ALEXANDRIA, Va.-The 1998 Eugene C. Bowler award was presented to David Siddall, legal adviser to Federal Communications Commissioner Susan Ness at the Personal Communications Industry Association’s Eighth Annual Eugene C. Bowler Dinner & Awards Presentation last week.
House Commerce Committee Chairman Thomas Bliley Jr. (R-Va.) also was presented with this year’s Lifetime Achievement award. In addition to the awards, PCIA Foundation Chairman Ray Ardizzone presented the Bowler scholarship to Gregg Strumberger, a second-year law student at the Boston University School of Law.
Strumberger recently interned in the legal counsel’s office for GTE Corp. He graduated magna cum laude in political science from Eastern Michigan University in May 1996, and plans to pursue a career in regulatory communications law.
Ardizzone also announced the recipient of the Glenayre scholarship, Anwer Ali Khan, a senior at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, majoring in electrical and computer engineering, specializing in communications systems. Khan plans to graduate next month and continue his studies in digital and wireless communications systems in Virginia Tech’s graduate program next year.
Jay Kitchen, PCIA president announced at the dinner that BellSouth Mobility DCS and Paging Network Inc. joined the Wireless Partnership for Education program, and will be sponsoring scholarships next year.
The PCIA Foundation Board presents the Bowler award each year to a government employee who has demonstrated career excellence. Bowler was a former chief of the FCC’s Private Radio Bureau/Land Mobile and Microwave Division. He died of cancer at age 39.
Ness presented this year’s Bowler award to Siddall, a FCC veteran who received the award for “his dedication and service on behalf of the telecommunications industry,” PCIA said.
Prior to Siddall’s position as a legal adviser for Commissioner Ness, he served as chief of the FCC’s Spectrum Allocation Branch, where he headed the staff responsible for authorizing uses of the radio spectrum. During his tenure, proposals were made to allocate spectrum for emerging technologies and services, including personal communications services, low-earth-orbit satellites and digital audio broadcasting.
The Lifetime Achievement award winner, Bliley, was elected to Congress in 1980, and is serving his second term as chairman of the commerce committee “for his demonstrated commitment and leadership to advancing the field of wireless telecommunications trade,” said PCIA. The award was presented by Sen. Ernest “Fritz” Hollings (D-S.C.), a past Lifetime Achievement award winner.
The commerce committee headed by Bliley was responsible for breaking up one of the biggest monopolies in the history of U.S. trade by leading passage of the Telecommunications Act that opened a trillion-dollar industry to free and open trade.
