The FCC would become a "board" and can most things, so long as they find that "the public interest would be disserved by waiting the convening of a quorum of the Commission." The only things they can't decide are petitions for recon of Commission Actions or applications for review of Bureau Actions. See 0.212. I'm not sure there's precedent that sets limits here.
Thanks for providing insight on this provision in regulations. The language in (b)(1) is pretty lenient on providing a broad override based on "public interest". I don't know my FCC history well enough to know how many open meetings had ever been conducted without a quorum. I would think that it has been a rare occurrence. Based on the wording of paragraph (c) ("The Board of Commissioners is authorized to act upon all matters normally acted upon by an individual Commissioner (when he or his alternates are not present or able to act) or by a committee of Commissioners (in the absence of a quorum of the committee)."), I am wondering how this would play out where there are only two active Commissioners to begin with as in a scenario that would commence as of this weekend, three of the five seats would be vacant therefore, there is no one representing a Commissioner in order to designate an "alternate".
Even if §0.212 was imposed here, since the Commission is at 1-1, anything that the minority party does not support could be stopped (no different than today with our 2-2 Commission that will last until tomorrow).
Let's look at a different scenario (I know that many would even dread me thinking about this), it was Gomez, instead of Simington that resigned. This would have resulted in a 2-0 Commission. I would wonder how the application of 47 USC §154(b)(5) would play out. ("The maximum number of commissioners who may be members of the same political party shall be a number equal to the least number of commissioners which constitutes a majority of the full membership of the Commission.") By having two Commissioners from the majority party and no Commissioners from the minority party, I would think that §154(b)(5) would be violated here since it would only the majority would be achieved through only one of the two people.
The FCC would become a "board" and can most things, so long as they find that "the public interest would be disserved by waiting the convening of a quorum of the Commission." The only things they can't decide are petitions for recon of Commission Actions or applications for review of Bureau Actions. See 0.212. I'm not sure there's precedent that sets limits here.
Thanks for providing insight on this provision in regulations. The language in (b)(1) is pretty lenient on providing a broad override based on "public interest". I don't know my FCC history well enough to know how many open meetings had ever been conducted without a quorum. I would think that it has been a rare occurrence. Based on the wording of paragraph (c) ("The Board of Commissioners is authorized to act upon all matters normally acted upon by an individual Commissioner (when he or his alternates are not present or able to act) or by a committee of Commissioners (in the absence of a quorum of the committee)."), I am wondering how this would play out where there are only two active Commissioners to begin with as in a scenario that would commence as of this weekend, three of the five seats would be vacant therefore, there is no one representing a Commissioner in order to designate an "alternate".
Even if §0.212 was imposed here, since the Commission is at 1-1, anything that the minority party does not support could be stopped (no different than today with our 2-2 Commission that will last until tomorrow).
Let's look at a different scenario (I know that many would even dread me thinking about this), it was Gomez, instead of Simington that resigned. This would have resulted in a 2-0 Commission. I would wonder how the application of 47 USC §154(b)(5) would play out. ("The maximum number of commissioners who may be members of the same political party shall be a number equal to the least number of commissioners which constitutes a majority of the full membership of the Commission.") By having two Commissioners from the majority party and no Commissioners from the minority party, I would think that §154(b)(5) would be violated here since it would only the majority would be achieved through only one of the two people.
I really do think we are now in uncharted waters.
The public interest is not a concern.