Homeland Security Is Job One

The 9/11 Commission Report—which ought to be required reading for each of us—lays out in chilling detail a state of communications unreadiness that seriously inhibited the country's ability to respond on that terrible day. Our challenge now is to make sure that we are ready next time by enabling our citizens—particularly our first responders—to communicate through a reliable, interoperable and redundant communications system.

This is clearly the FCC's job. This agency has the specific national-security responsibility, stipulated in Title I of our statute, to ensure the safety of our people through the communications networks.

It has been three years since 9/11. In that time, the FCC has allocated spectrum to public safety [and implemented and struggled with complex technical issues]. We have convened councils with industry. Advisory committees have had meetings, and our government partners have begun to reorganize.

The FCC is working hard. But the government still lacks a well-understood, aggressive, nationwide plan to ensure that every public-safety organization has access to a reliable system that they can use anywhere, to talk to any other first responder, in any emergency. That just doesn't exist today, but it can and it should.

The Government Accounting Office states that "a fundamental barrier to successfully addressing interoperable communications problems for public safety has been the lack of effective collaborative, interdisciplinary and intergovernmental planning." House Government Reform Subcommittee Chairman Christopher Shays [R-Conn.] has called on the FCC to take a more active role and says it's going to be costly if we don't. There is a void out there to fill, and I believe this agency needs to fill it.

We need a collaborative approach, and I think we have to consider having the FCC step into the breach. One approach might be for the commission to create an office that focuses exclusively on helping local public-safety organizations to share ideas, vet proposals, prepare plans, and coordinate them with both government and industry. If we lack the resources to do this, I am for going to Congress and asking for them.

This Report repeatedly catalogues communications breakdowns and examples of poorly protected critical infrastructures. It recommends legislation to increase the assignment of spectrum for public safety. The Report is strong on recommending efforts to protect both government and private communications facilities. The FCC is the expert on these issues. But amazingly, in my reading, the Report never mentions the FCC. So we have to get ourselves more front and center on these issues.