Vice President-elect Joe Biden’s prophecy has been realized: The new president will indeed confront a crisis of global proportions during his first six month’s in office. In fact, the moment of reckoning has already arrived for Barack Obama. It is the DTV transition – the potential digital Katrina of our time – of which I speak.
Once upon a time, the Feb. 17 transition was a firm date. But with snafus entangling the converter-box coupon program and other problems conspiring to create a potential public outcry over lost TV signals within weeks after the new president assumes office, the Obama-Biden transition team decided it might be smart to ask the Democratic-led Congress to legislate a DTV transition delay. Pandora’s Box opened, letters to the Obama transition team and congressional committees were fired off, and conspiracy theories began to fly. Democrats lined up behind Obama, while Republicans ranted that a DTV transition was bad public policy and a dumb idea generally.
Cellphone industry association CTIA diplomatically registered its concerns about a DTV transition delay, perhaps toning down what it really thinks in the spirit of avoiding a confrontation with Obama right out of the box. Verizon Communications Inc. and AT&T Inc., parent companies of the nation’s largest wireless carriers and the big spenders for licenses in the 700 MHz band (spectrum that broadcasters will relinquish in the DTV transition) that netted nearly $20 billion for the U.S. Treasury last year, were not inhibited in educating congressional leaders about the implications of the Obama proposal.
Verizon Wireless was most forceful in arguing against a DTV transition delay, likely reflecting plans to use 700 MHz spectrum for Long Term Evolution technology rollout later this year. AT&T Mobility, whose LTE plans are less time sensitive, said it could live with a delay lasting no longer than 90 days and offered suggestions for compensating 700 MHz wireless licensees as well as safeguarding their financial investment in the band.
Public-safety organizations, struggling to maintain a united front regarding improvements to D-Block dual-use licensing, urged the presidential transition team to exclude first-responder 700 MHz frequencies from any DTV transition postponement.
The Consumer Electronics Association predicted that pushing back the DTV cut-over would create confusion, chaos and skepticism for the next time the government tries to do something big by a certain date. I somehow doubt the latter fallout. Americans have become accustomed to broken promises by government. Remember President Bush’s call for universal broadband by 2007. Now it’s Obama’s turn.
Broadcasters, so loquacious about the FCC freeing up TV white spaces for Wi-Fi devices and situated at ground zero in the DTV debate, have offered only cryptic remarks without saying whether they’re for or against a transition delay. Undoubtedly industry groups are calibrating their messages on the Obama-proposed DTV transition delay for present consumption and future consideration.
Wheeler’s role
Just who was behind Obama’s call for a DTV transition delay that has the mobile-phone industry and others up in arms? Tom Wheeler, of course, the former cellular industry top lobbyist who is on leave from Core Capital Partners to serve as a member of the Obama-Biden Transition Project’s Agency Review Working Group responsible for the science, technology, space and arts agencies.
In an interview set to air Jan. 18, Wheeler tells C-SPAN’s Brian Lamb that he alerted Obama higher-ups that it had a situation on its hands. (Here’s a snippet from the interview.)
Wheeler is an unlikely hero insofar as trying to ensure a smooth DTV transition, which has a tortured history going back at least a decade.
Back in the day at cellular association CTIA, Wheeler was always warring with broadcasters, utilizing Civil War battle strategies to keep the TV industry in check.
When the FCC in 2001 proposed allowing broadcasters to sell their analog spectrum allocation to wireless carriers before the former vacated the spectrum, Wheeler let rip with a gem.
“Protecting reruns of Bonanza on UHF television pales in comparison to using the spectrum for 911 calls and better communications for police, fire and rescue,” Wheeler said at the time. “Even after the auction, the broadcasters will have to be paid extortion money to move. It’s a sad state of affairs when broadcasters have to be bought off what they promised to give back and Congress has directed to a higher public-safety use.”
But these are different times. Wheeler is on Team Obama and the DTV transition must be saved as a matter of public interest and political expediency. Obama was serious when he said he’d bring change. How does a June 12 DTV transition date sound?
