Remarks of FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai Before The 2014 Spring Meeting Of WTA -- Advocates For Rural Broadband

On April 9, 2014, Commissioner Ajit Pai of the FCC delivered remarks at the Spring Conference of WTA -- Advocates for Rural Broadband. During his address, he emphasized that the Federal Communications Commission must take seriously the promise of the Communications Act to “make available, so far as possible, to all the people of the United States . . . a rapid, efficient, Nation-wide, and world-wide wide and radio communication service with adequate facilities at reasonable charges.”

He then offered a number of proposals for doing just that:

• Rate Floor. Freeze the FCC-imposed rate floor indefinitely and reexamine the underlying policy.
• QRA Benchmarks. Strike the QRA benchmarks from the books.
• Helping Small Carriers Gain Scale. Streamline FCC review of transactions involving geographically adjacent rural carriers seeking to merge.
• Reducing Paperwork Burdens. Small carriers are facing death by 1,000 paper cuts.