FCC to reassess D Block: Spectrum may be back up for auction by end of year

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin said the agency will at next month’s open meeting consider rule changes to the 700 MHz D Block, which failed attract a bidder willing to pay at least $1.3 billion for the national commercial/public-safety wireless license and fomented intense controversy in the process.
“This is a very open-ended notice that doesn’t have any tentative conclusions about what we should or should not do,” Martin said.
The FCC chief said the notice of the proposed rulemaking, to be initiated at the agency’s May 14 meeting, is the beginning of the process leading up to the re-auction of the D Block, which could take place later this year.
Martin said the rulemaking “goes back through and asks how we should structure this [and] the potential for still doing the public-private partnership to further facilitate [a solution to] the concerns about solving public safety’s interoperability’s challenges. But we also ask about, in the alternative, if we don’t do that, how we should structure the auction. I think we’ve . included almost every question that was raised for any of the commissioners at the most recent hearing.”
The House Commerce telecom subcommittee held a hearing April 15 on the 700 MHz auction’s results, with some lawmakers voicing continued support for the public-private model and others calling for the elimination of that approach in the re-auction.
At a press briefing, Martin told reporters the agency’s inspector general will issue a report shortly on its investigation of allegations regarding pre-auction meetings among Cyren Call Communications Corp., the Public Safety Spectrum Trust Corp. and then-prospective D-Block bidders. Cyren Call, the advisor/agent to the PSST (the FCC-approved 700 MHz public-safety broadband licensee), is accused of demanding a $50 million-a-year spectrum lease payment from now-defunct Frontline Wireless L.L.C. and others. Frontline, which was considered a leading candidate for the D Block, shut down less than two weeks before the Jan. 24 start of the auction.
Cyren Call Chairman Morgan O’Brien has denied any wrongdoing, explaining the annual $50 million figure was put on the table as starting point for negotiations. Congress is also investigating allegations of improper conduct related to the D Block in the run-up to the 700 MHz auction.
Martin said the upcoming D-Block proceeding, among other things, will inquire about the relationship between the PSST and other entities, including for-profit advisors; whether the PSST can engage in commercial activities; and whether the D-Block’s 1.3 billion reserve price should be altered.
Also at the May 14 meeting, the FCC is set to take up technical issues related 700 MHz public-safety narrowband operations.