There is never a good time for a government shutdown. This comes from a scarred veteran of the 1995 federal government shutdown. In 1995, I was a Commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) when the federal government was shut down between November 14th to 19th, and from December 16, 1995-January 6, 1996.
What was the shut down about? President Bill Clinton vetoed the spending bill the Republican-controlled Congress sent him. A majority of Congress members and the Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich had promised to slow the rate of government spending, but this did not comport with President’s desire to improve education, the health care safety net, public health and environmental issues.
What that meant for the FCC — the agency that regulates broadcasters, interstate wired and wireless telecommunications providers, and cable companies — was that we lost 21 days (basically a month) of work time. At the FCC, there was just a skeleton crew of employees that were deemed "essential" to the FCC operations: the five commissioners, security guards, and a handful of employees who deal with high frequency interference testing and enforcement, critical agency communications (including international spectrum matters), and national security issues. We had some spectrum auction activity going on; it was suspended during the shutdown. The FCC’s building heat was turned off and there were only a few lights on. It was lonely to be in the FCC building at 1919 M Street, N.W., when it felt abandoned. Finally, I took home over a foot of circulate decisions and read them in my heated living room so I could vote on them and feel like I was doing something for my pay. But as a factual matter, the "essential" Commissioners cannot even issue a single decision without its trusty staff to produce it.
Agency morale plummeted as our employees fretted at home about when the furlough would end. They were understandably worried about the shutdown’s impact on the dockets they were working on, and of course, they were very worried about their lost wages from the shutdown. The FCC’s civil service employees are very dedicated to what they do. The issues they work on are interesting and unique. While government shutdowns are not frequent, they are completely out of control of an employee’s control. It is always a time when FCC leaders worry about losing our best employees, who forego better salaries in the private sector to work for the government.
The shutdown ended January 6, 1996. President Clinton and Speaker Newt Gingrich came to terms. We got back to work on January 7th, 1996, but that day, the Washington D.C. area got hit with the Blizzard of 1996, dropping 17 inches of snow as measured at Reagan National Airport and 24 inches out at Dulles Airport in Virginia. The nation’s Capital was paralyzed for three days, with the government closed down due to the snow emergency, with inadequate plows and blizzard plans. Personally I could not get my car out for over a week because my side street never got plowed. We went from glum to more glum.
On January 10th, the FCC reopened, and we were literally digging out of the snow and the backlog. The next week the 1996 Telecom Act passed in Congress. We immediately got snowed under again, but this time, by the mammoth task of implementing the first major rewrite of the Communications Act of 1934 in sixty years. I will never forget those crazy months in Washington, D.C.
Right now, as the 2013 shutdown continues to cast a large shadow over our economy, the shutdown of the FCC has had real impacts on the business of our nation’s communications, video and broadcasters. Over at the FCC, only 38 employees out of 1716 are on the job. Its website is not being updated, consumer complaint and inquiry lines are not being answered, consumer protection and local competition enforcement are suspended, licensing services are on hold, and there may be delays in equipment authorizations for computers, mobile phones, gaming systems, TVs and wireless medical devices that emit radio waves and require the FCC’s approval.
A major concern is how the furlough will impact both the PCS H Block spectrum auction, which is currently scheduled for January 2014, and the following incentive auctions of broadcast TV spectrum. There were already concerns about delays caused by the upcoming transition between the Acting FCC Chairwoman Mignon Clyburn and the nominated but not yet confirmed new FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler (now paired for the confirmation process with the new Republican seat Commissioner nominee Mike O’Rielly). Now with the current shutdown, these important auctions may be delayed, along with the attendant benefits for wireless consumers.
This government shutdown puts the FCC’s important agenda on spectrum at risk. It’s time to get our nation’s FCC employees back to work on the critical agenda at hand.
