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FCC Commissioner, Commerce Official, McCain Counsel, Others
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Top government officials and expert contributors to a soon-to-be-released book will assess the future of communications and broadband policy at a congressional seminar scheduled for Friday, December 6. Sponsored by The Progress & Freedom Foundation and the Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, the event will feature comments by FCC Commissioner Kevin Martin, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Technology Policy Bruce Mehlman, the Senate Commerce committee’s senior counsel for communications, William Bailey, and others beginning at noon in the Rayburn House Office Building, Room B369.
Members of the first of two panels – Randolph J. May, PFF senior fellow and director of communications policy studies, Adam Thierer, the CATO Institute’s director of telecommunications studies and Edward Hearst, a high-tech consultant – will unveil a new book to which they contributed, Telecrisis: How Regulation Stifles High Speed Internet Access. Members of the second panel – Martin, Mehlman and Bailey – will offer comment on the book and the future of communications policy. Registered participants will receive copies of the book published by the Pacific Research Institute.
“With Congress and the Administration looking ahead to next year’s policy agenda, we believe Telecrisis comes at exactly the right time to have an impact,” said PFF President Jeffrey A. Eisenach and PRI Center for Technology Studies Director Sonia Arrison. “We are pleased Commissioner Martin, Assistant Secretary Mehlman and Mr. Bailey are taking the time to comment on the important issues raised by the book. ”
“The goal of this book is to communicate to a wide audience the issues involved in rolling out high-speed Internet services,” writes Arrison in the foreword. “We seek to explain why it is taking longer than expected to make broadband services ubiquitous. A large part of the problem stems from regulatory paralysis of the telecom sector and political roadblocks to reform. This book examines the problems from four policy angles: how federal telecom rules stymie broadband rollout, state and local barriers to deployment, spectrum allocation issues, and lessons from past regulatory blunders.”
Those interested in attending the PFF Congressional Seminar should register by contacting Rebecca Fuller at 202-289-8928 or rfuller@pff.org.
The Progress & Freedom Foundation is a market-oriented think tank that studies the digital revolution and its implications for public policy. It is a 501(c)(3) research & educational organization.
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