As Kelley Drye reported in an earlier post, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is moving quickly on efforts to expedite review of certain FCC applications, including, but not limited to, Section 214 and submarine cable-related applications, by the Executive Branch agencies known as Team Telecom.  In a May 2016 request to the FCC, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) suggested applicants be required to include information addressing several topics typically reviewed by Team Telecom and make certain compliance certifications in initial application filings.  In response to NTIA’s Request, the FCC released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) in June, seeking comment on a number of issues such as the confidentiality of application information, timeframes for Applicant responses to Team Telecom questions, exemptions for Applicants with existing mitigation agreements and the scope of the proposed application information requirements.  See our post on the NPRM for additional details.

The NPRM was published yesterday in the Federal Register resulting in a comment date of August 18, 2016 and a reply comment date of September 2, 2016.  All industry participants contemplating actions requiring applications impacted by the proposed rules should consider if they want to share their views on whether the proposed rules will expedite and clarify the Team Telecom review process or if the burdens will outweigh the benefits.

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