In response to stepped up wireless industry concerns over the ‘co...

bid in an “immediate” auction of 1.9 GHz spectrum. This is among the bands that Nextel would receive under the consensus plan in exchange for giving up spectrum elsewhere to mitigate interference to public safety at 800 MHz. The plan is backed by the Assn. of Public Safety Communications Officials (APCO), PCIA and others. Verizon Wireless, in a letter to FCC Wireless Bureau Chief John Muleta, argued that public safety interference should be addressed by realigning the 800 MHz band without involving 1.9 GHz. CTIA and other wireless carriers have urged the FCC to consider alternatives to the consensus plan, including best practices measures for addressing interference. “For more than 2 years, CTIA, including its Bell-monopoly affiliated wireless members, have indulged in bullying tactics and spent millions of dollars lobbying to derail the consensus plan. They have pursued this agenda while offering no alternative to solve public safety radio interference and steadfastly working to divert attention from their own well-documented contributions to the problems of public safety interference,” Nextel said in a statement. “The failure to address this issue puts lives in danger every single day.” Countering what it said were misrepresentations about the value of the 1.9 GHz spectrum, Nextel disputed estimates that 10 MHz in this band is worth $7.2 billion. It said the highest amount ever bid for 10 MHz in this band was $3.3 billion in 1999, and that was never paid. “The highest amount ever received by the FCC for 10 MHz of spectrum at 1.9 GHz was in fact $1 billion,” it said. Nextel said that under the consensus plan, it would contribute 10.5 MHz of spectrum it had acquired since its founding. “Nextel was not a beneficiary in the FCC’s initial free spectrum allocations to the Regional Bell monopolies,” it said. In a letter to Congress members, the heads of APCO, the National Sheriffs’ Assn., the International Assn. of Chiefs of Police and the International Assn. of Fire Chiefs, said the consensus plan is “public safety’s plan.” Noting that some have characterized the proposal as crafted by Nextel for its own benefit, they said: “Nothing could be further from the truth.” Separately, Verizon Wireless late Thurs. submitted a more-detailed filing at the FCC outlining its concerns. “Removing the 1.9 GHz band from the consensus plan and auctioning it would allow the government (not a private party) to receive the substantial benefits that a nationwide block of clear, contiguous spectrum would bring at auction,” it said. Citing a legal memo prepared by Wiley Rein & Fielding, Verizon Wireless said it demonstrated the FCC had “full legal authority” to realign the 800 MHz band and direct Nextel to pay relocation expenses incurred by public safety licensees. The memo also said Nextel “can be made to pay the causally related ’second step’ relocation costs of the business and industrial users who would be moved as a direct result of Nextel’s relocation of the public safety licensees.”