FCC Defends FY 2016 Budget Proposal, Emphasizing IT, Lease Expiration
House Communications Subcommittee lawmakers grilled FCC Managing Director Jon Wilkins Wednesday at an FCC reauthorization hearing. Wilkins said the agency sought to be nimble and use its resources well in its $388 million budget request for FY 2016, more than $50 million more than what it received the previous year. Much of the money would go toward both modernizing the agency’s information technology and its move away from or restacking of its headquarters at the Portals, Wilkins said, as expected (see 1503030053">1503030053).
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“These are unavoidable costs,” Wilkins said. “The bulk of it is for the move.” The FCC’s lease expires in 2017, and spending money now will reap benefits later, he said, suggesting the agency can save $119 million over the next 15 years if it moves. As part of the move, space would be reduced by around 30 percent and costs would drop by $11 to $12 million a year, Wilkins said. “We are customers of GSA in this process.” Officials at the commission have discussed the move, and the General Services Administration ultimately will make the decision (see 1501090040).
The IT upgrade money will help the FCC do more with fewer people, said Wilkins. “In the last several years, we have asked for more money for more people,” Wilkins said. "We are not doing that. We’ve heard the message. … It’s a big request but it’s really just for these things.” The IT upgrade will help in areas such as Enforcement Bureau work, he told Democratic lawmakers worried about how the budget flatlining has influenced enforcement activities: “We don’t need to add dozens of people to any given bureau to deliver those results.”
Subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., noted Wednesday marked the deadline that he, Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., and Commerce Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Tim Murphy, R-Pa., had set for document submission for a process investigation. Walden “was distressed” to learn the agency wasn’t supplying a response by Wednesday, he said. “We do not intend to impose meaningless or trivial obligations.” The FCC "is working on a providing complete response," an agency spokesman told us following the hearing. "Today, the FCC will submit an interim response to the committee."
Walden also asked about investment firm Greenhill & Co., a contractor with the FCC working on the value of the spectrum incentive auction. He wanted to know about when a contract was awarded and other details, promising to follow up in questions for the record and suggesting the topic would come up in the FCC oversight hearing with all five commissioners on March 19.
Rep. Bill Johnson, R-Ohio, pressed Wilkins on whether it would have been “more prudent” for the agency to have sought “a legislative fix to net neutrality” rather than advance its own order and face likely litigation. “Taxpayers are paying for that litigation,” Johnson said. “No,” Wilkins initially answered. When pushed to follow up, Wilkins said litigation is part of FCC business and for some staffers, “their job,” with no extra money requested to cover litigation.
House Commerce Committee ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., hopes it’s “coincidence” that this FCC reauthorization hearing occurred less than a week after the agency voted on net neutrality, he said. He called it different from other budget hearings and considered the recent congressional standoff over Homeland Security Department funding: “I doubt the public wants us to create a brand-new funding cliff.”
Pallone and Communications Subcommittee ranking member Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., cited the agency’s struggle to process the more than 4 million net neutrality comments. “Modern computers should be able to handle that load without blinking,” Pallone said.
Eshoo asked about location accuracy for 911 calls from FCC headquarters and lamented that officials have to dial 9 first. “You’re really not behind the eight ball on this,” Eshoo said. “That really needs to be upgraded -- especially that it’s the FCC.” Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., brought up “really terrible stories” of disasters. Commissioner Mike O’Rielly has cited this concern in a blog post.
Continued flatline funding would “affect our ability to deliver all areas of our mission,” Wilkins told Pallone, concerned over enforcement regarding cramming and other fraud. There's opportunity in the IT revamp but it "requires investment," he said. Of the headquarters transition, "that money's got to come from somewhere," he said, considering a potential "downward spiral" if it's not funded that “would affect our ability to fund anything at a reasonable level.”
One resonant piece is the agency’s request to move $25 million from the USF to pay for the fund’s administration, Walden warned, asking many questions on the topic. “In the past, Congress funded the FCC’s Office of Inspector General with a transfer of USF funds for the purpose of bolstering audits and investigations to address waste, fraud and abuse in the fund following a GAO report -- and those funds have been expended by the Office of Inspector General over the last several years,” Walden said. “The request for $25 million is not for audits and investigations by the Office of Inspector General -- which based on our last hearing appears to have a rocky relationship with the chairman’s office -- but to reimburse the commission for the costs of performing the core function of implementing Section 254 of the Communications Act. This is a disturbing proposal.”