During a recent committee hearing, the Senate Commerce Committee chairman, Sen. Rockefeller (WV), expressed his passionate support for providing public safety (PS) the spectrum its needs to build a nationwide interoperable broadband communications network. His bill, S. 3756, would allocate the 10 Mhz known as the 700 D block (758 – 763 Mhz and 788-793 Mhz) to be combined with that already allocated to PS (763-768 Mhz and 793-788 Mhz) to provide sufficient bandwidth for a nationwide interoperable PS broadband network. Network build-out and on-going operational costs would be provided in part through AWS auction proceeds and incentive auctions of voluntarily relinquished spectrum. Read more »

The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau issued a public notice seeking comments on the proposed budget of the Public Safety Spectrum Trust (PSST) and corresponding annual lease fee for administration of the leases granted to the 21 700 MHz Public Safety Broadband Waiver Recipients. PSST submitted the budget on June 11, 2010 specifying the proposed administrative fees necessary to support lease administration, including how such fees would be structured, collected and expended.

The FCC is seeking comment on the budget and Lease Administrative Fees proposed by the PSST, particularly from the waiver recipients as to the reasonableness of the PSST's proposal. The deadline to file comments is July 9, 2010. All comments should reference PS Docket No. 06-229.