*************************************************** 
                         NOTICE
***************************************************

This document was converted from
Word97 to ASCII Text format.

Content from the original version of the document such as
headers, footers, footnotes, endnotes, graphics, and page
numbers will not show up in this text version.

All text attributes such as bold, itallic, underlining, etc. from the
original document will not show up in this text version.

Features of the orginal document layout such as
columns, tables, line and letter spacing, pagination, and margins
will not be preserved in the text version.

If you need the complete document, download the
Word97, or Adobe Acrobat versions, if available.

The path and name of the Word97, and Acrobat files
 will be the same as the ASCII Text file except that they  will 
end with the letters wp, doc, or pdf  respectively, 
instead of the letters txt.

****************************************************

SEPARATE STATEMENT OF COMMISSIONER KATHLEEN Q. ABERNATHY

Re:  	Federal-State Joint Board on Universal Service; Petitions for 
Reconsideration of the Universal Service First Report and Order; 
Petitions for Reconsideration of the Local Competition First Report and 
Order; Petitions for Reconsideration of the Local Competition Second 
Report and Order, CC Docket Nos. 96-45, 96-98, Order on 
Reconsideration

	I am encouraged that the Commission is taking this step to reduce the substantial 
backlog of outstanding petitions for reconsideration in the local competition and 
universal service dockets.  I write separately, however, to express my disappointment that 
the petitions we dismiss today have become moot simply because we have allowed them 
to remain pending so long.  Rather than periodically cleaning up our dockets in this 
fashion, we should adopt procedures to ensure that such backlogs do not develop in the 
first place. 

	I have spoken publicly about the need for more expeditious processing of 
petitions for reconsideration and applications for review.   The local competition and 
universal service dockets dramatically illustrate the problem:  most of the petitions for 
reconsideration we dismiss today have been pending for more than five years, and the 
remaining petitions have been pending more than four years.  

	I recognize that, in some cases, the Commission appropriately declined to resolve 
particular issues, because they were being decided by the courts of appeals.  But allowing 
so many petitions to remain pending for so long undoubtedly created substantial 
uncertainty in the marketplace.  And much of this uncertainty could have been avoided if 
the Commission had established procedures to ensure that petitions placed on the back 
burner do not remain there indefinitely.

Where petitions for reconsideration raise no new issues, I encourage the 
Commission to consider the use of form orders to deny such petitions within a fixed - 
and relatively short - time frame.  Petitions for reconsideration that simply rehash or 
elaborate on arguments that already have been considered and rejected by the 
Commission seldom require a great deal of time or new analysis to resolve.  If the 
Commission were subject to a deadline of, for example, 45 days, it could deny most 
petitions, using a form order, for the reasons that prompted the original decision.

Absent such a mechanism, there appears to be no means of preventing situations 
like the one we are faced with here - where scores of petitions have been pending so 
long that the passage of time has rendered them moot.  I look forward to working with 
my colleagues and the Office of General Counsel to develop new procedures that will 
ensure that the agency disposes of petitions for reconsideration in a timely manner.
  See FCBA Luncheon Address, September 17, 2001, available at www.fcc.gov/Speeches/
Abernathy/2001/spkqa102.html.