Kay has asked me to summarize the status of the federal legislative issues currently in play that are of interest to the ARRL. The Amateur Radio Emergency Communications Enhancement Act of 2011 S.191 is pending on the Senate Calendar, having cleared the Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee. John Chwat expects the bill to be taken up before the end of the month and for it to pass the Senate with the Coburn amendment (which added an unrelated report on FEMA grants) deleted. When S.191 is received in the House it will be referred to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. We thought that it might be referred to the House Committee on Homeland Security but apparently that is not going to be the case. John Chwat and Chris Imlay have a meeting with House Energy and Commerce Committee staff scheduled for June 27. After that meeting we will have a better idea as to what additional steps we may need to take to move the bill through the committee and the full House. H.R.81, a bill by the same name and with only slightly different wording, has been referred to the Telecomm Subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Our preference is for the House to take up and pass S.191 without change, to avoid the need for the bill to go back to the Senate before it goes to the President's desk for signature. So, for now we should stand by. Depending on how the June 27 meeting goes it may be desirable to stimulate some targeted letter-writing and contacts with key committee members. D-Block Public Safety Legislation (H.R. 607 et al) Last week the Senate Commerce Committee approved the Public Safety Spectrum and Wireless Innovation Act, S.911, a bipartisan approach to reallocation of the so-called D Block of 700 MHz spectrum. As originally introduced S.911 was simply a "sense of Congress" place-holder; the bill as approved by the committee is far more comprehensive and apparently contains elements of S.28 and possibly other Senate bills such as S.1040. The text is not yet available on Thomas, but a committee press release lists the key provisions as: * Establish a framework for the deployment of a nationwide, interoperable, wireless broadband network for public safety. * Allocate 10 megahertz of spectrum, known as the "D-block," to public safety. * Allow public safety officials, when not using the network, to lease capacity on a secondary basis to non-public safety entities in order to help support the network. * Provide the FCC with incentive auction authority, which allows existing spectrum licensees to voluntarily relinquish their airwaves in exchange for a portion of the proceeds of the commercial auction of their spectrum. This provides new incentives for efficient use of spectrum. In addition, the funds from these incentive auctions, in conjunction with funds from the auction of other specified spectrum bands, and funds earned from leasing the public safety network on a secondary basis, will be used to fund the construction and maintenance of the nationwide, interoperable, wireless broadband public safety network. * Direct the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Standards and Technology to conduct cutting edge research into transformative wireless technologies. * Surplus revenue from spectrum auctions, estimated to be more than $10 billion, will be directed to the U.S. Treasury for deficit reduction. While we will not know for certain until we have the opportunity to review the text of the bill, as far as we know it is benign for Amateur Radio. If the bill passes the full Senate it will be received in the House and referred to the House Energy and Commerce Committee, where H.R.607 is languishing and where the committee staff is known to be working on its own version of D-block legislation (based on, among other things, Chris Imlay's testimony of May 25). Given the state of play, Kay and I feel that it is best at this point to wind down our promotion of members' letters to Congress on H.R.607 as they have served their purpose. We will still need to monitor the House committee, but this does not involve grassroots activity and is best done quietly. We will not announce cessation of the letter-writing campaign and will not actively discourage members from writing; H.R.607 is still there and we must be careful to not say anything that might be misconstrued as a premature declaration of "Mission Accomplished." FCC Technical Expertise Legislation (S.611 and H.R.2102) These two bills address ARRL Legislative Objective #7, "to ensure that [FCC] Commissioners have adequate access to technical expertise when making decisions." This is not a subject that is likely to excite the enthusiasm of grassroots members and so does not lend itself to a letter-writing campaign, but we do want the ARRL to be on record as supporting this objective. Kay will write to the Chairmen and Ranking Members of the committees of jurisdiction setting out the ARRL's position. 73, Dave Sumner, K1ZZ