NTIA initially identified four bands for possible fast-track clearance in response in part to recommendations in the FCC’s National Broadband Plan, Associate Administrator Karl Nebbia told the Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee Tuesday. Two of the bands, including 1755-1780 MHz, have already been taken off the list since no decision could be made by an Oct. 1 deadline. The 1675-1710 MHz band, which provides weather satellite downlinks, and the 3500-3650 MHz band remain on the agency’s list for possible quick clearance. Another chunk of spectrum, the 4200-4220 and 4380-4400 MHz band, was on the list but has also been removed because of potential complications.

The FCC still does not adequately understand and has not addressed concerns about the agency’s proposal for a national public safety wireless broadband network and the need the public safety community has for control of the 700 MHz D-block, public safety officials said Tuesday during a hearing by the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Emergency Communications. But Jamie Barnett, chief of the FCC Public Safety Bureau, defended the agency in his testimony before the panel. Subcommittee Chairwoman Laura Richardson, D-Calif., said she was troubled by the concerns expressed by the public safety officials and would ask the FCC to respond directly.

USTelecom deflected accusations broadband isn’t being deployed in a timely manner to all Americans. The finding of the National Broadband Plan “is at odds with the findings of this more recent report that says that broadband deployment is not reasonable,” USTelecom President Walter McCormick said on The Kojo Nnamdi Show Tuesday on WAMU(FM) Washington. McCormick referred to the FCC’s Section 706 report that estimated 14 to 24 million Americans, many of whom are living in rural areas, still lack access to broadband. “We think [the report] was intended to alarm” and “we are concerned that this report is going to be used as a predicate for increased regulation,” he said.

The Senate will focus on cybersecurity legislation proposed by Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., over that offered by Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., as the lead for cybersecurity reform, predicted Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., at a cybersecurity forum Tuesday in Washington. Rockefeller’s bill will get the nod because it’s more comprehensive than Lieberman’s, Mikulski said: It protects the .com realm, not just the .mil and .gov. But the Senate will probably spend next week working on the Kagan Supreme Court nomination and won’t have enough time to address cybersecurity until returning to Washington after Labor Day, she said.

Media ownership and retransmission consent are separate issues with different FCC dockets and shouldn’t be examined in the same proceeding, many broadcasters said in filings on the congressionally mandated 2010 quadrennial ownership review. NAB, the Fox network and companies that own TV stations affiliated with other networks, including Gray and Nexstar, rejected comments earlier this month by the likes of the American Cable Association (ACA) and Time Warner Cable linking arrangements where stations jointly negotiate carriage deals to ownership (CD July 9 p6). One mid-size broadcaster said such deals can violate ownership rules.

The FCC and/or Congress may have to address a law that prohibits the FCC from using competitive bidding for satellite spectrum before moving forward on mobile satellite service incentive auctions, said industry executives and the NTIA. The Open-market Reorganization for the Betterment of International Telecommunications (ORBIT) Act of 2000 outlawed such auctions to facilitate international coordination of satellite spectrum. While the spectrum in question refers to the reuse of satellite spectrum terrestrially, a 2005 lawsuit on somewhat similar reuse concluded the Act’s language is ambiguous on the auction of the spectrum, officials said. The FCC recently opened a proceeding on how best to encourage mobile broadband investment in the MSS bands, through incentive auctions and other means (CD July 16 p1).

With the lower unit cost provision stripped from the Senate version of the DISCLOSE Act, broadcasters’ concerns that the bill would sap political ad revenue this year have largely been put to rest, industry officials said. As the Senate considers a vote for cloture on the bill Tuesday, some in the industry and Congress question its effectiveness and purpose. The Citizen’s United Supreme Court ruling, which the bill was introduced in response to, probably won’t lead to any huge influx of corporate spending on political ads, industry officials said. “You don’t see necessarily a flood now as a result of this decision,” said Kyle Roberts, president of Smart Media Group, a political media planning group: “What you see is an industry that’s probably going to spend 10-20 percent more than it did last cycle, just like it has been trending."

The FCC and Food and Drug Administration signed a memorandum of understanding aimed at improving information exchange between the two and streamlining collaboration, the agencies said. The MOU was unveiled at the start of two days of discussions at the commission during a joint meeting with the FDA on mobile health (mhealth) issues. The two agencies also released a joint statement on wireless medical devices. The FCC National Broadband Plan, released in March, dedicated a chapter to healthcare issues. At its July meeting, the FCC began a rulemaking on a program that would provide up to $400 million per year on health connectivity.

The Senate may hotline a disabilities communications bill in a unanimous consent vote as soon as Tuesday, a Senate staffer told us. The House was expected to pass its own version Monday night, industry officials said. The House considered HR-3101 in the afternoon, but postponed votes until after our deadline. Monday was the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Career FCC staffers don’t support a wide-ranging deal between the two most active filers in a 2003 auction of translator stations to resolve a dispute between many operators of the facilities and low-power FM (LPFM) stations, said commission and industry officials. They said Media Bureau officials recently said they won’t move to codify a memorandum of understanding in an existing draft order on Auction No. 83. The agreement was submitted this month by Prometheus Radio Project, representing low-power FM stations, and Educational Media Foundation (EMF), which runs several hundred translators, with the support of two other major applicants for translators in the filing window (CD July 12 p10). Representatives of Prometheus and EMF said they will need to take another look at the agreement if the bureau doesn’t codify it.