Official FCC Blog

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Just as the Internet is in a state of constant evolution, a good website must be in a constant state of innovation.  Since the launch of the redesigned FCC.gov last spring, we have continued to roll out new site features and enhancements. The daily work is informed by feedback from an array of audiences – legal practitioners, consumers, telecom professionals and elected officials, to name a few – as well as by best practices in the federal Web community and the broader Internet.

Two months ago, we announced the launch of MyFCC in beta, a companion site to FCC.gov that lets individual users create their own FCC online experience, with quick access to the tools and information they need. Today, I thought I would take the opportunity to update you on a number of more recent developments, and to again invite your feedback and suggestions.

These include:

These past few months have been especially proud ones for me at the Federal Communications Commission for one very simple reason: I have had the privilege of being part of a team that put the principles of smart government to work.  Yesterday, the Commission released a bipartisan Order comprehensively reforming the Lifeline program, the culmination of months of effort to clean-up and modernize this vital program.

Lifeline is a program that helps low-income Americans afford phone service by providing them with a monthly discount on their phone bills, averaging $9.25, paid for by our universal service fund. The program has been around since 1985, and over that time, the percentage of low-income families with phones has increased from 80% to nearly 92%.  But the program’s problems have also increased, especially after the Commission in 2008 made it easier for pre-paid wireless providers to participate.

The pre-paid services proved very popular, in part because the companies priced their plans so the Lifeline subsidy covered the whole bill, allowing them to advertise “free” phones.  Unfortunately, Lifeline’s rules were built for the kitchen phone, not the cell phone. As a result, some consumers got multiple subsidized phones – something that didn’t happen in the hard-wired wall phone days.   Some companies were enrolling consumers who weren’t eligible.  Some companies were collecting a $30 bounty every time they signed someone up..