Panel Agrees on Spectrum Issue

By Keith Perine, CQ Staff

The Joint Committee on Deficit Reduction showed its first glimmer of bipartisanship last week when four members — two from each party — wrote President Obama to ask that he expand his proposal for reallocating electromagnetic spectrum licenses from government agencies to wireless high-speed Internet providers.

A spectrum auction has been an attractive option for the committee because it would raise big money without raising taxes, a threshold issue for Republicans. In fact, the four members asked Obama to come up with even more government-held spectrum than he has already proposed reallocating to broadband providers as part of his jobs package.

“Spectrum auctions would generate tens of billions of dollars in auction proceeds” and “help the select committee meet its deficit reduction goals,” wrote the group, which included two leading lawmakers on tech policy: House Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton of Michigan, a Republican, and Massachusetts Democrat John Kerry , chairman of the Senate Commerce subcommittee that oversees spectrum policy. California Democratic Rep. Xavier Becerra and Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Patrick J. Toomey also signed the letter.

The committee’s eventual proposal would also be an attractive vehicle for proponents of a spectrum auction, since the administration’s overall push to repurpose a big chunk of spectrum currently used by television broadcasters, government agencies and others to handle the exploding traffic in mobile broadband is mired on Capitol Hill amid bickering between television broadcasters, the tech sector and public safety officials.

The Commerce Department has been moving slowly to identify government-held spectrum licenses that could be relinquished for wireless carriers. In January, it identified some spectrum holdings, but only a fraction was in the part of the spectrum best suited for wireless traffic.