the regulatory mix

The Regulatory Mix, TMI’s daily blog of regulatory activities, is a snapshot of PUC, FCC, legislative, and occasionally court, issues that our regulatory monitoring team uncovers each day. Depending on their significance, some items may be the subject of a TMI Regulatory Bulletin.

 

TELECOM

 

FCC

The FCC is seeking nominations for tribal government representatives to serve on the FCC-Native Nations Broadband Task Force. Specifically, the FCC is seeking to fill vacancies due to attrition, increase representation of certain regions, and balance the subject matter expertise of the Task Force. The FCC is particularly interested in applicants with diverse professional experience and backgrounds in broadband, telecommunications, broadcast, and technology infrastructure deployment and adoption. Nominations and re-commitments from current Task Force members must be submitted no later than May 15, 2014.

 

The Task Force was created to ensure that the concerns of Tribal governments are considered in all relevant FCC proceedings. For example, the Task Force is responsible for eliciting input from Tribal governments, ensuring that Tribal concerns are considered in all FCC proceedings related to broadband, developing additional recommendations for promoting broadband deployment and adoption on Tribal lands, and coordinating with external entities, including other federal departments and agencies.

 

US Senate

The Senate Committee on the Judiciary has scheduled a hearing entitled “Examining the Comcast-Time Warner Cable Merger and the Impact on Consumers” for Wednesday, April 2, 2014 at 10:00 a.m., in Room 226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building. A witness list has not yet been released.

 

FISC

The US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) has partially reversed its order denying the Department of Justice’s request to retain phone records (metadata) stored by the National Security Agency (NSA) for longer than five years. See the Regulatory Mix dated March 11, 2014. After the FISC issued its Order, the US District Court for the Northern District of California issued temporary restraining orders prohibiting the government from destroying the metadata. In light of the Court orders, the FISC agreed that the government should retain the data beyond the five year period as required by the California Court.

Regulatory Briefing