Hutchinson Saluted on Senate Floor

Retiring Texas Senator and former TV news reporter was instrumental in AMBER alert, opposing fairness doctrine and net neutrality regs

By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 12/18/2012 5:45:12 PM

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) praised exiting Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) on Tuesday in an extensive tribute on the floor of the Senate, saying he had been honored to serve with her.

Hutchison is the former KPRC-TV reporter who became a four-term Senator and ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee before deciding to retire at the end of her current term at the end of this year.

Hutchison was a long-time opponent of network neutrality legislation, opponent of the so-called fairness doctrine and a supporter of ensuring broadcasters were compensated for moving off spectrum in the FCC's incentive auction plan and for making sure the government looked at all stakeholders for spectrum, not just broadcasters.

Hutchison was also instrumental in passage of AMBER alert legislation, which established a national missing children alert system in concert with broadcasters, local law enforcement and others that to date has helped locate 595 children.

The AMBER alert was created in 1996 in Texas to issue immediate information about child abductions via broadcast media and highway signage.

The alert -- with networks operating in 14 states and 29 localities -- was named after nine-year-old Amber Hagerman, who was kidnapped and murdered in Arlington, Texas.