Press Release

The Aspen Institute Dialogue on Public Libraries is pleased to announce the publication of Libraries: Building Community Resilience in Colorado. This report is the result of a collaboration with the Colorado State Library. The report unveils a set of opportunities and recommendations for building public-private and public-public library partnerships statewide that include participation in new youth initiatives, workforce readiness, and libraries serving as civic hubs. 

House Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-OR) appeared at the State of the Net conference for a wide-ranging discussion with former Federal Communications Commission Commissioner Robert McDowell on broadband infrastructure, Net Neutrality, 5G, and more. Chairman Walden said, “A government that can’t protect the data of its own employees, I struggle with the notion it’s going to run a complete architecture and network that will be hack-free.

American Action Forum Director of Technology and Innovation Policy Will Rinehart: “The FCC needs to be a datafirst organization, and the creation of such an office could help reorient the agency toward more empirically grounded analysis.” (Full Steam Ahead On The FCC’s Office Of Economics And Analytics, Blog, 1/17/18)

The Federal Communications Commission's Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee (BDAC) adopted a recommendation that would mandate the use of contractors to move telephone company equipment to make room for new attachers' equipment. This is work that is currently performed by trained, skilled, career employees at AT&T, Verizon, Frontier, and other employers. The BDAC recommendation threatens public safety.

In responde to a National Security Council memo urging the Trump administration to consider extraordinary efforts to clear the way for 5G, FCC commissioner responded:

I posit that the Federal Communications Commission needs to reconsider the ineffective and burdensome requirements currently imposed on our nation’s broadcasters to air a certain amount of educational and informational children’s programming on a weekly basis, colloquially referred to as Kid Vid.  While Kid Vid rules (minus the reporting requirements) apply to noncommercial educational stations like PBS, such programming is tied to the mission of these stations and PBS does not need a mandate to continue providing such content.  In fact, children’s programming on PBS is only expected to inc

The false alert issued on January 13th by the State of Hawaii, in which recipients were warned of an imminent ballistic missile attack, was absolutely unacceptable. The Federal Communications Commission acted swiftly in the wake of this incident to open an investigation into the matter.

House Commerce Committee Ranking Member Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) sent a letter to Universal Service Administrative Company CEO Radha Sekar requesting the audits conducted during the preceding three fiscal years for both the Federal Communications Commission’s Legacy High-Cost and Rural Health Care programs in order to better understand the potential for waste, fraud and abuse in the programs. The High-Cost Program is by far the largest Universal Service Program, spending $4.5 billion each year. Rep Pallone is requesting that the Universal Service Administrative Company provide:

The Federal Communications Commission released an 8-page document outlining "A Year of Action and Accomplishment" led by FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, broken down into the following categories: bridging the digital divide, promoting innovation and investment, protecting consumers and enhancing public safety, transparency and process reforms, and cutting and modernizing outdated regulations. 

Government rules for the internet have been debated for nearly as long as the internet has existed, even before a professor coined the term “net neutrality” 15 years ago. The internet has changed our lives and grown beyond what anyone could have imagined. And it’s done so, for the most part, with very few—but often changing—rules. Regulators under four different presidents have taken four different approaches. Courts have overturned regulatory decisions. Regulators have reversed their predecessors.