower than I do for purposes of signing. And then, we found if you want to speak, if you will just raise your card like this, I can watch the table fairly well to see who would like to speak next on any particular issue. And that just helps me identify folks at the table. At the table with me is Bob Pepper and Ellen Blackler who will help me facilitate the discussion, and other members of the FCC staff are around and about. Marian McCormick, I'll just have her taking some flip chart notes as we go through. We just find that helpful to figure out where we are in the discussion. And, Ellen, I think you had a couple of other -- did I cover them all? Are there any, sort of, opening housekeeping issues, any other ground rules anyone wants to propose? Are you all comfortable? I think what we will do is open with an introduction. If you would introduce -- yes? MR. STOUT (Sign Interpreter speaking): Is there a reason for keeping the flip chart up at the top in the front of the room, because it's blocking the screen with the captioning? MS. BROWN: I see. MR. STOUT: I was wondering if it would be possible to move it slightly, so I could read the screen and the captioner? MS. BROWN: Sure. MR. STOUT: Thank you very much. MS. BROWN: So, let me try this, I think we should start with an introduction. Each of us, if we would introduce ourselves, say where you are from, who you are representing today -- does that work, Al? Are we okay? Good. And then, perhaps, you could start -- let's start with that vision thing. What is your vision of the telecommunications environment in the next five years? And give us a little -- a short, if you would, a short presentation, some thoughts about where you think we're headed. And I think that will help all of us become acquainted with each other and, perhaps, start to understand each other's perspectives. And then, we'll open it up for discussion after that. I would remind you that there's over 25 of us here, so we should try to keep our comments, unlike what I just did, short. And then, everyone will have an opportunity to speak. I will try my best not to be rude, but if someone does spend more time than I think the others are getting legally in that chair, I'll ask folks to summarize their comments and then move on. So, shall I ask -- Bob, why don't you start, and then we'll work around the room, introductions. MR. PEPPER: Yes. I'm Robert Pepper, Chief at the Office of Plans and Policy here at the FCC. And we've been working with Kathy and all of the bureaus and offices on developing the five-year strategic plan. Lisa Sockett, who is Deputy Chief in OPP, actually is the person who's been sort of leading the charge on this. And we're all really sort of in great debt to Lisa for doing this. What we're very interested in is your views of where you think, not only where the industries are, but where do you think and how do you think consumers will be thinking about and responding to where the industry will be over the next several years and what, if anything, the FCC should be doing differently in order to either facilitate the good things that you see occurring, or if you believe that there are concerns that you have, you know, what should we be doing to address those? And also, we need to have a better understanding of what you're thinking about, in terms of a future role for the Commission and its relationship to other government bodies at the local and state levels. So we're here, really, to listen to you and to learn from what you have to say. MR. MARSHALL: Good morning. I'm Pluria Marshall, Chairman of the National Black Media Coalition. We're a 26-year-old public interest advocacy organization. And we go back to Dean Birch's (phonetic) days at -- here at the Commission. We have some serious concerns about where the public's interest is being taken care of. And from our perspective, the Commission doesn't seem to be doing a very good job of making sure that, especially radio and television and, to a lesser degree, cable television still understands that they have a responsibility to serve the public. We have seen an almost complete erosion of this area of responsibility. And this is what we're most concerned about seeing turned around, as we go into this new millennium. Thank you. MR. SCHWARTZMAN: I'm Andy Schwartzman. I'm president of the Access Project, which is about the same age as Pluria's group. And we've been a political interest law firm representing the rights of citizens before the FCC. And in that connection, I guess I would quickly hop on the podium. And it's one of the themes that I want to stress here in the context of what NAP is and who we represent is important. We're not just consumers. We're also citizens. Corporations, trade associations don't have a vote. Under the present system, they have a de facto vote with their money, but they are not supposed to. I think that it is a matter of longstanding and continuing concern that the board or interest of citizens are encapsulated into consumer, which is a very passive notion, and further, that the Commission pigeonholes this as one set of interests to be dealt with separately, rather than realizing that our interests cut across the board with all the different industries and stuff involved. And if we're viewed in isolation, we're not viewed as part of the larger decision-making process. You've talked to the consumers. Now you can sit down and talk to industry and the different players there. This is less a problem on the 8th floor where the commissioners are. It's much more a problem with staff. It's a mind set of the staff, and I'll elaborate on it, because I do think this is one of the major institutional challenges of this agency. MR. RAMSEY: Hi. I'm Brad Ramsey. I'm the assistant counsel for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners. A couple of things, NARUC doesn't have a generic formal position on FCC reorganization. But fortunately, on May 20th, four commissioners came to town to testify before Congress on how the FCC should change over the next five years. And I have brought those in, the testimony, to be submitted in this docket. There are -- many have had two separate forums at the state level for just state commissions to determine where the states should be going over the next five years. And today's recommendations, generally, were increasing focus on service quality and consumer protection. And I'll move toward acting as a dispute-resolution forum for different parties in the industry, which is kind of William Kennard's view of things. One of the overriding things, of all of them, was the imperative for an increasing cooperation and coordination between the FCC and the states. This FCC can't provide the -- but Kennard has been the most open and the most cooperative and, in my view anyway, the hardest working FCC I've seen in the nine years I've been in this town. But we can do more. Two areas where, recent areas, we know of increased coordination have been with the FCC standing rules and ways to implement it and increase delegations to the states, with regard to numbering issues. I had about five points that I hope I'll have an opportunity to develop. But in the interest of time right now, I'll just mention one. The one thing I think is important for the FCC to continue to do is to reduce the incentives for form shopping. A more per state phase would interfere as little as possible with what the states are doing to try to implement the act. So far, I've been pretty pleased with how the Commission has been doing that. MR. KRAMER: Hi. I'm Jeff Kramer. I'm in the Federal Affairs Department at AARP. I want to start off by saying that we're very pleased with the direction that both Chairman Kennard, the Commission, and the Commission staff have gone in consumer protection in the area of telephony. We feel very good about what's been going on in the last year, year and a half on that. And we hope it continues. We hope that's part of the FCC's role in the future. Our concern, really, is with these conversions of services, as we see down the road as more and more of our members are getting into the area of wireless communications and to the Internet and a number of other telecommunications services. We're concerned that there may be a lot of consumer confusion and a lot of possibility for fraud and deception. And we hope that the Commission continues to play a role in that area. MS. LAWTON: I'm Jane Lawton, and I am the President of the National Association of Telecommunications Officers and Advisers. And NATOA is a leadership organization, a professional organization with about 1,000 local government members, local government officials. I hope that the FCC's role in the future will recognize that local government is a legitimate partner with you. We have legitimate regulatory and landlord authority, and we're really excited about the new landscape in telecommunications. We support the competitive goals and the speedy deployment of the services. But we have concerns for consumers, for our citizens, particularly residential, rural, low-income and small businesses. We are very concerned about the digital divide which seems, in many instances, to be exacerbated. We're concerned about rates, and we're concerned about access to services by all people. We are also the users of services, and we're concerned about ourselves being able to use services to serve our public and for public safety. We applaud you already for the efforts you've made to reach out to the community, with regard to the Local- State Government Advisory Committee. These forums, and even your web site, which is very actively -- you use it actively, and we use it actively. And we applaud you for reaching out to us. I think the previous speaker makes a good point when he says it's sometimes hard to always be entertained by you, separate from industry. And so, I would like to suggest that you may want to have some of these that are more combined in the future. And you may also want to have field hearings yourselves and do even more with ombudsmen from your different bureaus, et cetera. We certainly know and understand the industry's world goals and their worldwide economic thrust. But I just want to say that, obviously, it starts one customer at a time. And local governments are there with those customers. And we'd like to help partner with you to serve them. MR. NEUBERGER: Good morning. I'm David Neuberger from St. Louis. I'm with the Campaign for Telecommunications Access. We are generally a coalition of organizations of people with disabilities and older adults who have been focused on the question of access to telecommunications services. I have, perhaps, a story which is what we do in the Midwest. Today, to highlight the point that I would like to bring to your attention, when I came to visit you today, I used the Metro Link, you know, the Metrorail, I guess, we call it in Washington and came down, I think, it's D Street to try to get to the Commission. And the interesting thing is that in order to take the shortest route, which is down D Street, there are not curb cuts between here and there. It is not possible to get to the Commission, so here you have a beautiful new box that's fully accessible at the end of the network. But you don't have a network that is reachable by people with disabilities. And that is the fundamental problem that we are faced with in the telecommunications industry that we need to -- we are concerned, or organizations have been, over the fact that we think that the FCC has created incentive toward building new technologies in a kind of a black box at the end of the network, rather than building the technologies out throughout the network. So we believe that the disadvantaged and people with limited incomes, and so forth, have been able to use the telephone system, because solutions have been inside the network, not at the end of the network. We think that you are discouraging, the Commission is discouraging, innovation inside the network and a whole host of proceedings that I could draw to your attention. And we think that that's a direction that, in the end, will exacerbate the difference between haves and have-nots. And certainly, our folks with disabilities and older adults are often on the wrong end of that scale. Thank you. MR. RUCK: My name is Lee Ruck. I'm the executive director and general counsel of NATOA. You just heard from our president, Jane Lawton. I would only add to what she has said in a couple of ways. Originally, much of telecommunications started out as a monopoly. And then, we had a period of time where there was a substantial attempt at trying to force divestiture, competition, a number of brand new industries, a number of brand new companies starting out. Now, we seem to be in a period of oligopoly again. Local governments believe that we are the closest to the customer, the closest to the community. And although we believe that there is a role for the mergers and acquisitions, the new business restructuring that is taking advantage of these new technologies, we also believe that the Commission, the state governments, and the local governments have to be very, very careful as we take a look at the way services are being rendered to make sure that there are unbundled services which are still available by choice to the rural, to the low-income, to the residential community, which does not need all of the high-technical capacity, which is being offered by the industry. MS. TRIGG: Good morning. My name is S. Jenell Trigg. And I'm executive director and chief operating officer of a very new nonprofit corporation, the Telecom Opportunity Institute. We are promoting professional opportunities in telecommunications. And I mean employment, as well as entrepreneurship for our ethnic minorities, women, and at-risk youth. And, I think, I bring a unique perspective to this forum having spent 20-plus years in telecommunications in the private sector, having served at the FCC, and most recently, the Office of Advocacy, Small Business Administration. And one of the concerns we have is that given the growth of the telecommunications industry -- and we all know that the rate of mergers and acquisitions is unprecedented -- that we are losing one class of competitor in that -- our small businesses, particularly minority and women-owned. We think these businesses bring true vigorous competition to the industry. And one of the things that we'd like to encourage the FCC to do is to implement aggressively its five different statutory provisions that provide looking out for small businesses, minority, and women-owned. And that includes Section 257 of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, market entry barriers for small businesses, the Regulatory Flexibility Act, the Paperwork Reduction Act, the FCC's implementing regulations, Section 151, and certainly, 309(j). Individually, each of those statutory components gives the FCC full authority to look at the impact of the industry and to take some measures. Cumulatively, they can be very powerful. And we'd like to continue working with this administration, Chairman Kennard, and truly the most diverse Commission ever in the history of the FCC to promote more opportunities for small businesses, minority, and women-owned. We, too, believe in universal service, which is why we're working with at-risk youth to make sure they know about telecommunications technology, and the future of this industry. Thank you. MR. MENGE: Good morning. Good morning. My name is Eric Menge. I am assistant chief counsel for telecommunications at the Office of Advocacy at the U.S. Small Business Administration. I'm here today to stress the crucial role that small businesses play in telecommunications, especially in this era of convergence and chaos between the different forms of services that are cumulating. I also wish to point out that small businesses are the innovators, who are introducing a lot of the new services and creating new technologies. They provide telecom service to high-cost customers and those who are overlooked by the larger companies. However, the regulatory machine of the FCC often creates barriers to entry for these small businesses or regulations that unfairly burden them. Any reorganization of the FCC should take into account the thousands of small businesses over dozens of industries that the FCC has jurisdiction over. Advocacy also believes that the Office of Communications' business opportunities must be an integral part of any revision of goals or reorganization of the FCC. OCBO has the ability to help the FCC meet the six goals the chairman listed in his report -- promoting competition, deregulation, protection of customers, making communications services and technology to every American, and fostering the innovation, and advancing competitive goals worldwide. OCBO should be given the tools, resources, and authority to accomplish these tasks. MS. BROWN: Thank you. MS. KUMEKAWA: Hi. My name is Joanne Kumekawa. And I'm representing the Office for the Advancement of Telehealth, which is a very new office, as well. It's about eight months old. We're part of the Department of Health and Human Services. The director, Dina Poskin, sends her regrets today. You had asked about vision at the beginning, so I thought I'd start with our vision and kind of talk to you about what we're hoping to see. Our vision and your vision may be supporting one another. Our vision is -- well, maybe first I should explain to you what Telehealth is. Telehealth is telemedicine and also distance learning. And telemedicine is providing health care by using advanced telecommunications and information technologies to provide health care at a distance. So, our vision is a world where no matter who you are or where you are, you get the health care you need when you need it. And if I can break that down into a couple of parts, well, a world where no matter who you are, well, that speaks to affordability and access, where you are, we're talking about some difficult places to get to, particularly rural areas in America, that may not have the kind of infrastructure that everybody else has. Native Americans do not have access to the kind of infrastructure that everybody else may have and get health care you need when you need it so it's available at any time of day when you need it. The two issues, then, we are looking at from the FCC, the first is competition. You see prices go down and more services where there's competition, we don't really see a lot of competition in rural areas, so we're emphasizing rural areas. The second part is to focus and fine-tune on the universal service issue. MS. BRUNSON: Good morning. I am Melanie Brunson. I'm director of Governmental Affairs and Advocacy for the American Council of the Blind. We are a national organization of people who are blind and visually impaired. And I thank you for the opportunity to be here today, because as probably is the case for most of us, but especially is the case for people who have visual impairments, communication and the ability to be communicated with are basic to all of our lifestyles. So, for us, the role of the FCC is an incredibly important one. And our vision for that role involves, probably at its heart, the promotion of universal access for everyone to communications methods, as well as services. We have been pleased with the FCC's work to implement regulations and statutes that promote that access, particularly Section 255 of the Telecommunications Act. And we are hoping that, as the FCC evaluates its role, that those kinds of things will continue. We are specifically looking at ways that the FCC could work with both consumers and industry to ensure things like the increased availability of video description, just as communication for people with hearing impairments has been enhanced by the increased availability of closed-captioning. Much to the credit of the FCC that has championed that, we would like to see the FCC champion the same type of access for people with visual impairments through increased availability of descriptive video. And we think that the FCC would be in a good position to help all of us to have access to better information about communication methods and communication services that is reliable and that people can access the information and, therefore, make wiser decisions about the services that they tap into, as well. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Melanie. MS. DUBROFF: Christa DuBroff. I'll be reading for Melanie today. MS. BROWN: Thank you. MS. MILLER: Hi. I'm Patti Miller. I'm director of the Children and the Media Program at Children Now, which is a national children's advocacy organization. The children in the Media Program work to improve media for children and about children's issues. We worked -- we lobbied for and worked on the V-chip and TV ratings system, as well as the Three-Hour Rule. And what I would ask the FCC, as you look at the landscape of changes in the media industry, that you not only look at what is in the public interest, but ask is it good for kids? As we approach a new millennium and as the FCC continues to stay ahead of the curve in a rapidly changing field, we ask you to protect our most vulnerable consumers, our children, and to continuously ask the question is it good for kids and how will certain legislation or certain changes impact children? MR. DINSMORE: My name is Alan Dinsmore. I'm senior governmental relations representative with the American Foundation for the Blind. And our interest in telecommunications actually goes back to the early '30s when we worked with organizations to license the technology for the old 33 and a third RPM record, if anybody still has a record player that deals with those things. A vision of the future for regulation is always a tough one. I think outside this council, someone told me that their best vision of regulation is I get to do everything I want to do, and the other person can't do anything. And in some respects, that has been the kind of a forum that we have often had to deal in. But I think to try to advance this a little bit, what the real challenge for the FCC is, as a good phrasemaker put it recently, how do you regulate at the speed of light? And I think that possibly the way you start to approach this is that the FCC is going to have to choose very carefully what they do look at, realizing that often there are legislative mandates that require you to have certain kinds of dockets and shape those dockets. I think it's probably also important for the FCC to look very carefully at how that system is probably going to have to be changed. Let me give you an example. When we have been working very long and hard with other disability and consumer organizations to look at what a rule might look like for Section 255, the Disability Access Section, the first thing that we discovered is the old-fashioned method of regulation, which essentially said this is what the device looks like. This is the power that ought to be regulated, and this is how it ought to be deployed, doesn't work, that, in fact, in the period of time that we have been waiting for the rule rollout, technology in the market has changed things dramatically and, probably, to the advantage of both industry and consumers. But, at the same time, the market still isn't really very interested in deploying any of this. So I think that is a serious challenge to look at how you regulate. And I would suggest also and be happy to elaborate later that the FCC has a very important public information role. In spite of the fact that there are literally hundreds of newsletters out on various segments of telecommunications, most of them are extremely expensive, not available to consumers. And if you follow newspaper articles of all of the things that we are interested in and the convergence issues and any other issue you choose to name, there's very poor coverage outside of major cities. Consumers, and particularly consumers with disabilities who can't read print, even those items that are in print simply are not getting the information to effectively participate in the marketplace. MS. BROWN: Thank you. MS. GRANT: Good morning. I'm Susan Grant from the National Consumers League. We just celebrated our 100th birthday a couple of years ago. So that probably makes us the oldest group in the room here and maybe even as old as the phone, I don't know. But the world has certainly changed in the last hundred years. However, the basic principles on which the Consumers League was founded haven't. And that's access to good quality products and services at fair prices for consumers, information that they need to make informed buying decisions, and hand in hand with that, good working conditions and decent wages for the people that are producing or providing those products or services. We are concerned in this new era of moving from a heavily regulated industry to a less regulated environment that we don't sacrifice consumer protection in the process, especially as industries are converging. As services are being bundled, we are concerned about fewer choices for consumers, not the more choices that we've been promised. We are concerned about the quality of service and the price of services and whether consumers will be able to get basic services without the bells and whistles. We're concerned about fraud. We operate something called the National Fraud Information Center, which is the hotline that consumers can contact for advice about telemarketing and Internet fraud and also to report instances of fraud. We take that information and relay it to law enforcement agencies. We've seen a tidal wave of complaints about slamming, cramming, and other telephone bill abuses. The telephone bill has now become more like your credit card bill, than something that just has to do with communications. The word telecommunications is getting harder to define and more confusing for consumers, which opens up the possibilities of fraud. We see that the Commission has an important role to play to be as more nimble and active in its fraud-fighting. And for that reason, we're grad that it is creating this new enforcement bureau, but also see the need for the FCC to work more closely with the state and local governments to be where the rubber meets the road and also world consumer organizations, such as ours, not only in their enforcement activities, but also in the public education that is so necessary to let people know where to complain and how to make the right choices to begin to avoid problems. MS. BROWN: Thank you. MR. TRAVIESO: Thank you. I'm Mike Travieso. I'm with the Maryland People's Council. Our agency is the oldest consumer, state consumer advocacy agency in the country. I haven't been there since its founding, but I've been doing what I've been doing for about five years now. We represent the residential consumers of utility services. We see a lot of changes occurring. And I'd like to talk a little bit about the changes and then a little bit about some sort of global recommendations. There is, of course, obviously deregulation of commodities and services, which produces customer choice. But it also produces customer confusion and vulnerability and requires the need for increased consumer information and consumer protection. There's this thing of convergence, which I think will raise a lot of regulatory authority issues. When an electric company starts offering phone service, for example, there are -- there will remain monopoly networks, which will create access issues, service obligation, and competition issues. There will be issues like cross-subsidization, because there will be an increasing use of companies to provide both regulated and unregulated services. There'll be an increased problem with federal, state, and regional regulatory issues, as things become essentially more federalized. And there will be access-to-service issues for geographically challenged and economically challenged and people with physical impairments in the future. We see, potentially, some reorganization necessary. And we'd like to see the federal regulatory system organized by function, rather than by industry, so that there would be a regulatory agency that would deal with consumer protection and information. There could be a regulatory agency that would be a network-type of regulatory agency. And there would be one that would deal with affiliate and competitive issues. And, for example, that might mean that the FCC and the FERC would merge. And they are going to be regulating network industries and access-to-public facilities, rather than being regulated, you know, just particular companies or industries, individually. Integrated decision-making and cross-network industries, we think, will become extremely important. The FCC, for example, is already a consumer protection agency and an enforcement agency. And maybe, that's the play where the consumer protection issues should go. We believe that the FCC, the FERC, and the DOE should establish forums, panels, and dialogue with NARUC and NASUCA, which is the agency to which the organization which my agency belongs, the National Association of State and City Consumer Advocates, and others, to discuss the federal- state role. I think when we deregulated transportation and a number of other industries, they became federalized. And that is likely to happen with telephone and these other industries. And I think it's important to anticipate that and to dialogue with these organizations about how to deal with that. We think there needs to be a place for consumer advocacy in the federal scheme and also a strong state regulatory and advocacy role. There are going to be access issues. I think these need to be coordinated with federal policy, as well, one of the services to which the people should have access, how they are going to be funded, what providers should have those obligations. I mean, the phone service is going to be delivered by cable companies. For example, should the cable companies have the same obligation for universal service as the phone companies? FCC specifically, we think there should be public forums around the country like this one. We think the agency should work directly with citizen groups outside the beltway and outside D.C. And we think the agency should work directly with NARUC and NASUCA and other consumer groups. Thank you. MS. BERLYN: Good morning. I'm Debra Berlyn. And I'm executive director of the Competition Policy Institute. CPI is an independent nonprofit organization that promotes public policies to bring competition to telecommunications and electric industries in ways that benefit consumers. I appreciate the opportunity to participate in this series of forums. The chairman submitted a report a couple of months ago to Congress. And in that report the chairman spoke of his vision of the future. And that is when competition is king. Well, I'd like to offer a couple of -- four guiding principles that will help bring us to that coronation day. The first is to accelerate the pace of decision-making. Regulatory delay isn't good for competition or consumers. It only aids those resistant to change. The FCC should act expeditiously and decisively to continue to implement the Telecommunications Act. Disputes among stakeholders must be resolved quickly. Second, take bold initiatives. The FCC is in the best position to direct the course of competition. And it should take bold actions to ensure continued progress. It's tempting, but perhaps futile to try and appease all parties, including members of Congress. Aim to do the right thing for consumers and competition. Third, continue to involve consumers in the process. I think this Commission has done an excellent job of increasing the opportunity consumer groups have to participate, as evidenced by this forum today. Continue this effort and work with consumer groups to consider additional ways to strengthen our role. And my fourth and final point is one that is directed towards the Commission's goal for consumer protection. If the Commission is truly interested in consumer protection, the best consumer protection we believe the Commission can offer is competition. Turning this industry into one that offers consumers real choice for services at competitive prices will help resolve many of the concerns we have today. Thank you for holding this forum and inviting all of us to participate. And I look forward to our discussion. MR. SONNENSTRAHL (Sign Interpreter speaking) : Good morning. My name is Al Sonnenstrahl. And I'm with the Consumer Advocacy -- rather the Consumer Action Network of Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Consumers. And that is known as CAN. First of all, I would like to say thank you to Reed Hundt (phonetic), the former chair of the FCC and, as well, to Linda DuBroff for opening the doors, prodding the doors open here so that consumers and so that the present Commission can continue to push those doors open much wider to us. So I very much appreciate this opportunity. There are many issues that I'm sure we'll discuss here today. And we must not forget that there are groups of people who don't depend on audio information. There are many people who have hearing disabilities, who do not benefit from the current information services. And so, I would submit that FCC might revisit the definition of telecommunications services and to make sure that the data service includes text information, because we do need some assurance from the FCC that text information will be included in every service that is provided in an audio format or vocal-voice service. If we look back as to who began the telecommunications, we look at A.G. Bell, Alexander Graham Bell, who invented the telephone. But he was actually trying to invent a hearing aid for deaf people, because his wife and his mother were both deaf. As a result, hearing people benefitted from his invention. And we see the same thing happening with Samuel Morse, who invented the Morse Code, in order that he could communicate with his deaf wife. As a result, the hearing world benefitted from his invention. That was -- and deaf people have been left out of the picture. So, I think that the FCC should work on this perspective to make sure that people with hearing disabilities are not left out. We need to decide where to decentralize or deregulate or where to centralize, where to regulate services. I understand that the FCC is going through quite a bit of pressure in order to be deregulated or decentralized. But if we look at recent history, we need to ask why do we have these services centralized? Why were they regulated? And in part, the answer is because we do need to monitor people in order to assure that they do provide appropriate services to the public. The public now appears to be more knowledgeable of their issues. But today people, in general, are still not familiar with some of the specific issues that relate to text services. And I strongly recommend that the FCC maintain this central regulation, centralization and regulation, in regards to text services until, that is, the public does become more aware of this issue. Thank you. MR. STOUT (Sign Interpreter speaking) : Good morning. My name is Claude Stout. I'm executive director of the Telecommunications for the Deaf, Inc. First of all, I'd like to say thank you on behalf of the 28 million deaf and hard-of-hearing persons for the opportunity for those of us here representing them today. I've worked with TDI for the past two years. And during that time, I must say, I commend FCC and the chairman for doing such a good job at making our means an interest. However, there are many people who are involved in not necessarily FCC, but in the system where things do need to be changed. And by that, I mean I think one of the women on the end said regulatory delays. I have experienced that, in terms of telecommunications relay services and Section 255, in regard to 711 services. I think that the FCC is willing to make decisions often in our favor, but the system doesn't allow for those decisions to be made in a timely fashion. Again, I commend the FCC for establishing the Disability Issues Task Force, but there are only two people on that staff. That's like running the school with a principal and no teachers, no janitors, no teacher aides. And so, we recognize that there are more -- there's a need for more staff within the DITF. We're in full support of Chairman Kennard's vision for procompetition, for consumer protection, and for universal standards. That's well and good, provided that there are more resources available amongst the staff in order to produce effective oversight or watchdog action so that, out in the telecommunications field, we can see a fair procompetition approach so that there are adequate consumer protections available. I can give you one example. Here at FCC, they tried to provide a long list of access issues to both consumers and industry. Now that was fine, but in terms of this building here, I see eight phones, eight pay phones out in front, none of which are equipped with a TTY. In this room here, in this meeting room, there's no TTY available, although I do see signage that indicates there is. When I looked around, I was unable to find such a device. So, I certainly don't mean to be critical, but I do think that the FCC may not need to do the bold things. But they do need to get the little things right by the consumers. And I would strongly advocate that the FCC uses a collaborative and partnership approach with the industry. And we certainly intend to be involved, but we need FCC in support before we're going to be able to have an effective collaboration with industry representatives. And I look forward to our discussion this morning. MS. STRAUSS: Hi. I'm Karen Peltz Strauss, and I'm here representing two entities today. The first is the National Association of the Deaf, which is the nation's largest and oldest organization representing the 28 million deaf and hard-of-hearing people in America. And the second is the Council of Organizations, organizational representatives on national issues concerning people who are deaf and hard-of-hearing. This is a coalition made up also of various service groups and membership, consumer membership, organizations that represent deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans. I'm going to reiterate some of what the other individuals representing deaf and hard-of-hearing interests mentioned. But I just want to say that I do want to applaud this Commission for its dedication and commitment to securing access for people with disabilities. The 1990s was unique in bringing about a number of very significant laws that will affect access for people with disabilities, starting off with the Americans With Disabilities Act and its requirements for telecommunications, really services moving on to the Dakota Circuitry Act, requiring all televisions to be equipped with closed-captioning Dakota Circuitry and finalizing with the 1996 landmark legislation that requires access to telecommunications products and services, as well as closed- captioning access. These various laws are going to take a lot to be implemented, a lot of effort on the part of the FCC. Our biggest concern is that the consumers not be lost in this effort. Consumers must be -- there must be coordination with consumers. There must be efforts to develop some kind of advisory committees, ongoing advisory committees, by the FCC. Most importantly, the FCC cannot lose sight of the fact that, in spite of the fact that there is significant deregulation, these are areas that must be regulated. There must be some effort by the FCC to engage in alternative methods of dispute resolution and an ongoing effort to monitor the implementation of these laws. Already, we see significant complaints in the failure of many of the video programming providers that are covered by the closed-captioning rules to comply with those rules. This is just one example. And, basically, this is a cry for help. We have the laws, but we need the implementation. Lastly, but not insignificantly, we need significant outreach and education to consumers, as has been mentioned by others on this panel. Consumers are not aware of what the laws -- the extent to which the laws can protect them and the extent to which the laws will bring them access. We're going to need help from the FCC on this point. Thank you. MR. HOWSE (Interpreter speaking): Hello. My name is Jim Howse. And I represent the Independent Center of Northern Virginia, which is itself a consumer-run resource center for people with disabilities. First of all, I'd like to commend the FCC for the work over the last two years that has been done. However, more is necessary. First and foremost, we need to keep consumers first. I think there are two things that we need to keep in mind, in terms of enforcement. We still need a watchdog monitoring from the government. With technology changing so quickly, what, with phone companies and cable companies involved, we need to ensure maintenance of universal access for people with disabilities. Another thing that is needed is public information. I still meet people today after the relay service has been available for, what, eight or nine years, people who still say, now what is a relay? It's amazing that they don't know. And when I use the relay, I will call and leave a message for someone through the relay and they never call me back. Later, I find out they were unsure, they were frightened. They were not -- they didn't know what the system was. In terms of captioning rules, we need enforcement assistant. And, again, I'm not going to repeat what's already been said, but we also need to know how to provide information to the consumers, so the consumers are able to protect themselves and, in addition, how consumers can either provide complaints or commendations to companies that provide services and products. We already have quite a good network of over 500 centers for independent living across the United States. The FCC can utilize that resource and network of organizations in order to promulgate information, as to rules or statutes that people need to be aware of. That network is already available. There are also other organizations that the FCC might tap into, in terms of sharing information. Thank you. MR. SHOOSHAN: Good morning, Kathy and Bob and everybody. I'm Chip Shooshan with Strategic Policy Research. And I want to thank the Commission staff for letting me appear out of order today. I was to be on next Friday's panel, but scheduling made it necessary for me to be here today. And it may be that it's appropriate, because I'm going to be an outlier for so many of my fellow panelists this morning, calling for more process and an expanded role for the FCC. I'm actually an advocate for a lesser role for the Commission, but for the Commission to do a better job of what it does do with increased accountability and greater positive -- improved decision-making, rather than greater positive accountability. I think after this restructuring effort that we're a part of here today is finished, the FCC looks and functions pretty much like it does today that it will have been a failure. I'm going to talk a little bit later on about some restructuring that I'd like to see. But I think, generally speaking, the Commission of the future, at least as I see it, having been around this town and these issues for about 30 years at this point, is a lean, mean, and increasingly unseen FCC. I think that looking at the chairman's vision, it's fine as far as it goes, but it doesn't go far enough in my view, for example, in promoting policing competition, a critical area for the Commission to focus on. But there, I think, the transition in the end should be part of a transition in the end to other agencies that are there to police and enforce competition in the economy, generally. The question, ultimately, is why do we need an FCC to duplicate what other agencies are doing in the economy, generally? In terms of universal service and consumer protection, certainly your role in the short term -- but again, the transition I'd like to see is one where there's an increased role in the future for state and local governments who, after all, are closer to the consumer or the citizens and what we're trying to serve here. In terms of enforcement (phonetic) management, there I think is an area where the Commission will continue to have a role. And I think the chairman's right. And one final thought that the theory of his vision of organization by function, rather than by industry, is a very good one. And while I would be much more radical, in terms of what I do organizationally, I think that reorganization by function, rather than by industry, is a very good step. MS. LEWIS: Good morning. My name is Maureen Lewis. I'm the general counsel of the Alliance for Public Technology, which is a 10-year-old consumer advocacy organization that is a coalition of other nonprofits that are interested in equitable, affordable access to telecommunications products and services. The alliance is particularly concerned about the advanced telecommunications services that are merging and developing very quickly in this world. And we are particularly interested in implementation of Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act, which as many of you probably know, encourages state and federal telecommunications regulators to encourage the deployment of advanced telecommunications services to all Americans. And to that end, the alliance has been active before the Commission in trying to get implementation of that provision of the '96 Telecommunications Act. And we are also very, very supportive of the recommendations or the proposed restructuring that Chairman Kennard has spoken of. His vision of an effective and responsive agency that is organized along functional lines, we think, will be particularly helpful to consumers in the future and to help achieve the alliance's goal, which is to get advanced telecommunications capabilities to all Americans, regardless of where they live, how much money they have, or what kind of physical limitations they may have. One of the things I do want to emphasize, though, is that while the alliance is very supportive of competition, we do not believe competition is an end, in and of itself, but that competition provides benefits -- can provide very real benefits to consumers in the form of lower prices and innovative services. But those advanced -- those new services may not be available and affordable to everyone. And so, we are particularly happy that the chairman is focusing reorganization along lines that emphasize the Commission's commitment to universal service and also to protecting consumers and informing them and educating them about some of the important choices they will have to make in a rapidly changing communications landscape. Thank you. MR. JOHNSON: Good morning, everybody. My name is Marcus Johnson. I'm CEO of the Mormos (phonetic) Entertainment Group, Inc. As we discuss the FCC for the 21st Century, I'm a little disturbed and cautiously optimistic about what the future may hold. Today, I can make contacts with my friends from thousands of miles away. Business communication is easier than ever. And my phone has features that Alexander Graham Bell never imagined. However, sometimes when we look at this, it may seem as though everything is good. However, I also must remember that I live in Washington, D.C., the nation's capital. As I travel as an educator, as a musician, as a businessman, I'm exposed to many other segments of communications culture that exist and our country. Many of our schools do not have computers and are being left behind by others that travel along the information highway. I should mention, maybe or maybe not, that this disparity is usually based on class or racial factors. I'm not informed on the exact statistics, however, I will go so far as to say that most of the schools, primary and secondary, that I visit are not equipped to prepare our children for the future. I must remind myself that this culture is plagued by the aftermath consolidation. It's amazing how once a month in law school you can take an antitrust class and the next semester everything you learned can be thrown out the window. I know of a company that just purchased four or five stations in a particular metropolitan area, not too far from here. Megacommunications firms are establishing play lists on the national level, with very little regard for what -- for the programming on the local level. And so, what will result of industries such as the contemporary jazz format, they are losing stations on almost a monthly basis. Furthermore, the MACA programming has led to a steep decline in record sales. So, we're seeing that this has an effect, not only in our industry, but in other industries. In general -- and I hate to sound political -- I get the feeling that government for the people, by the people has turned into government for some of the companies by the largest contributors. I especially feel this way when it relates to the communications industry being in my field. It is true that these organizations do themselves pay taxes and rightfully should have their interests represented. However, it should not be at the expense of the, quote, unquote, "people" used so much in the documents of governments created by our forefathers. So as I look into the 21st Century, I hope that the FCC will take the idea of universal service and access with them. I would hope that they would couple this access with information and guidance on how to use the technology and for what specific applications. Also, we need to teach consumer responsibility, as it relates to communications. Furthermore, understanding the importance of communications and its increasing role in our everyday life, I would argue for working closely with the Department of Justice and state and local governments to zealously protect the rights of those who cannot combat the price forces associated with an oligopolistic industry that is displaying many monopolistic characteristics. Let me end by stating that these airwaves are not owned by businesses. They are owned by the, quote, unquote, "people" and licensed to communications companies for their commercial use. I hope that the FCC of the 21st Century will never allow that idea to be lost. Thank you. MR. BRACY: My name is Mike Bracy. I'm here wearing two hats today. One is as consultant with Bracy, Williams, and Company, and we represent cities here in town. And I represent, currently, four cities on telecommunications issues. And I'm also here as executive director of Low Power Radio Coalition. We're a grassroots organization that is working on behalf of the causative low power radio. And I've already violated the first rule, which is when you're on a panel with Marcus, you sit on the side where you go before Marcus, instead of after Marcus. What the Low-Power Radio Coalition is working to do is two types of education. The first part is trying to take this causative, low- power radio in the concept of the proceeding and educate the public outside of D.C., because what you see is most stakeholders don't understand what's going on. They really don't engage with the process. The second rule, then, is to take that information and get it back into the capital and make sure that the Commission is aware, make sure the media is aware and make sure Congress is aware of how these -- what these stations will look like. And I think part of what we need to think about, in terms of the cities that we represent and also in terms of this coalition, is that we've had a cultural shift in the last 15, 20 years where people don't want to "consume," anymore. People want to create. And there's a different mentality where people are much more, sort of, aggressive in the concept of creating content and looking for platforms. So, local government, you see that in PEG, in Public Educational Government cable channels. You see that in distance learning. You see it in public safety spectrum use. In this Low-Power Radio Coalition debate, you see it in educational institutions throughout their little neighborhood station with a reach beyond the campus. So, you see it in an independent record store owner who wants to be able to broadcast, you know, their station outreach a couple of blocks. But there's a true disconnect, I think, with the work that the Commission's trying to do and the stakeholders. Particularly, we see it in the independent music industry. Marcus and I were at a convention last -- two weeks ago for the Association of Independent Music. And when we met with people and talked with people over and over you heard the same thing, oh, I thought they could do low power radio stations. Didn't I see a story about that? Or how do I get my license? Or I made a comment with who? And, you know, basically my message is it's really encouraging the Commission to work on three things. And I think the chairman, I think the work that's going on on this is not news. I think people know these problems and are working in the right direction. The first is really think through the interface of stakeholders. And the Commission, hopefully, can become more customer-oriented. And I think the LSGAC and the work that they are doing for local government is a good starting point, but it needs to be expanded. The concept needs to really be taken farther. The second is to leverage technology to improve outreach. I mean, the FCC should be able to use video conferencing, so Commission staff can appear at a conferences without having to travel. I think the work that's done on the Internet, I think there's a lot of good things being done, certainly, internally. But I think communications technology creates a lot of opportunities to better inform the public. Then, the third is the concept of proactive enforcement, especially as we look at something like the low power radio proceeding where eventually I'll have a couple of hundred or maybe as many as 1,000 new community radio stations. And one of the concerns is you get people who, maybe, don't have the background that some of the larger broadcasting companies have. If we can think of enforcement, not as reacting to problems, but proactively creating solutions so we don't get to the problem stage, in terms of engineering solutions or obscenity issues, or anything like that, hopefully you know the Commission can be, you know, working in a proactive way, instead of just being reactive. But thanks for having us. MS. PRAISNER: Good morning. I guess I'm the last one, so I'll try and not repeat what I've heard. I'm Marilyn Praisner. I'm a county council member in Montgomery County Maryland, but I'm here today as vice chair of the Local and State Government Advisory Committee for the FCC. That's a 15-person group that was appointed by the Commission to help provide local and state government perspective on the implementation of the Telecommunications Act. We represent states, cities, counties, and Native Americans. And we meet here every other month for a very hectic day or day and a half trying to cover the myriad of issues that are on our plate or continue to be on our plate or, all of a sudden, appear on our plate in trying to deal with telecommunications and the issues that are in front of either the FCC or us as local officials. From my perspective, it's been a healthy exchange and it's been a growing and learning experience, I think, for all of us, for elected officials, for the industry, for FCC Commissioners, and for FCC staff. We especially appreciate the Commission's perspective in leading the local officials in trying to share and exchange our visions. We support the chairman's vision and are anxious to have all of our communities achieve those goals. In the interest of doing so, though, I think it is safe to say that the Advisory Committee is concerned that we all appreciate and recognize the partnership that should be developed in achieving the goals of the Telecommunications Act. And that is a recognition of local government, not only as consumers and providers, but also as regulators and advocates. We, I guess, would support the NATOA position, since those are our people who do the day-to-day work in trying to delve into the Act and also to try to deal with the myriad of complaints or issues that come before us. It is important that we strengthen that partnership. And events, such as this, are helpful. I would encourage and continue to encourage Commission staff members and Commissioners to broaden their interchange and interaction with local and state officials. And that includes not only video conferencing, but attendance at those kinds of community conferences, not just industry conferences. I would like to see you at the National Association of County, at the National League of Cities, the Conference of Mayors, the National Conference of State Legislators, whether in person or using the technology to try to broaden our community's knowledge and understanding. We're not all the same, and we're not all going to be at the same place at the same time, but we all want the same thing, which is the opportunities which this telecommunications industry benefits and development is going to bring us. But we have to do so, and we have to achieve that with the recognition and the respect from each other's roles. Thank you. MS. BLACKLER: Hi. I'm Ellen Blackler on the staff of the FCC. I'm assisting Kathy today, and I'm also leading the hot-off-the-press input from the Internet. Most of what we've gotten so far has really reenforced what folks in the disabilities community have said here today. But I will add one comment that has been received from Ron Vickory in Rome, Georgia. He is suggesting that what we really need is more resources at the Disabilities Issues Task Force with an emphasis on research and engineering capabilities, so we can better understand all of the technical implications of what we're doing to both do things right the first time and stay ahead of the technologies that are developing. So, if you're listening, you can send us comments in on the Internet and we'll incorporate them into the discussion. MS. BROWN: Well, thank you, everyone. You can see that this is a very diverse group. And I feel very lucky to have had you all come today. I thought we would try for a couple of minutes, here's what I'd like to do -- it's 11:30 -- is to spend maybe 20 more minutes on this question of the role of the FCC. And I'd like to put a couple of questions to you. And then, I thought perhaps we could shift then to particular processes or different kinds of techniques we might use to be responsive, so more process issues, secondly. And then, thirdly, if anyone wants to comment further on sort of the structural issues -- I heard a lot about functional structures -- I'd like to explore that a little bit with you. But for about 20 minutes, perhaps, we could stay with this question of the role of the FCC. It will be very helpful to me, by the way, if you would just put up your card so I can see your names. And then, when you do want to get into the discussion, perhaps you could just put your card up, and I'll know to call on you. Some suggest that -- Andy, you have to let me ask the question first. See, I love this group. MR. SCHWARTZMAN: I thought you did. MS. BROWN: Let me just ask this, and then I'll go right to you. Some talk about the -- this notion that as we go forward into a competitive environment, that the FCC really does not have a role, does not have a role in consumer protection, that in fact that role best lies with, perhaps, a different federal agency. Some talk about the FTC, that it may lie with the states or it may lie with local government, but that that would not be our ongoing role. I'd like to talk a little bit about that, because others argue as strongly that in a competitive environment, there would remain a role for the FCC for consumer protection. And it would be helpful to hear from you your perspective on that. And also, what does that mean, consumer protection? Particularly, in a converging industry, what would that look like? Secondly, I heard a lot of discussion around citizen and consumer input into the proceedings that we have to do, with respect to the network, with respect to equipment that goes on the network, with respect to spectrum management -- who, for instance, gets to use the airwaves at what price. How would we ever decide that? And I'd like to talk a little bit there about the consumer-citizen role with -- in relation to the FCC and what the role of the FCC ought to be back to you. So, two little different questions, but if we could talk about that for awhile, it would be helpful to us. Andy? MR. SCHWARTZMAN: Well, that's what I was going to speak to anyway. For those of you who know my colleague, Gigi Sohn (phonetic), she's taken a leave of absence to do some stuff in New York. And there's a brashness deficit at New Access Project, as a result. So I have to be brash enough for Gigi and me. Picking up on what Chip said, I think that the role for the future is not a question of the FCC making itself absent or eliminating its processes. In fact, the role of the FCC is to facilitate a much more effective, well-formed role for the public in interacting with the various industries and other regulated players. The more of that kind of interaction there is -- licensing, broadcaster dialogue, effective consumer awareness and participation of the marketplace role of telephone companies and wireless companies, and so forth -- facilitates removing regulation and facilitates removing a hands-on process. And in that connection, I think that the presentations this morning are a little bit skewed, and this is not a criticism. It's really to the Commission's credit, because the disabilities community has been effective, vocal, well-organized, and taken good advantage of legislative opportunities that they have, to some degree, created for themselves to be extremely effective and extremely well-represented. And that's, as I said, hardly a criticism. There's a strong motivation there. I think that the Commission needs to look at its shortcomings more generally, with respect to other communities. In particular, I think the Commission's role has to be to facilitate citizen participation in the process. It's not the fault of the staff doing it, and I should have seen it back then. But the Commission's web site has many shortcomings. It's very good in the Common Carrier Bureau and the Cable Services Bureau, in my opinion. And it goes down from there. I think that it's been very hard to get some effective changes in that, staff forums to do it, but it's been not enough money, can't do this, can't do that. I think it's a critical thing. You're pulling citizens out of the process. There's a couple of recent standing decisions that gives consumers less role and less right to participate in Commission proceedings. Wrong way to go. Publication of proceedings, an effective way that's accessible to the public, not just to the communications lawyers and the industries in town, is important. The web site only helps those, particularly in the Mass Media Bureau, who know that there's a decision to find and know a little bit more about finding it. The stuff is not very accessible. I think you need to make that process much more open, much more accessible. To the extent that it could get on the Commission's web site, no fault of anybody here, but I mean, there are mechanical problems at the moment. So far as I can tell, the Mass Media Bureau has still not posted the fact that there's an extension of the low-power comments list, one of the most important things. If I'm wrong about that, the first extension that was granted was not posted for two weeks. And indeed, there was very incorrect information about deadlines prominently posted at the top of the page for a long time. That's a kind of inattention to what citizens need to be drawn in. There is no real involvement in seeking out citizen input throughout the staff level. It only comes from the top, from the people who are, frankly, more politically attuned. I think that this is a basic institutional problem that is necessary for the Commission to remove its regulatory role. MS. BROWN: Jenell? MS. TRIGG: Thank you, Kathy. In response to your question regarding some people feel that the FCC does not have a role in consumer protection, I always start with my beloved statute, which has the rubber band around it and dog-eared pages, and whatever. I find that inconsistent with the very first section of the Telecommunications Act, Section 147 U.S.C. 151, when it speaks to for the purpose of regulating interstate and foreign commerce to all the people of the United States without discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, or sex, et cetera, et cetera, combined with Section 254, which speaks to, as you know, 254(b)(3) to all Americans and all nations and consumers must have access to telecommunications at reasonable charges. How do you not look at the consumer component when you have a statutory mandate to make sure that all telecommunications services -- and that's broadcasting, cable, everything across the board -- is accessible at reasonable charges, is available in a nondiscriminatory basis? You have got to get involved in consumer activities due to the statute. So, unless someone's going to rewrite, throw out, eliminate -- and these are just two provisions offhand of the entire 1996 Act, Communications Act of 1934 as amended by multiple provisions the past 60 years, you very much have a role. Now, how do you implement that and what do you do? I do think you need to get beyond the beltway. As much as I decided to stay in Washington in my new role, I find it refreshing to get a plane and go away. It's amazing what people outside of Washington, even the East Coast, talk about telecommunications. All they read about telecom is what's in the newspapers. And, again, the perspective of what's being reported in our national publications, not our trade journals, not our trade publications, but our national news is quite different. And I really think more outreach to different types of consumer groups, maybe not billed as consumer groups, but certainly everything from the Girl Scouts to fraternities and sororities and church groups, technology affects them probably more so than anyone else, because they are doing more outreach and they are in the trenches, as well. And I think some of that perspective would be very helpful. But you very much have a role in consumer and citizen involvement just by the nature of your regulating statute. MS. BROWN: Thank you. MS. TRIGG: Thank you. MS. BROWN: We'll go on this side of the table. Susan? MS. GRANT: I think the FCC's role is even more important now than it has ever been because of regulation and competition. The FCC needs to ensure that consumers are not defrauded and that anticompetitive practices are not perpetrated. And I don't think that that's a role that the FCC can or should advocate to others, whether to the FTC or to the states. At the same time, I think that the FCC must be careful not to preempt other agencies at the federal, state, and local levels from helping to protect their constituents and that you could use the FTC as a model for how to maximize your resources by working jointly with other agencies at all levels of government to investigate problems in the field, to take enforcement actions, multilevel enforcement actions, to do consumer education. All of the successes that the FTC has had in the last 10 years, or so, have been because they've been able to form effective partnerships with other government agencies and also with nonprofit consumer organizations to get what needs to be done done. I don't think that that's a responsibility that is going to go away or that should go away. I think that the FCC will always be needed in order to make sure that telecommunications competition is working for the public in the way that it's supposed to. MS. BROWN: Thank you. Pluria? MR. MARSHALL: I think it's real important that the responsibility area of serving the public is made clear by the FCC, because most of the people in communities that I visit feel that there are no longer any areas of responsibility that radio and television stations and cable systems really have to serve the community. Most of the people think that they are just there to make money. And people are charging for public service announcements. There are almost no public affairs programs on the air anymore. They keep lying about, well, we cover it in the news. But, you know, how much can you do in 30 to 60 seconds? So, I think it's important that the Commission get out there and really give some real information about what the television, radio, and cable television's responsibilities are to really serve the community to open those facilities up however they are going to. But right now, folks really feel shut out. MS. BROWN: Al? Claude? MR. STOUT (Sign Interpreter speaking): I think that the FCC should stop telling the citizens that it's not my jurisdiction, that that's someone else's jurisdiction, because we can't assume that all Americans are very familiar with the various jurisdictions here in Washington, D.C. There are people who still feel that video captioning is a part of the FCC's responsibility, that multimedia is part of the FCC's responsibility. So there's a lot of confusion, and I think that it may be beneficial to start thinking about creating an interagency program in order to work with the various agencies at the federal level and to find common ground so that when a complaint comes in from a citizen, that work with the other agencies is done in order to work through it. For example, there are many deaf children in mainstream education programs. And as a requirement of the Department of Education, although it's required, still many schools do not provide their TV programs with captioning, which leaves those deaf students out of the picture, in regards to mainstream education programming. And I think that it might be part of the FCC's responsibility to make sure that captioned programs are included. I think there's a lot of gray areas here. The Department of Justice is responsible for the 911 access services. But who's responsible for providing the phone lines? I understand that there wasn't any technology, technological assistance programs provided until we had the riots in 1964, which then helped the Department of Justice to find the funding to be able to provide technology assistance programs to all law enforcement programs across the country. It may be that FCC should think about finding moneys to provide technological assistance programs and training to industry, to the public in order that folks become more familiar with the various jurisdictions and their appropriate responsibilities, in regard to program access. MS. BROWN: Thank you. Alan? MR. DINSMORE: I think most of us will probably agree that the FCC does have an information role. That's probably the easy part of it. I think the more difficult part of it is how do you configure yourself to do all the things that, I think, most of us agree need to be done? I could say, for example, in looking at your web site, we have had problems with that in that often the information up there is not accessible for a string reader, but to talk about it in a more universal sense about the kind of organizational change that you might have to think about in order to be effective, and I think you really do need to take that seriously, because of what I said earlier and what other people have said earlier that much of what is really important for citizens to know simply isn't expressed in media outside of some of the major media markets. The FCC needs to look at that very carefully. And the suggestion I would make is to follow the example of one commenter from an industry not associated with the FCC, except that they do Internet training now, which was the Charles Schwab Company. And they said when we set up ourselves in the information business, we had it as a separate entity, which when I think the way the FCC kind of tends to view information right now, it's something you do on the web site. And they said they never were really able to obtain the full advantage of being an effective participant in the information world that that company needs to be, until they began to realize that that information process has to be integrated in the way the whole company does its business. And that, I think, is something that the FCC needs to consider that you don't just have a web site to put up things that you get from the various bureaus and the comments, that you are in the information business now, just like everybody else is. And you need to think about what effect that has on your organization, because I have a sense that some of the reasons for the slips that other speakers have talked about, in terms of other things not being posted in a timely fashion or not being posted in a correct fashion, have to do often that you've still got this separation within the agency that we do all of our work with all of the dockets over here and the information people are over here. And I think that has to change in order for that to become really effective, so that all of us can use it more effectively. MS. BROWN: Thank you. Jeff? MR. KRAMER: Thank you. MS. BROWN: I think you're okay. MR. KRAMER: All right. I think, first of all, that the FCC very clearly has a role in consumer protection now and in the years ahead. And I think it's sort of a copout when people say, well, FCC maybe should abdicate that, because the FTC and the states and the local government -- I think it's clear to everybody that regulation and legislation can be crafted so that you're not pre empting the states or that you're not treading on FTC authority. And I think it's real important that that be taken into consideration. Also, I also think it's important to echo what some of the other people have said about the FCC getting outside the beltway. I know in talking to our members who call me, the press they get, for the most part, is that phone companies are suing the FCC, or the FCC's in court with somebody, or the FCC's doing this to us, or the court taxes the FCC. And that's all I'm hearing. No one's really talking about the benefits that they get from these services. All they are talking about is how this is screwing us up, and we're ending up paying a lot more for these services. So, I think it's real important that the FCC spend time with consumers out in the hinterlands to explain to them what's going on. And the other thing is, I think, on the consumer protection side that the FCC, again, is going to have a unique role because, as some people have mentioned, the digital divide. And I think that's a real concern. I think there's going to need to be consumer protection for the low-end customer and for the high-end customer. I mean, you're going to see a lot of your telecommunications service providers marketing to these high-end customers, but I think there, even those customers are going to end up being confused or not know what services they are getting, what those services are, what they are paying for. And on the low end, you're going to have people who either aren't getting the services and should be, or who are getting services they don't even know they are getting. And I think, again, you're going to have all this confusion and there's a lot of -- MS. BROWN: Well, let's try sharpening just a little. What's the role, then, of the regulatory agency? Let's assume it's the FCC for the moment. Ensuring that customers are getting information about products and services being offered by competitive companies. Should the government, should the FCC say to companies, well, here's how you put that information out? Or should we be actually putting information out? Or should we be leading people to information? I'd like you to sharpen this a little and give me some input on that. And we'll get right over to you, Chip. MR. KRAMER: Well I think, for the most part, you should be leading people to the information. I think there are a lot of organizations, and I think voluntary AARP is one of them that's willing to help consumers with the information. I don't think you have the resources nor that's your role to be providing that information. But I think you can be instrumental in leading people to that information. MS. BROWN: I know that Chip may have an opposite view, so I'm going to let you come in so we can stir this pot a little bit. MR. DINSMORE: I want to respond to Jeff's view that people don't share his views have copped out somehow. I think there are two issues here we need to be clear about. One is I think I completely agree with people on this panel who said that the Commission needs to do a better job of informing the public about what it does and the decisions that it takes. When I made my comments, though, about consumer protection, if you assume we're living in a world where we can have all the government we want or that AARP wants, maybe there are no limits. But I think my view is that where we should be moving in this competitive environment in communications is so that communications as a commodity, if you will, is not unlike any other commodity in the economy. And we have consumer protection agencies at all levels of government that are set up to deal with protecting the consumer. If those agencies aren't doing their job, we ought to reform them. We shouldn't overlay them with the federal communications as a consumer protection agency. That's the point that I wanted to emphasize. MS. BROWN: Somebody want to jump on that? Go ahead, Mike. MR. TRAVIESO: Yes. I sort of find it odd that I'm sharing a position with Chip but -- MR. SHOOSHAN: It's okay, Mike. MR. TRAVIESO: -- I think if you think about a company in the 21st Century providing services to the public, what you're going to have is a holding company that's going to have underneath of it a whole bunch of other companies. And it's going to be providing to residential customers cable service, Internet, energy, gas and electric, security systems, banking. And it'll also own, theoretically own, pipes and wires. And it'll be regulated. And we will all interact with companies like that. And if we get -- if bad things happen and we want to make a complaint or we want to go someplace to get relief, it doesn't make sense to me that we'd have to go to the FCC to complain about certain things and to the FTC to complain about certain things and to the FERC to complain about certain things, and perhaps, to a state commission to complain about certain things. Now, the organization that I've appeared before has jurisdiction over almost all of those things. In Maryland, you can go to one place, raise your issues, and get relief. My view of the future is that on the federal side, there is a great need for consumer protection and consumer information and consumer education, but it's going to be a disservice to little guys and little customers if you have to go to five places and get referred back and forth and people, agencies keep saying, well, we can handle your phone problem, but maybe this is really a marketing issue that the FCC would have to deal with, because it's not really something you regulate. MS. BROWN: So, Mike, would you see the FTC taking, for instance, as an example the whole of telecommunications consumer protection? MR. TRAVIESO: Now I would see the FTC as handling commodities, commodity-type issues. And I don't really disagree with Chip that all of these kinds of services are going to be commodities and that there needs to be a place for a consumer to go if they have complaints about that. And that's what happens at the State Commission. And we've advocated for our State Commission to have a consumer protection role for all the utility -- what used to be utility services and marketing and other things. MS. BROWN: Let me push back a little on this commodity notion. What someone started -- I think it was you, David, who said well there's this box, but there's no way to get to it. And then, I thought you gave a wonderful statement about networks and how they need to be open and accessible in order to get, perhaps, the service or product. And I always, when I hear this commodity argument, wonder about this notion when these networks seem to be like our nervous system and is there something there about the nature of networks and our network of networks that causes us, perhaps, to look at it differently and, perhaps, causes citizen and consumer groups to warrant an expert agency to be involved? And I'll go to David since I used your language, I think. MR. NEUBERGER: Well, that's fine. I have fundamentally wondered about this. I have worried about the process of decisions that the Commission has made in this area, because it seems to me that, in many respects, the decisions have picked winners and losers in various segments of various industries. Whether it's broadcast or telecommunications, or whatever. The effect of decisions has been to pick winners and losers. And in my sense, that has been not a way to bring new technological innovation out to everybody. If I may, just to give you one example of a decision that has worried me a great deal, it was the ADSL decision to require the telephone companies, or at least the RBOCs, to do it through an affiliate, which had the effect of having the RBOCs sell on a selected basis, just like the competitors are selling on a selected basis and leaving the consuming public out, the residential public. While I certainly am disabled and speak from the point of view of disabled people, but I think I'm talking about a very broad segment of the residential population without getting -- having companies have the wherewithal, any kind of company having the wherewithal, to bring those ADSL services to all of our homes. And so, in one sense when you're re-inventing the Commission, in my sense, I think that we only get the competition when we have mutual facilities-based competition in the networks, and so that I think that what we need is to find ways. And I must say that if you make the reselling so cheap that I think that keeps people like the cable TV industry from coming into telecommunications, because those prices are so cheap at the RBOC level. So that it seems to me that what we -- if we are picking anything, we ought to be getting to the point that we have multiple networks -- electric, utilities, cable television, hopefully wireless satellite, and hard wire systems that are competing into the same household. And at that point, we take advantage of competition. If that dream can happen, then competition will come. And I think that consumers will generally be protected. Then, it seems to me, that you come down to certain issues that only an agency can protect. And it seems to me that what we want to have is competition solve the vast bulk of the problems and then understand that markets have glitches, and they don't solve problems. Markets do not make poor people wealthy. And so, we need government, to use government policy to support making -- helping poor people have adequate resources for the way that they live. Just recently, in my community, TCI came out with digital television and they did away with that Channel B in the audio, which did away with descriptive video. Well, we -- I mean, we can't have that. We've got -- can't be building barriers. We've got to be eliminating barriers. And that's what your role is. First, make competition realistic where people are going to head to head on a facilities basis and then come in and solve those problems that the government won't get to -- I mean, that the business won't get to and only the government can help us with. MS. BROWN: And there are quite a few people who would like to speak. So, let me just try and go around. Brad, you've had your card up for a little bit? MR. RAMSEY: Well, that was back on an earlier issue. But I just wanted to say, as far as migrating or centralizing consumer protection, I mean it's a good idea in an ideal world. But near-term, like in the next five years, it seems to me that the FCC has to stay in the business. We're still in the middle of doing implementation, and I don't think you're going to be finished, at least for another couple of years and, you know, could be beyond that. And during the implementation phase, it doesn't strike me that it's appropriate for anybody -- any other agency to be trying to come up with the backstop. And I refer to them as a backstop, because of course nobody thinks that the primary enforcement should be at the state level, but the backstop enforcement role for the FCC. One other thing that the agency, at least the state commissions believe is extraordinarily valuable is, you engage in information collection on what is going on in the industry, which helps other agencies at the state and federal level do their jobs. And that is a critical role for the FCC and one that nobody's gone on record in the nine years I've been here, at least six or seven times, saying that you need to keep doing it. MS. BROWN: So, Andy doesn't push off the table, I'm going to let him speak for a minute. MR. SCHWARTZMAN: I think that the discussion by itself answers some of the questions about how quickly it's possible to combine some of these functions in a different way, because I think that the answers here are reflecting the perspectives of the different issues that the people here have worked on. Certainly, since my principal concentration has been on the mass media side, I don't think that free expression and diversity of opinion and creation of a well-informed electorate is a commodity. I don't think that this is something that can simply be turned into something to be sold as broadcast licenses, like pork bellies. I think that there's a different function there. More importantly, when we talk about the values of convergence and competition -- and I stress what was said before. And I know the Commission has a comprehension of this, but we speak loosely. Competition is a means, not an end. If you've got one or two people in a particular industry, that's competition. We had competition with two cellular players, but it didn't really produce a whole lot of good. So, we can't use these terms too loosely. As we move through convergence, you are now having cable operators and telephone companies through DSL becoming conduits for information that traditionally was available on over-the-air broadcasts. Information that relates exactly to how the public becomes informed on issues and ideas and participates in self-governance. The Commission cannot remove itself from that role, but the Commission certainly can facilitate it. We've talked about collection of information, pointing stuff out on the Internet. The Commission is getting the right idea, although it took a long time to realize that maybe putting tariffs on the Internet was helpful, not hurtful. And our prior Commission didn't understand that, and the current Commission does. But the Commission's information function is critically important, because the Commission can make the information be produced and produced where there's some teeth that it's accurate. And the Commission has been very, very under -- it's been going the wrong direction, in terms of collecting information and making it accessible to the public in a meaningful way. Just last week cutting back well over 50 percent on the advances that have been made on the main studio and public -- rules in broadcasting, I think, was a real tragedy. As best I can tell, the FCC cannot produce an effective, meaningful good number on the penetration of cable systems in the United States. MS. BROWN: Well, let's -- MR. SCHWARTZMAN: That kind of stuff you need to do in order to ultimately get out of the way. MS. BROWN: Let's talk about that a little bit. The industry ought to come in and say that as it becomes more competitive, there's less reason for the government to be collecting information, because consumers can find the products or the service in the marketplace. So, we don't have to be tracking it. Others have argued that, well, this is not a completely competitive marketplace, first of all; and secondly, that we don't know yet if it's competitive if we don't have some monitoring to understand what level of competition is out there. While you're talking, maybe someone can give me some feedback on that. Debra, you had something? MS. BERLYN: Well yes, I did, Kathy. I'm not sure if we're -- MS. BROWN: Go ahead. MS. BERLYN: -- on that particular question, although I might hit it. A couple of things I wanted to say, first of all, it's always good to have at least one attorney in the room. I know we have several, but I agree with Jenell's pointing to the Act about the FCC's mission. And I think the law provides for the role that the FCC plays and that the Telecommunications Act actually added a role for the FCC to play in promoting competition. Underlining all of that is an important role, in terms of consumer protection. And I don't think any of that goes away, but it does evolve. It does change. And I think that the process that you're undergoing now is one that should continue. As the industry changes, whether it be through convergence, a level of competition that develops, I think the FCC can play an important role for itself in continuing to monitor that and look at ways in which you can evolve to protect consumers. One example of what the FCC can do in a competitive market is what you just did in truth and billing. I think that was an example of how you stepped in to give consumers better information when they are looking at multiple carriers. So, I think there is definitely a role to play to continue to protect consumers. MS. BROWN: Karen? MS. STRAUSS: Very often, when the industry tries to say that they are going to be competitive, they try to suggest that the FCC has no role, as you suggested. But as David alluded to before, they are in fact in the area of disability's market forces are not effective. And that's the whole reason that the FCC has the responsibilities to implement the various sections of the 1996 Act. There are sections in that law that require the FCC to monitor and to make sure that captioning takes place, that access takes place. Andy, I appreciate your kind words about the disability community. I'm glad that we're viewed as being so organized and so effective. Unfortunately, I would say that our effectiveness is largely limited to within the beltway, again, that there are people with disabilities out in the country that still have, as I mentioned before, no idea that many of these laws existed. And all you have to do is look at the numbers of complaints that the FCC has received on relay services on Section 255, which has been in effect since 1996, to see that most of these people actually have no idea of their protected rights. And so, not only because there are federal laws covering these access issues, but also I want to just comment on one other thing that Andy said; and that is, access is not a commodity, either. And access crosses virtually or nearly all FCC proceedings. Nearly all of your proceedings have some implication for access. I can't imagine another agency being able to interweave its obligations into making sure that access is provided in the various proceedings that come out of the FCC. So, as long as access is going to be mandated by federal law, there's going to be a role for the FCC to make sure that that access is carried out. MS. BROWN: Maureen? MS. LEWIS: I want to say that I think it's very important for the FCC as a repository of some very specialized expertise continue to play a very active and effective role in consumer protection and in education. For the very point that Mike made about one-stop shopping, I think the FCC can really facilitate consumer complaints, because they have the opportunity to come to a federal agency that can then work with state and local government agencies in order to get redress to consumer complaints. I think it's very difficult for consumers to do, as Mike said, to bounce from agency to agency, but if because of the title of your agency's name, Communications, if the complaint or the issue relates to communications or communications services, I think it would be -- consumers would be very well-served to be able to come to the FCC that can then work in partnership with other organizations to help redress consumer issues. MS. BROWN: Marcus? MR. JOHNSON: Thank you. I guess the point was made, I guess, going down the lines of, like, if we keep going, we'll have all the -- you know, people want all the government they want. But I want us to also recognize that the competing factor there is all the greed that you want. And, you know, we're talking about industry. My first day of marketing at business school, I was told, like many other places, I'm sure all marketing classes, that you know what is marketing and business about? It's about money. So, when I look at the FCC, I look at you as more of the check and balance of what's going on around the country. You don't just have one function. You mentioned about providing information and then somebody coming up and saying, well, you know this, that, and the other. I mean, you have to put it in context with all of the roles of FCC. I think, maybe, we want to talk about that, instead of saying the role. And figuring it out and of finding it, as it relates to getting, like, the information out there, you know, you're asking for ideas. I may date myself here, but I was one of the people -- I had to take the citizenship test, so you know how young I am. But there are ways to empower the people, I think. And that's -- you know, if we go in and work with the states, as some people are advocating, maybe come up with some information to -- I mean, most people, my assumption is that most people don't even understand their rights about where they can go in the FCC to get the information that they need. And I figure if I can learn the same history for 12 years that, you know, one semester of learning about agency law, what the FCC will do for me, you know, that's not bad. MS. BROWN: Thank you. Welcome, Mr. Chairman. Glad to see you. We've been talking this morning about, in the last couple of minutes, about the role of the FCC, as we go forward, and consumer protection and sort of a different, a little different angle than consumer protection complaints, but also what and how do we ensure that we have the consumer role heard and understood in the ongoing proceedings we have to do, with respect to access to the airwaves, access to networks, access to new services. And that's where the discussion is right now. MR. KENNARD: Okay. MS. BROWN: Would you like a couple of minutes, and then we can -- would you like to speak a little bit and then we can continue? MR. KENNARD: Okay. MS. BROWN: Okay. MR. KENNARD: All right. Well, it's good to be here. I've been looking forward to this gathering. As you know, this is one of three forums that we're hosting here to hear from people about what the FCC should look like, what we should be doing, how we should be structured. And in my view, this is one of the most important things that we'll do in this process, because one of the things that I have learned as chairman of the FCC is -- I've learned a lot of things as chairman of the FCC. But one of the most important lessons that I've learned is how difficult it is in this town, given the way policy is made in Washington today, to stay focused on your agenda and keep it moving, because the whole infrastructure of the town is designed to co-opt your agenda. It is an unbelievable thing. You know, we are daily assaulted by people who are paid a lot of money to basically take the agenda away from the five commissioners. And it's the most amazing thing. I mean, I've never had a job where so many people are paid so much money to talk to me and tell me what to do. And it's not just the, you know, the people who are paid to do their work, the lawyers and the lobbyists, but it's the think tanks, it's the PR campaigns. It's the way that people are able to get hearings called in Congress. And you're called up there and not only are the hearings instigated often in this way, but the questions are planted. The most amazing thing happened to me in my confirmation. I was -- the night before my confirmation, one kind soul faxed me a stack of questions that were going to be asked of me in my confirmation. Many of them had been drafted by industry groups and not only -- they had the letterheads right there, you know, ask him this; if he says this, say this. You know, it's an amazing thing. And so we are challenged here, and I know many of you are in government, so you face the same challenges to find the true public in the public interest because what we hear most of, what is so easy for us to do is to hear what the shareholders' interests are, the economic interests, the industry interests. And sometimes, when you're in my position, just trying to articulate what this means to the average consumer or people who rely on these services is sort of an aside or an afterthought, because the press is always -- they're here. Okay. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: They're always here. MR. KENNARD: The press is and I hope you're listening to this -- they are always inclined to pick winners and losers. Well, who's going to win and who's going to lose. Is it the RBOCs today, or is it the long-distance carriers? Is it the CLECs? You know, is it the cable industry? And so, our job is always to focus on, well, the winners always have to be consumers and the public and articulate that, you know, again and again. I, not long ago, this was really driven home to me when I took a cab, and I was just outside the office here. I jumped in a cab and the cab driver looked in the mirror and he said, you're the chairman of the FCC, aren't you? And I said, yes, that's me. And we chatted a little bit about my job and about his job. And he said, you know, I have -- I carry a lot of people around in this area and I -- you know, a lot of lawyers and lobbyists, people up on -- back and forth to Capitol Hill. And I hear them talking about you sometimes. And I said, well, do tell. And what are they saying about me? He said, well, they say that they just can't figure you out, because you just don't play the game. And they don't know what you want. And they say that you don't cut deals. And when I heard that story, I felt that was probably the best compliment that I had ever received as chairman of the FCC, because then this guy went on to say, but that's okay with me, because I know that you're looking out for the little guy. And, you know, that day was really -- made everything I've gone through in this job worthwhile hearing that guy say that. But I tell this group this story, because we're all on the same team here. You know, we're trying to find the public in the public interest. And it is challenging for us to find ways to reach out to you, because you have limited resources. Many of you, you have organizations where you're stretched very thin. So, we have to come up with ways to make sure that you have an opportunity to participate in our processes. That's why we've set up advisory committees, and groups like the Local State Government Advisory Committee. That's why we've reached out to NARUC in a very intense way. That's why we're going to set up a Disabilities Advisory Committee, why we hold forums like this. But it's very -- you have to really work hard to make this happen, because the whole of the infrastructure is designed to influence you in different ways. And you could do this job as a commissioner here and spend all of your time sitting in your office talking to people who are paid to talk to you and cutting deals. And many people have done it that way. But obviously, you know that we can't do it that way. And we've got to come up with structures to make it easier for people in my job, my successors to be able to more systematically reach out to this community. That's why I have proposed setting up a public information bureau, because I think that the agency has to do a better job in reaching out to consumers outside the beltway and understanding what people care about, in terms of what we do and being able to be responsive. That's why I've proposed setting up an enforcement bureau. We'll, hopefully, set up both of these bureaus before the end of the year where we have a different enforcement culture at the FCC. So much of the culture of the FCC right now is designed around writing rules and policies. And we need to shift the resources and focus of the agency more toward enforcing the rules that we have on the books, because as I've talked to many people who deal with the industry, they don't feel that we have an enforcement mechanism that works quickly enough and is aggressive enough. And I know, because I talk to people all the time who are focused on this process of FCC reform. And it means different things to different people. To some people, it means eliminating the agency in a few years. To other people, it means not a frontal assault on the agency, but weakening the agency in a way that it can't enforce the rules, so that if we write great rules on 255, as we will, we won't have the resources to enforce them. So, that's why your input on this process is so vitally important, and not only the input in this process, but also just teaming with us on important issues. We can do so much more when you stand with us on these issues that we all care about. That's why it was so important when we announced our new slamming rules that AARP stood with us and the National Consumers League. And that Karen Strauss and Claude and the organizations they represent are standing with us on the disabilities issues, because we can't do this alone. You know, people will -- if we're alone, people will try to say that, oh, there he goes. He's off on his social agenda again. And they'll try to marginalize what we're doing. You've got to stand with us. Now, I will complete and hear more from you. The last thing I'll say is I am more than happy to be a martyr for the issues that I feel passion about, about access for persons with disabilities and bringing telephone service to the Native American populations and improving minority ownership and employment. I am more than happy to be a martyr to those issues. But I want to bring some of you all down with me. That's my message today. (Laughter.) MS. BROWN: -- when the Chairman's feisty. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So with that little pep rally in the middle of a discussion, perhaps we should continue. And I think, Melanie, you've had your card up for so long that why don't I go to you? MS. BRUNSON: Thank you. I've been sitting here trying to kind of meld my reactions to several of the things that I've heard. And I guess, let me start by saying I'm kind of a neophyte to the communications policy-making arena, but one of the things that occurs to me, as I'm sitting here, is that I'm not certain that we really -- that it's really appropriate to look at whether we should expand or diminish the role of the FCC so much as it is to focus it, perhaps, on just what the subject matter is. I think if you want to view communications as a commodity and say that that is the focus of the FCC, then I think the question would be that the -- the conclusion would be that the FCC's role would be to help both industry and consumers in determining what that commodity's going to look like, because the FCCs focus is communications. So, whether you define that as a service or a commodity, then the role of the agency is to help both sides, whether they be consumer or industry. And I suppose there's even more than both sides. There's multiple sides, the government, everybody in determining what that -- how that communication takes place, what it looks like. I think when we, as a consumer organization, go to industry, for instance, with some of our concerns, and their question becomes to us is, well, why should I pay attention to that segment of the market, what's in it for me, then I think your role as a commission is to help us to answer that question, be that you're saying to them well, yes, you can successfully and you should successfully compete for that aspect of the market to helping us to define that market for them. So, it's not a question of really consumer protection versus industry or service versus commodity. It comes back to we are about communication and defining who is communicated with and how and where that communication takes place, and making sure that it's available to those who want to avail themselves of it, and making sure that the means are out there for them to do that. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Melanie. And I think you hit a note that any number of people raised early on that, you know, we had a industry round table, and then we had a consumer round table. And any number of you said, what were you thinking? We really need to be talking to each other and that one role that you, the FCC, can play is to facilitate that kind of communication. And I'll use this into a -- segment. I know there's some more people who want to talk. And I promise I will get to you. To how we can better facilitate that input, how we can -- it seemed to me, there are a number of things that were talked about. The informations or our output to you. What information ought we be providing to you and how. And then, I heard a lot about your input to us. How can we facilitate your input into our processes and into our decision-making? And not only into our processes and decision-making, but perhaps to the industry? And I think as we, as an example, worked through the 255 issues, we found it very helpful. Although I know frustrating on all sides at times, for the parties to be talking to each other, because if there are technical kinds of fixes early on, for instance, in the design of a particular piece of equipment, it's helpful for the industry to understand that and to actually focus on it. And so, one thing I thought that was very successful is our convening groups to be able to talk to each other about those things. So, I put that to you. The other thing that I asked the industry and I'll ask you, this is a very paper-intensive organization. It does its work on paper, and it does its work through rules. And I wonder a lot -- a lot about that kind of process, paper process, and also this whole notion of rule-making in whether as we move into a more competitive environment if there is a role, whether that role really does shift from rules to enforcement, and what else. So, let me go to Jane. I think you've been trying to get in here for awhile. MS. LAWTON: First, I appreciate the Chairman's remarks, and I think he certainly -- a lot of us had made notes. And we just had to scuttle what we were going to say, because you've said it all. Right? You did say a lot about it. I think it's interesting to think about government. I was just sitting here thinking about this. I think that both levels of government, all levels of government -- state, local, and federal -- our staffs and ourselves, management level and also our staffs are really students. We have to continue to be students. And so, at the FCC, I think your staff and you all have been challenged to learn, first of all, in this huge telecommunications evolution to learn about the technology and about its capabilities and what it means and how it's going to change the way we're living. And then, secondly, you have been challenged by industry. And I think industry has taught you that. For the most part, they have been your constituency in the past, and they have been the people you've been closest to. And so, secondly, then they started teaching, I think, about the global marketplace. And so, a lot of your staffs are truly students of the global marketplace and of the technology. But I think there's a huge disconnect between the decisions that are made, even the smallest decisions, and their impact on the consuming public and on state and local government, too. And so, what I'm asking you to become now in the -- more of what we're facing in this evolution, the deployment of the services and the actual receipt of the services by people is to become students of local and state government processes and the consumer movements. And to think about the fact that, even though local governments look sometimes tedious or are portrayed to you to be that, that there are purposes behind the laws that they have passed and the regulations that they have put in place. And some of them, as Marilyn said, are we're different entities. And some of us move more quickly than others. And some of us are able to do things better than others. But I think that the purpose behind our laws are similar to yours. And so, we share that. And as Chip says, I don't think we want more government regulation, but we want to use efficiently both levels of government. And there is a place for efficiency, and there's a place to challenge all of us to listen also to industry, which goes to the idea that we need to be together. And I know, in our county, we've tried -- and it's amazing to sit down with industry, and particularly in wireless and some of the other now in telecom. And so, what are your biggest challenges? What do you need? And they have said, we need speed and reliable processes, et cetera. And we've tried at the local level to put that in place. And I think that's what -- the kinds of things we need to challenge local government to step up to the plate, change their processes, and become efficient themselves. But we can't lose sight of the fact that their laws and their rules are supportive of the same kind of goals that you're supportive of. And that says that pre-emption is something that you should try not to do if, in fact, you can avoid it and if you can reach out first and try to understand what local regulatory schemes are. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Jane. Lee? MR. RUCK: Quite a bit of discussion here on just what consumer protection is and what it means. The Chairman said it's looking out for the little guy. I think it was Maureen who mentioned that we're talking about one consumer at a time. I think it is important, as Jane just mentioned, that where there is something that is clearly a national policy issue, that the national government set that particular policy and set in motion the way to enforce it where there has not been a national policy, either set by Congress, or even just historically by the common law that, you know, that we allow the states and the local governments to use their own local needs to set that. One of the things that was successful in the early days of civil rights protection in the EEOC was the concept of the deferral agency. And this worked very well in many instances. And it may very well be that what would be appropriate where the FCC has limitations in staff, has limitations in the ability to actually create the mechanisms so that each consumer can be protected, even if it is a national policy, is that you make use of state and local governments. Just a couple of numbers. Fifty states and the District of Columbia, 3,100 counties, 79,000 cities, towns and townships, all of which have police power authority. That's over 80,000 jurisdictions which have their own state constitutional ability to exercise health, safety, and welfare for the benefit of their residents. If you add to that the educational involvement and what you're trying to do in consumer protection in reaching people, even through PEG channels, avenues of that nature, bring in the educational community, you're talking over 15,000 employ -- I'm sorry, 15 million employees who, once educated ourselves, are available to educate others as to exactly what you're trying to do. There is an opportunity here for a very real partnership among all levels of government. And it is something that I think puts the FCC, in a position or could put the FCC in a position to both support us when we are acting as laboratories in the public interest, and to allow us to support you when the policy decision has been made to ensure that it is enforced, one consumer at a time until it applies nationally. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Lee. Eric? I'd like to let Eric and then we'll come back to you, Jenell. MR. MENGE: I had a couple of ideas on possibly the things the Commission could do to increase the flow of information communication. The first one is use of compliance guides. If the Commission could take the rules it has and put them in a condensed, easy-to-read, easy-to-understand format on the specific issues, for example, kind of what the FCC has done regarding how to file a comment -- how to file complaint on its web site. The FBI has put together a Compliance Guide, regarding CALEA and it has proved extremely helpful. And we think that advocacy believes that compliance guides would really help take the information, put it in a digestible form, help the little guy understand what it is the FCC is requiring him or her to do. The other idea I was having was on how to cut down on the amount of paper and to get more interaction. It occurred to me when I was going through the 706 MPRM that the proposals and MPRM Act -- MPRM were extremely vague. As a consequence the comments, reply comments, were all the large industries covering their bases on everything. So, I had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of pages of comments to go through. And if you're trying to run a business, you can't read that stuff. It's too dense. And so, my recommendation is not to have MPRMs with vague proposals, but to have actual text, what the rule is you are proposing in the rule and say we're suggesting this, comment on this, because if you have a vague proposal, you're going to get lots of vague answers. And that tends to take lots of words. Those were my two ideas I had. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Eric. Jenell? MS. TRIGG: Thank you. Kathy, you asked a, not so long ago, a question about is there still a role for the FCC to collect information if indeed there's, quote, unquote, "competition." I think you need to define competition. I am concerned that, for example, in broadcasting, that it's considered that one entity that owns eight stations in a market is full and vigorous competition. Well, where there's a holding company of a particular telecommunications service that has multiple companies, maybe 10s, 20, or whatever, that are providing services across the board -- but, again, it all goes back to the top. I think that's important, at least at this stage until full implementation of the 1996 Act, to still take a look at some of the corporate structures to ensure that competition is truly vigorous; it's being offered by a diversity of companies, diversity of voices, not just a large number of companies in a particular area. I think it's important to look at what types of services are offered. It's great that you've got, maybe 10, 20 different, you know CLECs, in a community. But who are they providing services to? And, again, there are different types of consumers. There are small business, large business, residential. Are all of those 20, or so, companies offering services to the same type of consumer? Where does the competition break down? Also, I'd like to address the commodity issue. I'm a little concerned, and I agree with Andy, when you're looking at broadcasting as a commodity, but I'm also concerned when you're looking at telecommunications. I don't know too many commodities that can benefit or devastate entire communities if there's no access to a service. Now, if there's no access to orange juice at competitive and reasonable rates, you can drink something else. You don't have that alternative when you're looking at advanced telecommunications services, basic telephone services. You also don't look at First Amendment, fundamental citizenship issues in commodities, as we know them. So, I doubt that telecommunications should ever, much less than can ever, become a commodity if you're not looking then at a commodity, then you're really looking at the different types of consumer protection. If you're looking at consumer protection when it comes to fraud, surely the FTC can address that. But the type of consumer protection that's fundamental right now is inherent in the nature of the telecommunications industry. It is inherent in the way the technology works with companies, the convergence of companies, how they relate to each other. And only the expert agency for telecommunications can address those issues. They shouldn't have to rise to the level of a consumer issue, because by then someone's already been harmed if, indeed, you can prevent some of those problems at your regulatory and your policy-making stage. So at this point, I really think we're defining different types of consumer protection. And I don't think telecommunications is a commodity that the FCC can just ignore that. It makes a difference on how communities interact, how people get jobs, how kids get educated, health care, all of these things. And I know of no commodity that provides those benefits or doesn't provide those benefits to our communities. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Jenell. I'm going to go up the side and around. And then, also keep in mind there's about 25 minutes left, so if someone wants to comment on some of the organizational issues we raised, too, and you want to include them in your comments, we'll be happy to hear them. Debra? MS. BERLYN: Thank you, Kathy. I want to offer a couple of suggestions, as well, to increase consumer input. First, the role that consumers play here at the FCC is limited by lots of rules and the way of the road. You talk -- you mentioned paper proceedings as one example. I don't know how many folks around this room have looked at a two-week window for reply comments when you have to read thousands of pages of documents, something that is not very taxing for the industry that have a long lists of lawyers who can do that. But for consumer groups, I think that limits the participation that we can have. Now, that does conflict with my other suggestion that you act expeditiously on these issues. But what I might suggest is that in some of these proceedings where there is a value to consumer input, that you do both or one of these things. One is to offer, perhaps, a longer window for consumers to reply and give them an additional week or two to provide comment. The other would be to direct a specific number of questions to consumer organizations that you would like to get comment on so that they are not faced with a long list of issues that they don't necessarily need to respond to. I also think it's important in some way to involve consumers in the decision-making process at the FCC. I'm looking at the example of the Universal Service Joint Board. To get consumer input, we could have had a process of just involving consumers in meeting with joint board members. But instead, we actually have a joint board member who is a consumer advocate and involving consumers in the formal process of decision-making, I think, is absolutely crucial. You do have an Advisory Committee for State and Local Governments. And now you're setting up an advisory committee for the disabled community. I would urge you to consider a similar advisory committee that brings in a group of consumer advocates to work with the FCC and serve in an advisory role. And finally, I'd like to support your idea of convening some forums between industry and consumer organizations. I think that would be valuable, especially if we had some very specific issues to address. I think that would be interesting for all. And finally, I'd like to say that, Chairman, instead of us all going down with the ship, I hope that we can all be here for you. I think most of us around this table share your mission. And so, I hope we can be there to help push all of us up. Thank you. MS. BROWN: Joanne? MS. KUMEKAWA: Thanks. I'd like to agree with Debra on the two-week turnaround for comments. And maybe, another way to address that is to have some type of automatic notification on the web site. Let's say, if you apply for automatic notification for a particular subject and you happen to be on that list, perhaps, that might address that issue. So, you'd be automatically notified for that particular issue, not that you want to notify a million people. I understand that. I wanted to go back also to your comment about moving from rule-making to enforcement. And I think that also speaks to the idea of making decisions very quickly as you move away from rule-making and look more towards enforcement. I have a question, really, for you all which is that can you think about allowing a certain package, let's say, of stuff or services, or whatever it is that an industry member might want, with the understanding that they have to meet certain requirements, something that I think Eric was talking about? You know, you have a certain set of requirements or you have a certain set of things that you have to do in order to get something that you want, also the idea of regulating more broadly and don't sweat the small stuff. And I'm not sure whether or not that's what you mean by moving away from rule-making towards enforcement. Is that what you mean by sort of -- could no longer sort of, focusing on every little detail, but really regulating sort of more broadly. And finally, you know, as someone else said, focusing. What are you focusing on? Is it first competition? Because, certainly, we would support that. We believe that if you are really focused on competition, that a lot of the problems will be solved. And the ones that aren't solved, again, will be those that the FCC will have to enforce. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Joanne. Let me go to Maureen, and then we'll try to -- let's try to get everyone in in the next 10 minutes, which means you have to -- narrow the Reader's Digest edited edition. MS. LEWIS: Well, I did want to re-enforce something that you said about the FCC's role as sort of a convener of stakeholders. I think that's a very, very important role for the FCC to play at two levels. First of all, at the consumer complaint stage, I think the FCC has a great opportunity to resolve consumer complaints quickly and expeditiously if, in fact, its first point of contact for consumers, those consumer counselors, if you will, are well-trained in mediation and dispute resolution and have the ability to pull the interested parties together quickly to try to hash things out before issues escalate, because I think one thing that's very frustrating for consumers is the delay that they sometimes face in getting their issues resolved. Sometimes, it's just a matter of a quick phone call from a neutral third party to help facilitate a discussion. The other thing is I wanted to echo a recommendation that I've heard around the table on several occasions are field hearings. I think that's an excellent opportunity for the Commission to get first-hand information about what consumers want and care about. Also, the last thing I wanted to mention is a joint conference on the implementation of Section 706. It is a task force-kind of idea that we would like to see sort of on the model of the Local and State Advisory Committee to help bring together the federal and state regulators on implementing Section 706 quickly. The states can provide an excellent laboratory for implementation of broad ban deployment and -- MS. BROWN: Thank you, Maureen. Al? I know your card has been up for awhile. MR. SONNENSTRAHL (Sign Interpreter Speaking): Thank you. There are many things that have been covered here. And I've been thinking about what the relay service is, in regards to the ADA, the Americans with Disabilities Act, which was passed in 1990 and mandated that FCC write rules and order the common carriers to provide relay services. And as a result, we have 50 states that have taken responsibility to make sure that the relay services are provided. And the mechanisms of providing this service vary amongst the 50 states. The rules vary. There's a lot of comedy of errors, if you will, going on amongst the states, between the states. And still, the FCC has not yet gotten involved. So I think that, then, creates -- I don't want to use the word advisory, but I think the idea of creating an administrative board within the FCC to monitor and survey technology and to provide technology assistance and even to force the regulations, I think that might be an example of a model that other programs are using today. So, I just wanted to raise that thought. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Al. Let me go to David. And then, I'll come back. MR. NEUBERGER: I wanted to specially address your question on enforcement mechanisms, because while I may be a consumer advocate, I'm also a member of the Bar. And when you say you're thinking about shifting to an enforcement focus, to me, that raises the immense amount of litigation that you're talking about undertaking and a variety of problems happen. One, people won't have standing to comment. Things will be done on a case-by-case basis. So, other parts of the community may have a hard time bringing their thoughts to bear, which is a reservation. And secondly, of course, the standard for review shifts away from abuse of authority, which then means that everything runs to the courts. And so, we pile on the litigious society. I do think that it is very significant and very important that you do try to enforce the rules that are out there. And I do have, as I've indicated, a lot of questions about rules that are out there. But rules should be enforced in some kind of consistent fashion. I wonder whether one can use enforcement in a policy developing kind of role, because I think that's what a lot of the enforcement issues are going to become if you move in that direction. By introducing some kind of a mechanism for alternative dispute resolution, which is the same concept, in my mind, as the collaborative sessions that everybody is supporting that we should be meeting together and talking with all of the interested people. I've watched with some interest what went on in Texas in their 271 proceeding where they seem to have reduced, at least the number of issues that they are battling out to a much smaller number. So enforcement, in just a quasi-judicial sense, is scary because of the volume of business that you're going to have and the backlogs that you could create. And, you know, you could just find yourself permanently in the federal courts, but finding a way to move between enforcement and rule-making through alternative dispute resolutions, collaborative processes, incentives that if somebody can work it out in a collaborative process, then they're relieved from some burden in another way or a whole set of mechanisms to make that possible. I remember, just as one last thought, that one of the books, I think it's Von Bright, refers to the utility regulation process as a quasi-judicial and a quasi-legislative proceedings. And Lord only knows what that means. But I think that's what I'm suggesting. MS. BROWN: Those of us that have been around in awhile know. Claude? MR. STOUT (Sign Interpreter Speaking): Thank you. I do have several short comments. I'm hearing again and again telecommunications mentioned as a commodity. And I want to make sure that I've followed the conversation entirely. But I want to assert again that we in the disabled community have a basic right to quality telecommunications services. That must not be forgotten. Secondly, if you'll remember my comment in regards to Disability Issues Task Force, they do not have enough staff. And I want to reiterate again that they need a full component on that task force meaning increased staffing. And, perhaps, the name should be changed. Perhaps there shouldn't be a task force because that implies a temporary mechanism. Perhaps, it needs to be something that implies a permanent mechanism. Maybe there needs to be a department of I don't know disability access. Again, I applaud Chairman Kennard for his work, in terms of disability access, in regards to the potential of an advisory committee. And we certainly look forward to that group being established. Now, I would strongly encourage that the location of the now current DITF not be somewhere stuck in the middle of the FCC, in terms of the bureaucracy. I would suggest that the DITF be placed in the Office of the Chairman, and that way, there is the intrabureau authority and oversight available to the various bureaus in order to get a more immediate response to issues that come before the Chairman. These are some of my thoughts. Thank you. MS. BROWN: Thank you very much. Chip? MR. SHOOSHAN: Thanks, Kathy. When I came here today, I thought I was going to be talking mostly about organizational issues. And that is the tail end of this discussion. But I really think that bringing it around to the focus of today's panel, consumer confidence I think in the Commission, when all is said and done, means confidence in the decisions the Commission makes and the decision-making process the Commission goes through. And it seems to me, I recall when I first started in this area 30 years ago as a young staffer for the House Commerce Committee and I was sort of -- I was concerned about the way in which decisions were made at the FCC in those days. I watched the pendulum swing very far in the other direction. And I'm not sure it's been all to the good. I can't do justice in a couple of minutes to the whole solution that I recommend here, but in the Federal Communications Law Journal last year, in May of last year, I wrote an article about -- with a -- entitled, "A Modest Proposal for Reinstructing the FCC". And what I suggested there is there is a model we could look at. And that's the model in the UK of a single administrator. And the more I thought about these issues -- and I'll bring it back to decision-making in a minute -- the more I'm persuaded that that's not what we have to go to. It's not one you can go to yourself. You're going to need Congress to step in. And I'm not saying what about Congress' willingness to do that, because I think to some extent they don't want to give up the multiple pressure points that come with having multiple Commissions, as the Chairman spoke about or alluded to earlier. But I think from a consumer perspective, going to a civil administrator makes a lot of sense. One, it reduces cost. And all of us, as taxpayers, should be concerned at some point about the cost of government and bringing that into check. The second thing is I think it improves decision-making. I look at the way decisions are made now. I look at the decisions themselves. The decisions of the FCC are basically long recitation of what the parties say. And then, there's a very brief discussion of what the Commission's decision is. And, largely, that's a hodgepodge of putting together a variety of different, sometimes conflicting, positions. There's no road map there. There's no real vision. There's no direction. Contrast those decisions with the decisions, for example, of Oftel in the UK. Whether like them or not, you can see that philosophy, that pathway through those decisions. Secondly, the way in which decisions are made, I think, the Government and Sunshine Act has brought with it a lot of problems. I mean, the open meetings today are a joke. What they -- unless you think that your interests are being protected by the Sunshine Law, you know what's happened. The decisions are forced into the back room, and the Commissioners can't even participate. That has to be done by staff because, God forbid, if more than three Commissioners, or three or more Commissioners got together, it would be a meeting. You can have all the advisory groups in the world, but the kinds of real dialog you need is the ability to sit down with the Commission, yes, with the doors closed and have a real discussion. And with a single administrator, you can get that. But even if you stay with a multi-member Commission, you really ought to look at fundamental changes in the way in which the Commission does its business. And going back to a point the Chairman made earlier, it will also improve what I call positive accountability. When those decisions are made, you will know who is responsible for that decision. And that single administrator will have to defend the decision. And similarly, when I emphasize positive accountability, he or she will have to stand on the basis of those decisions. And it won't be the kind of negative accountability that we have now where these competing interests try to paralyze the Commissioner, find three votes to be against the Chairman so, as a result, nothing gets done. So I think again just to wrap it up, and again, there are more details in the article, that the best way to preserve consumer faith in the Commission and -- is to change fundamentally the way in which the Commission is structured, change the way in which the Commission makes decisions, yet prove its accountability. And I think that can be done by a fundamental reform, as I said earlier, a leaner, meaner and less-seen Commission in the future. But I think it would be a big step in the right direction. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Chip. I want to be very mindful of people's time. We have about six minutes to when we said we would break. So, let me ask -- may I ask everyone, is there something that you wanted to say that you didn't get to say? Is there something that has not been covered yet that we had best get on the record? And let me just -- Karen? MS. STRAUSS: I just wanted to add to something that David had said before, in terms of FCC, rather than in terms of FCC proceedings. One thing that hasn't been mentioned is negotiated rule-makings. And a few years ago, we had an enormously successful negotiated rule-making on hearing aid compatibility. The thing to do however is not to have a notice of inquiry, and then an MPRM, and then a negotiated rule-making. I think that the FCC should consider, even though I realize that a lot of people in this room may groan because it's so resource-intensive, it was so successful and has been successful ever since that I would encourage the FCC to consider more of those at the outset. Secondly, I want to support what Eric said, in terms of having text in proposed rules. I found that very helpful years back when the FCC used to do it. It was very helpful to have something actually in text, so that when the final rule came out, it didn't look completely different than the notice that was proposed. So, I would encourage the FCC to go back to that policy. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Karen. Jim? MR. HOWSE (Sign Interpreter Speaking): Hello. I support very much what Al and Claude commented in regards to the Disabilities Issues Task Force. There are times when there's a person who might have some sensitivity to an issue when, in fact, the person who actually has a disability might be able to be more effective. And I think the Commission might consider having people who can actually provide those kinds of insights to the FCC's point of view. Thank you. MS. BROWN: Thank you, Jim. Go ahead, Mike. MR. TRAVIESO: Yes, real quickly. I would just urge that the FCC have its regulatory structure respond to the market structure. And by that, I mean, there are going to be products and services which are going to be competitive. There are going to be networks that need to be regulated so competitors can have access to them, open access, and nondiscriminatory access. And there are going to be issues like universal service, which really are social issues, but I think have to be dealt with by the government. And finally, I think on the products and service side and the competitive side, the FCC, if not the government in general, somehow needs to coordinate with state and local agencies to provide data on things like bad practices that they've observed, the pattern of bad practices, a complaint registry on companies that lot's of complaints have been made against, information that can be shared with the state and local agencies that will allow them to benefit from the FCC's broad jurisdiction. MS. BROWN: Thank you. Andy? MR. SCHWARTZMAN: Thanks. I appreciate your generosity in giving another chance to speak. And I will be brief. One of the things throughout has been the difference in the way in which industry is treated at the Commission versus members of the public and some of the inevitable problems that come from differences in resources when, as the Chairman says, there are people paid to spend all of their time here knocking on doors or, in current circumstances, waiting downstairs phoning up -- (Laughter.) MR. SCHWARTZMAN: -- and getting voice mail. But, as I've said, I think this is a mindset problem, lodged in the staff. The people on the eighth floor are inherently more political and are more receptive. And that's a kind of weird irony, but it's -- I trace it back to staff changes during the Reagan era. But that's -- it's a mindset, and it's much harder to get heard. In order to focus and in order to improve the quality of the decision-making that's regarded, it does seem to me that it would be useful to determine whether particular proceedings which the Commission is involved may have some significant impact on the general public. I mean, you can exclude type acceptance and engineering kinds of things and, you know, but where there's going to be an impact on the public, how about including a consumer impact or public impact statement along the lines of the small business impact that Congress has required? Well, Congress hasn't required a public impact statement explicitly, although I would think the public interest standard suggests it. But I don't think members of Congress would object if you are explaining what the impact on the general public is and you did that on a routine basis. MS. BROWN: Thank you. Was there somebody in the audience who wanted to offer a comment? Anyone? (Pause.) MS. BROWN: Can you give your name, please? UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: -- how to proceed here -- MS. BROWN: Could you give your name? That's fine. MR. MEADOWS (Sign Interpreter Speaking): Certainly. My name is Lee Meadows. And I'm from the state of Massachusetts. I came here because I've been a long-time advocate for telecommunications and cable television. I am involved in a town board for cable access and telecommunication issues and problems. I represent consumers, deaf consumers that is, in my local area. I have become concerned about the relationship that those consumers have. I'm not talking about industry, but rather consumers. If there's an issue with a TV station providing captioning, then there might be meetings to discuss improving the qualities of the captioning service, but I get -- well, there doesn't seem to be much knowledge out there about captioning. And in regards to the political information and all the rule-making, and whatnot, I don't know that information is available. We tried to contact the FCC and we found out that there is an office at the airport, near the airport. And so, it wasn't generally accessible in terms of making a call to get information or to get feedback. There's a concern about the interpretation. MS. BROWN: Are you talking about captioning at the airport? MR. MEADOWS (Sign Interpreter Speaking): No, I'm not talking about captioning in the airport. I'm talking about calling the FCC, their regional office. I looked in the phone book and it said at the airport. And my issue didn't have to do with the airport. Does that make sense? So, I feel like we need to have a place where the FCC can be called in order to work with consumers better. That's my issue. I know that there's been a lot of meetings, but I would appreciate having the FCC staff there, so that we might work more effectively. I'm sure the FCC knows about technology. They probably know a lot more than we do. And so, it would be nice to have the FCC represented there in order to help us work together; that is, industry and consumers more successfully. I thank you for letting me take some of your time. I appreciate it. MS. BROWN: Thank you very much. Al? MR. SONNENSTRAHL (Sign Interpreter Speaking): I believe that what Lee was trying to say related to what we were talking about earlier in regards to improving relationships with citizens. That is, outside of the beltway, as he evidenced in terms of his frustration at trying to contact the FCC when outside of the beltway. MS. BROWN: Yes. Thank you. Well, this has been, I think, just for us a wonderful discussion. And I think it's given us a lot to think about. Let me just say to you what I think I've heard in the broadest sense. And we've taken notes on all of this. We've talked about structural issues. We've talked about very specific kinds of structural issues, a functional kind of approach to structure here at the FCC. And then, we've talking about OCBO, and we've talked about the Disabilities Task Force. We've talked about the use of advisory committees and how we might incorporate that into our thinking when we're thinking structural issues. We've talked about process issues. And there, we've talked both about how to better get citizen input into our processes; how to think more about local state government connections and interactions; how always to work with our state regulatory colleagues; how we might do field hearings outside the beltway and you've been very clear about that. And how to generally open our processes, including our web site. We heard very clearly to get better input to use technology better. I heard about the use of video, as well as the Internet to try and be more places. We heard a lot of about access, a lot about access and how access to the airwaves, access to networks, access to information, access to the decision-makers. I think, that's a theme of this conversation that we will try to capture. And then, we did an awful lot of talking about what is consumer protection, where and who ought to be thinking about consumer protection. What are some transition issues as we move from a monopoly to a competitive environment? And then, what does it look like going out? And there were really very many, very good suggestions that you've given us. So, we want to thank you. Our next step is to, yet, have another of these forums with those think tank types and get that input. And then, we will have some internal discussions. And it occurs to me that at some stage after we then put all this together, that, and now my staff is going to jump up and strangle me, but that it would be well worth it after we have a document to try one of those forums where we have an integrated group to say, well, here's what we came up with. Now, what do you think? And so, I will commit to doing that. I think that could be fun. And I -- UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Remember she's from New York. MS. BROWN: I'm from New York. And I think very worthwhile if we're going to present that to the Congress. So, again, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank all of you. (Whereupon, at 1:04 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.) // // // // REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE FCC DOCKET NO.: N/A CASE TITLE: FORUM ON A NEW FCC FOR THE 21ST CENTURY HEARING DATE: JUNE 2, 1999 LOCATION: WASHINGTON, DC I hereby certify that the proceedings and evidence are contained fully and accurately on the tapes and notes reported by me at the hearing in the above case before the Federal Communications Commission. Date: __6-2-99__ ___Sharon Cook_______________ Official Reporter Heritage Reporting Corporation 1220 "L" Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20005 TRANSCRIBER'S CERTIFICATE I hereby certify that the proceedings and evidence were fully and accurately transcribed from the tapes and notes provided by the above named reporter in the above case before the Federal Communications Commission. Date: __6-10-99_ ___Terri Mathews______________ Official Transcriber Heritage Reporting Corporation PROOFREADER'S CERTIFICATE I hereby certify that the transcript of the proceedings and evidence in the above referenced case that was held before the Federal Communications Commission was proofread on the date specified below. Date: __6-14-99_ _George McGrath_______________ Official Proofreader Heritage Reporting Corporation