FCC Starts with a Clean Slate for Next broadband Report to Congress

The Federal Communications Commission began its sixth inquiry for Congress into the state of broadband in the US -- an inquiry that this year is intertwined with the agency's larger effort to create a National Broadband Plan. In the Notice of Inquiry, the Commission starts with a clean slate against a backdrop of statutory and policy changes. Those changes include Congress's requirement that the FCC develop a comprehensive National Broadband Plan by Feb 17, 2010, that it improve its broadband data collection, and the Commission's own efforts to collect broadband data on a more granular basis. A report based on the inquiry, commonly known as the "706 Report" after the section of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 mandating it, must be delivered to Congress on Feb. 3, 2010. Comments and other materials received for the National Broadband Plan relevant to the inquiry will be incorporated in the upcoming 706 Report.