A Closer Look at the Titillating Report on FCC’s Martin

House Energy and Commerce Committee Paints Ugly Picture of Boy-Faced Chairman

Data manipulation. Lax oversight resulting in overcharges to taxpayers. Lack of transparency in public business. Micromanagement and “senseless” demotions. By some accounts, any of the above would aptly describe a day in the life at the Kevin Martin-run FCC.

That’s according to a new report issued by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, one of the Congressional bodies that oversees the FCC. The committee started investigating the FCC in March 2008. And after culling through hundreds of thousands of documents — paper and e-mail — and interviewing 73 people tied to the agency, committee staff in December released a report entitled, “Deception and Distrust: The Federal Communications Commission Under Chairman Kevin J. Martin.” Sounds like a good summer read, too bad it’s December.

The House committee is Democrat-controlled, although the investigation began as a bipartisan effort. Minority leaders wouldn’t sign on to the findings, however, because they said they disagreed with them. Regardless, that a committee usually focused on pressing social issues — think clean air, health care and food and drug safety — spent months exploring complaints about the FCC indicates something was amiss, something too big to ignore. And if the findings are correct the question becomes what, if anything, will come of them.

Martin isn’t accused of breaking any laws, “just” obscuring and impeding commission business. He’s expected to resign upon President-elect Barack Obama’s assumption of office and from there he’ll probably return to the private sector. That leaves extensive cleanup for the as-yet-unknown incoming FCC head, a big chance for the agency to begin fresh with employees and the communications industry.

Ever since President George W. Bush appointed Martin as head of the FCC in 2005, something started rotting in Denmark, as it were. Internally, spokespeople would, for the most part, only talk to reporters on background, a shift from more open policies previously. Senior career staffers suddenly were demoted to junior positions and many ended up leaving the FCC — an immeasurable loss of braintrust and institutional memory.

Externally, the competitive community had hoped for a friend in Martin; soon, however, CLECs discovered the chairman’s loyalties lay with the Bell companies. But the cable industry got the brunt of Martin’s scrutiny. From the beginning, cable operators felt Martin was out to get them. The very Republican Martin, you see, has stood for “decency” and family choice in pay TV programming, yet according to arcane rules, he couldn’t impose the regulations he wanted to put on cable.

Meanwhile, some FCC employees were watching certain funds make what they perceived as gross overpayments to providers. Fears about “fleecing” Americans fell on deaf ears. Finally, as Martin laid down increasingly strict directives about gaining permission for even the most run-of-the-mill agency tasks, the House Energy and Commerce Committee got to work on a lengthy investigation.

Where There’s Smoke...

The committee’s 110-page report is broken into five sections and concludes with pages of e-mail and other documentation. It’s a fascinating read and confirms what many in the communications industry suspected, but couldn’t outright say: that Martin had it out for cable operators, commanding people below him to rewrite a specific report until it showed the findings he wanted, while allowing at least one telecom services provider to collect more public subsidies than necessary. Plus, Martin, like his boss, Bush, didn’t like his people talking to folks outside of the FCC — whether that be press or other agencies — so he muzzled them. All of that added up to create a culture of distrust even among Martin’s four fellow commissioners, preventing the commission from doing its business in the public’s best interest.

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