For the first time in Senate history a bill will be challenged today (Thurs.) under a point-of-order as an unfunded mandate. The bill would make permanent the moratorium on discriminatory Internet taxes, including access taxes. Sen. Allen (R-Va.) expressed confidence in a press conference Wed. that S-150 would clear the Senate -- a similar bill, HR-49 by House Select Homeland Security Chmn. Cox (R-Cal.) already cleared the House -- but Sen. Alexander has vowed to challenge the bill under the rarely invoked Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995. The bill, opposed by many state and local groups concerned about loss of telecom tax revenue, is able to come to a floor vote because Alexander agreed to lift his hold on the legislation last week.
Among the issues with which federal spectrum users are grappling as part of an interagency task force is whether there should be some form of Executive Branch oversight when differences arise on thorny policy issues, acting NTIA Dir. Michael Gallagher said Wed. President Bush in June created a task force to recommend how to stimulate more efficient spectrum use by federal customers. The next step the Bush directive set, which involves private sector input, will begin shortly and use the FCC’s Spectrum Policy Task Force report as a starting point, Gallagher told us.
The House passed Enhanced 911 (HR-2898) legislation Tues. afternoon as supporters turned their attention toward moving an E911 bill through the Senate. The House bill was passed on the suspension calender on voice vote. Sponsor Rep. Shimkus (R-Ill.) told us there would be challenges in getting a bill to President Bush’s desk since there were significant differences in the Senate companion bill, but said getting the House bill passed might streamline the process. “Clearly, we have a wide gap to bridge,” House Commerce Committee spokesman Ken Johnson said: “But considering people’s lives are at stake, Americans want us to get this bill done now.”
Acting NTIA Dir. Michael Gallagher told the Senate Commerce Committee Tues. that in negotiating a swath of spectrum from the Defense Dept. to be used for Wi-Fi, he learned the importance of engineers in devising policy. “I learned to trust the engineers over the lawyers,” he said during his confirmation hearing. Gallagher said strong leadership from the top also helped ensure that the Wi-Fi spectrum would remain open. Earlier this year, NTIA, the FCC and commercial wireless interests negotiated an arrangement to free spectrum in the 5 GHz band for Wi-Fi. He said such policy decisions helped “put the U.S. at the leading edge of technology.” The Commerce Committee didn’t vote on the nomination and will schedule a vote on several nominations later, a committee spokeswoman said. But Gallagher appeared to be well received by the 4 senators who showed up for the hearing. However, Sen. Allen (R-Va.), while supportive of Gallagher, asked him about Commerce Dept. objections to a bill (S-196) he introduced that would provide $250 million to black and minority colleges for telecom infrastructure. The measure has passed the Senate, but a companion bill by Rep. Forbes (R-Va.) (HR-2801) is stalled after procedural objections from the Commerce Dept. Gallagher said he was aware of the impasse and would pass Allen’s concern on to the Commerce Secy. He also told reporters after the hearing that the Commerce Dept. would wait until next year before again prodding Congress for legislation that would bring the NTIA under the Technology Administration (TA). That proposal has little support on Capitol Hill and Senate Commerce Committee Chmn. McCain (R-Ariz.) said he didn’t see that proposal being introduced this year. CTIA said it supported Gallagher’s nomination.
It was still unclear Mon. whether the Senate Commerce- Justice-State appropriations bill (S-1585) would move to the Senate floor as a standalone measure or as part of an omnibus appropriations bill, sources said. The Senate still has several appropriations bills to consider, including Agriculture, District of Columbia and VA-HUD, and is running out of time to consider all the measures. Senate Majority Leader Frist (R-Tenn.) reportedly is aiming for Nov. 21 adjournment, leaving few legislative days to consider all the remaining appropriations bills. A spokeswoman for Senate Appropriations Chmn. Stevens (R-Alaska) said he still was trying to move all of them to the floor. A spokeswoman for Frist said he still was in discussion with Stevens and could finish negotiations on the Senate’s remaining schedule by Mon. evening. The CJS legislation includes language that would prevent the FCC from raising the broadcast ownership cap to 45% from 35% as was part of the its controversial media ownership rules change in June. The same provision is in the House CJS bill that has passed already. The bill also includes a controversial amendment that would allow Multichannel Video Distribution & Data Services (MVDDS) to receive a portion of spectrum without going through the FCC auction process. Senators who object say the amendment would favor Northpoint Technology. The CJS bill also would strip funding of the Commerce Dept.’s Technology Administration.
The trend to sourcing high-value TVs from China for distribution in the U.S. took a peculiar leap forward Thurs. with the announcement that a Cal. investment firm will distribute advanced digital flat-panel displays from Xiamen Overseas Chinese Electronic Co. (Xoceco), ranked among China’s Top-4 producers and considered by experts to be a leader in HD-resolution plasma and LCD displays.
A new congressional caucus opposed to international piracy of intellectual property will “look like a laser beam” at the subject, one of its co-chmn. said at a news conference Tues. House Internet Caucus Co-Chmn. Goodlatte (R-Va.) was joined by Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking Democrat Biden (Del.), Sen. Smith (R-Ore.) and Rep. Schiff (D-Cal.) in introducing the 59-member caucus. After the conference, Schiff, whose district includes many TV and movie studios and recording labels, told us he was preparing legislation targeting unauthorized file sharing. Piracy “is a big deal,” Biden said, and “the question remains, ‘What are we going to be able to do about what is in essence a theft of American assets?'”
International piracy of videogames and other intellectual property is the target of a new congressional caucus announced Tues., with co-chmn. from both parties and both the House and Senate. “There are a lot of caucuses on the Hill, we all know that,” Entertainment Software Assn. Pres. Douglas Lowenstein said, but this one will be “focused” on crime that costs U.S. companies billions. Caucus Co-Chmn. Goodlatte (R-Va.), who also co-chairs the House Internet Caucus, told us he had lost track of how many caucuses he belonged to, but insisted that the Congressional International Piracy Caucus would “look like a laser beam” at piracy.
The co-sponsors of tax legislation designed to prevent MCI/WorldCom from taking advantage of a tax loophole praised the Treasury Dept. for issuing a temporary regulation designed to block companies from using that loophole. The said House members wouldn’t push the measure any longer if Treasury would make the changes permanent. Critics contended that MCI/WorldCom was trying to avoid paying taxes by arguing that it should be treated as 2 separate entities in tax filings. MCI was seeking to register $10-15 billion in operating losses as separate from the $36 billion in debt forgiveness WorldCom received in bankruptcy protection, Sen. Santorum (R-Pa.) said in a floor statement as he offered legislation that would prevent the tax classification. Santorum, who called the provision a “loophole,” has said MCI would have been able to avoid $3.5-$5.25 billion in taxes. Rep. McCrery (R-La.) also introduced a bill (HR-2706) to prevent such tax status. On Oct. 2, McCrery and the bill’s 34 co-sponsors -- including House Commerce Committee Chmn. Tauzin (R-La.) -- sent Treasury Secy. John Snow a letter praising the changes and urging the regulation be made “permanent as soon as possible.” The letter said the regulations should close the loophole, but if they failed, the House would resume action on the bill. “We endorse your efforts to close an anomaly in the tax code that could cost taxpayers billions of dollars and provide a competitive disadvantage to companies emerging from bankruptcy,” the letter said.
GENEVA -- ITU Secy. Gen. Yoshio Utsumi acknowledged at a closing session of ITU Telecom World 2003 here Fri. that only 50 heads of state so far had committed to attending the upcoming World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) that starts Dec. 10, but a U.N. official said that figure had grown from earlier in the year after U.N. Secy. Gen. Kofi Annan stressed to govt. heads the importance of the summit. “I do think it’s a pity if attendance does not rise beyond that level,” said Shashi Tharoor, undersecy.-gen. for communications at the U.N.