WASHINGTON, D.C. –The Government Accountability Office (GAO) today released a report on streamlining the decision-making process on telecommunications policy entitled “Improvements Needed in Communication, Decision-Making Processes, and Workforce Planning.” Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), former chairman and current senior member of the Energy and Commerce Communications, Technology and the Internet Subcommittee, requested that the GAO prepare this report.

"This report underscores the organizational challenges and opportunities facing the FCC,” said Markey. “The rapid evolution of the telecommunications marketplace requires an agile agency, and reforms initiated by Chairman Genachowski have begun moving the FCC in a positive direction, particularly in the areas of transparency, public participation, and human capital management.  I look forward to continued oversight of the FCC as it responds to the important findings in this report."

“I am pleased Chairman Genachowski has already launched a wholesale review of FCC process and that we are already seeing some results from that review,” said Rep. Rick Boucher, current Chairman of the Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet. “I look forward to further reforms at the FCC and urge the Chairman to continue to take steps to ensure that the FCC serves the public interest by being open, transparent and accountable.”

The Report identified the following recommendations for executive action to ensure better inter-bureau coordination at the FCC on policies:

 
-Determine which bureau will serve as the lead on crosscutting issues and outline the responsibilities entailed regarding coordinating with other bureaus; and ensure that staff from separate bureaus and offices can communicate on issues spanning more than one bureau.

  -To clarify FCC’s policies on providing commissioners access to information from bureaus and offices about agenda items, we recommend FCC take the following two actions:

Each chairman, at the beginning of his or her term, develop and make publicly available internal policies that outline the extent to which commissioners can access information from the bureaus

In revising its current Strategic Human Capital Plan, include targets that identify the type of workforce expertise needed, strategies for meeting these targets—including methods to more flexibly augment the workforce—and measures for tracking progress toward these targets
 

A full copy of the report can be found here: http://markey.house.gov/docs/gao11810.pdf

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