Sen Heller Introduces FCC Process Reform Bill

Sen Dean Heller (R-NV) has introduced Federal Communications Commission process reform legislation similar to a bill that passed in the House in early 2014.

Sen Heller's just-introduced Federal Communications Commission Process Reform Act of 2014 would:

• Require the Commission to survey the state of the marketplace through a Notice of Inquiry before initiating new rulemakings to ensure the Commission has an up-to-date understanding of the rapidly evolving and job-creating telecommunications marketplace.
• Require the Commission to identify a market failure, consumer harm or regulatory barrier to investment before adopting economically significant rules. After identifying such an issue, the Commission must demonstrate that the benefits of regulation outweigh the costs while taking into account the need for regulation to impose the least burden on society.
• Require the Commission to establish performance measures for all program activities so that when the Commission spends hundreds of millions of federal or consumer dollars, Congress and the public have a straightforward means of seeing what bang we’re getting for our buck.
• Apply to the Commission, an independent agency, the regulatory reform principles that President Barack Obama endorsed in his January 2011 Executive Order.
• Prevent regulatory overreach by requiring any conditions imposed on transactions to be within the Commission’s existing authority and be tailored to transaction-specific harms.