CQ TODAY ONLINE NEWS – TECHNOLOGY & COMMUNICATIONS
Oct. 12, 2011 – 6:37 p.m.

Broadband Providers, TV Broadcasters Decry Proposed Fees on Spectrum Usage

An odd-bedfellows alliance of broadband providers and television broadcasters is lobbying the deficit reduction committee against the imposition of new fees on spectrum usage.

The National Association of Broadcasters, along with CTIA, the wireless industry trade group, sent a letter Wednesday to the committee members registering their opposition to President Obama’s proposal to impose hundreds of millions of dollars in new spectrum fees. Obama made the proposal part of his jobs package.

The broadcasters and wireless companies are arrayed against each other on other aspects of spectrum policy, including how to repurpose some of the broadcasters’ spectrum holdings for wireless broadband.

But they are united against the spectrum fee proposal, even though Obama has proposed exempting television broadcasters.

“We are acutely mindful of the economic challenges confronting Congress and the country,” the heads of the two groups wrote. “We do not believe, however, that the solution to unemployment lies in the imposition of new fees and taxes that will inevitably shift money from much-needed capital investment in state-of-the-art communications technologies critical to the health of the American economy.”

They were joined on the letter by the Satellite Industry Association, the wireless infrastructure company trade group PCIA and the National Religious Broadcasters.

Under the president’s proposal, the FCC would have to collect at least $200 million in new fees in fiscal 2012. That would grow to $550 million for each fiscal year from fiscal 2015 to fiscal 2021.

The deficit reduction committee is expected to include spectrum-related provisions in its prospective proposal because of the billions of dollars in revenue that could potentially be reaped by auctioning more spectrum licenses to wireless providers.

Four members of the panel wrote last week to Obama, urging the president to broaden a proposal for repurposing some government-held spectrum for commercial broadband.