FCC Should Fix Rulemaking Process, Says O'Rielly
The FCC rulemaking process is “mired by incomplete and unfinished documents being allowed to circulate, perpetuating a belief that the circulation deadline is irrelevant,” said Commissioner Mike O’Rielly in a blog post Wednesday. FCC staff “certainly should not be negotiating…
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last-minute deals with outside parties or revising the document without advance notice to all Commissioners and the consent of at least three offices,” during a proceeding’s “sunshine period,” O’Rielly said. It’s “patently unfair” to expect FCC commissioners to be able to read and give feedback “when staff is working on a substantially different document to be provided later -- sometimes not until late the night before a vote,” O’Rielly said. The FCC should “codify” its rules that the final text of a meeting item has to be presented to commissioners 24 hours before an open meeting, O’Rielly said. “If that simple concept -- what some wise people previously referred to as the pencils down moment -- can’t be met, there is no shame or harm in pushing the item to the next meeting,” he said. Many changes to recent items have been unrelated to edit requests from commissioners, O’Rielly said. “We are left to guess why revisions were made and at whose behest.” Edits to items are also not always memorialized in the “official email chain” as they're supposed to be, O’Rielly said. “If staff feels that additional changes are truly needed for whatever reason, then they should be made under the Chairman’s name and posted on the official email chain,” O’Rielly said. Revisions shouldn’t be made to an item unless two commissioner offices agree to them, O’Rielly said: “That shouldn’t be a heavy lift.” The FCC didn't comment.