Today the Sunlight Foundation submitted comments encouraging the FCC to quickly create a centralized, publicly accessible database of information about the political ads buys. The current system, in which valuable information about political ads is located in the file cabinets of broadcasters across the country, prevents the information from being shared, analyzed or understood. To truly make the most use of the data, information from broadcasters’ political files should be available to the public on a centralized, searchable, sortable database on the FCC’s website.

As we noted previously, broadcasters will likely complain loudly that online filing requirements will be too burdensome. The FCC should recognize that such a complaint is disingenuous at best. Most data regarding broadcast ads is already submitted in an electronic format. Electronic filing would make it easier to ensure information is complete, timely and publicly available. Moreover, broadcasters have a responsibility to serve the needs of the public in exchange for the use of the public spectrum. Making public information about who is placing and paying for the political ads people are forced to watch is fundamental to serving those needs. Finally, the information about political advertising is already supposed to be public. But in the 21st Century, burying paper in filing cabinets at broadcasters’ offices across the country is anything but public. Public means online.

It is currently too easy to mislead the public about the source of money behind a political ad. A searchable FCC database of ad buys would enable the public to learn who is behind any given political advertisement and allow for big-picture analysis about the money being spent to influence our elections. We applaud the FCC for opening this rulemaking and hope it adopts meaningful rules to create a more transparent system of political advertising.

Sunlight Foundation Comments to FCC on Broadcast Rules                                                     ...

Today, the Federal Communications Commission voted to open a rulemaking calling for online disclosure of information that broadcasters collect about the political ads they air. If robust disclosure rules are put in place before the 2012 elections get into full swing, it will be a huge victory for the public, who has a right to know who is paying for the avalanche of political ads that will blast from their televisions in the months ahead.

Political advertising has an overwhelming impact on the election process. Making public information about who is paying for political ads, which candidates the ads support or oppose, where they are being run, and how much is being spent on them has always been in the public’s interest. In the post Citizens United era, where it is not only easy but commonplace to mislead the public about the source of dark money behind a political ad, such disclosure is even more important, and fully in-line with the Supreme Court’s embrace of transparency in that decision. If the FCC adopts a meaningful online disclosure system without delay, it will secure its leadership in using technology for information gathering and disclosure, setting an example for other agencies to follow.

A searchable FCC database of ad buys would not only enable the public to go directly to the FCC’s website to ascertain who is behind the nasty, misleading political ad that just interrupted their enjoyment of Dancing with the Stars, but would allow for re-use of the data and in-depth analysis by local journalists, scholars and others who could analyze whether the ad money being spent on races in Kansas is coming from New York, whether more money is being spent by outside groups than the candidates themselves, and where races are heating up as determined by spending.

Efforts to make information about political advertising more publicly accessible have been thwarted before, and certainly the National Association of Broadcasters is likely to object to rules that they will claim are burdensome. But that powerful special interest should not be given a free ride this time around. The public has a right to know the true source of the funding behind the political ads they see, and broadcasters across the country have an obligation not to be complicit in the conspiracy that keeps the public in the dark.

The Federal Communications Commission announced a new initiative that demonstrates that the agency understands and welcomes full disclosure. As of June 1, the FCC began requiring that details about ex parte communications—meetings with agency staff where only one side of an issue is present to make its case—must be filed electronically. Not only will transparency at the FCC be improved, but the initiative serves as an example of how transparency should work throughout government.

According to the FCC’s general counsel, “disclosing the contents of oral ex parte contacts on the record ensures that interested parties, the public, and the Commission staff all have complete information about the data and arguments that are presented to Commission decision-makers.”

Makes sense to Sunlight. An ex parte contact at the FCC sounds a lot like a lobbying contact on Capitol Hill. Nothing wrong with it, but details need to be disclosed so that interested parties have a chance to know who is saying what about important public policy issues. We’ve called for improving disclosure of lobbyists contacts by, among other things, including naming the Member of Congress’ office with whom the lobbyist met and providing details of the lobbyist’s request. It sounds a lot like the FCC’s requirement that ex parte notices must list of everyone who participated in the meeting and a summary of all data presented and arguments made.

These types of disclosures will improve the dialogue at the FCC and would do the same for Congress. Fundamentally, lobbyists are educators. More disclosure about meetings would ensure that decision makers have a more complete understanding of all sides of the issue at hand.

Naysayers who say that agency communications are different than lobbying Congress should look to the example of Sen. Gillibrand. She publishes all of her official meetings online the day after they occur. She knows that if a voter sees that she has met with a lobbyist whose views they oppose, they can contact her office to make sure their viewpoints are heard too.

The same principle is at work with the FCC’s ex parte rules. The FCC gets it. Hopefully Congress will too.

In the most recent, and possibly most repugnant, turn of the revolving door, FCC commissioner Meredith Attwell Baker will join Comcast just months after approving the Comcast/NBC Universal merger. The move spurred the New York Times to call for expanding the definition of lobbying. We agree. While Baker’s hiring may be a done deal, the lobby laws need to be changed so that we know who she is lobbying, about what, and when.

Rules put in place by the Obama administration mean that Baker will not be allowed to lobby anyone at the FCC for two years. That’s a sliver of an exclusion that leaves her plenty of opportunities to spread the Comcast/NBC message inside the beltway. The day after she starts, this well-connected, high-ranking administration official can start lobbying Congress on any issue, including the Comcast/NBC merger.

The current laws do next to nothing to inform the public about the ways Baker will wield her power on Capitol Hill. Sunlight is calling for changes in the current Lobbying Disclosure Act that would require her and others like her to report the names of the offices she lobbies—whether in person, on the phone, in writing or email—and link the names with the specific issues on which she sought government action. We would require that reporting to happen in real time and online.

We may not be able to close the revolving door, but we can find out what happens whenever people pass through it.

Two of the biggest proponents of net neutrality rules for broadband providers involved in closed door congressional committee negotiations have hired 112 former government officials to lobby as Congress and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) have both pushed new broadband Internet policies.

For the first three months of 2010, seventy-four percent of the lobbyists hired by both Google* and Microsoft have previous experience in government, according to data obtained from the Center for Responsive Politics and lobbyist disclosure forms. This is a very similar number when compared to the percentage of former government officials hired to lobby for the top six telecommunications organizations.

The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation and the House Committee on Energy & Commerce are holding meetings with industry and consumer organizations in response to a series of actions by the FCC including a court decision that blocked the FCC's attempted implementation of net neutrality rules. Net neutrality rules would disallow broadband service providers from discriminating against users and content by preventing them from slowing access to certain users and charging money to acesss certain content.

The committees held their first meeting last Friday and plan to host another meeting on July 2.

Google and Microsoft are spending the most on lobbying among the pro-net neutrality organizations invited to the behind the scenes discussions with the two committees.

According to first quarter lobbying disclosures, the two companies have spent a combined $2.1 million on lobbying. By comparison, the two lobbying spenders opposed to net neutrality that were invited to the congressional meetings shelled out $10.5 million in the first quarter of 2010.

Despite spending far less than organizations opposed to net neutrality, Google and Microsoft have fielded a quality team of lobbyists with experience working for important lawmakers and on crucial committees.

Combined the companies have hired thirteen former staffers of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation or members of the committee and nine former staffers of the House Committee on Energy & Commerce or their members.

These lobbyists include Barry LaSala, the former chief of staff to the Senate committee's number two Democrat Sen. John Kerry, who lobbies for Microsoft. LaSala also lobbies for net neutrality opponent Verizon.

Andy Scott Wright, lobbying for Google, worked previously as the Chief of Staff to Rep. Rick Boucher, chairman of the Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet. Boucher is leading the meetings for the House Committee on Energy & Commerce.

The representatatives in the closed door congressional meetings for both Google and Microsoft have experience on the committees. Google’s Johanna Shelton previously worked on the House Committee on Energy & Commerce and Microsoft’s Paula Boyd used to work for the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation.

Other Internet companies supporting net neutrality might be spending far less than Google and Microsoft, but they are also largely hiring former government officials to lobby for them.

Over eighty percent of the lobbyists retained by both eBay and Amazon.com—of these two only Amazon.com is engaged in the congressional meetings—have experience in government.

(*Disclosure: Google senior manager Kim Scott sits on the Advisory Board of the Sunlight Foundation. Kim Scott sits on the Advisory Board of the Sunlight Foundation, but no longer works for Google.)

Last Friday, two congressional committees held closed door discussions with 31 representatives from industry and activist groups to discuss writing a new broadband Internet policy, largely focused on whether and how to implement net neutrality rules, into the Telecommunications Act of 1996. While the meeting contained more proponents of net neutrality, opponents of implementing the policy hold a lop-sided advantage in lobbying spending and contributing to political campaigns.

In attendance were some of the major organizations on both sides of the debate. The biggest organizations in attendance in support of the legislation included Google, Microsoft, Amazon.com and two service providers breaking with their industry, DISH Network and Sprint. Opponents included AT&T, Verizon, National Cable & Telecommunications Association, Communications Workers of America and the US Telecom Association. A number of public interest and consumer groups were also present.

According to data obtained from the Center for Responsive Politics, net neutrality opponents represented at the meeting combined for $19.7 million in lobbying in the first quarter of 2010. Supporters, on the other hand, only combined for $4.7 million in first quarter lobbying expenses. (Organizations with undefined, or unidentifiable, positions combined for just under $1 million.)

The major campaign contributors opposed to net neutrality gave $6.9 million to political candidates from 2009-2010 while major contributors in support gave $2.2 million.

Both sides of the debate sent lobbyists with previous government experience into the closed-door meetings with the committees. Eight of the 31 organization representatives present at the meeting previously worked in Congress. Five of those eight previously worked for one of the two committees holding the meeting.

Lobbyists for net neutrality proponents had good connections to the lawmakers in the room. Google's Johanna Shelton previously worked on the House Committee on Energy & Commerce; Microsoft's Paula Boyd used to work for the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation; Amazon.com sent lobbyist Emmett O'Keefe, a former staffer to Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation member Sen. Byron Dorgan.

Two organizations in opposition sent lobbyists with similarly good connections: National Cable & Telecommunications Association sent James Assey, a former staffer on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation and US Telecom Association sent Walter McCormick, another former staffer from the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation.

The meetings, held jointly by the House Committee on Energy & Commerce and the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, are the result of years of efforts by Congress to pass net neutrality legislation and recent developments involving the Federal Communications Commission's attempts to impose net neutrality rules the industry.

Net neutrality rules would disallow broadband service providers from discriminating against users and content by preventing them from slowing access to certain users and charging money to acesss certain content.

The FCC attempted to impose these rules after Comcast slowed service to certain users using the BitTorrent file-sharing service. In April, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled against the FCC, stating that they did not have the regulatory authority to stop Comcast from blocking or slowing certain users of their broadband service.

Broadband providers have largely opposed the implementation of net neutrality rules, while Internet companies have largely backed them.

The committees are scheduled to hold another talk this Friday. The list of organizations and their representatives, provided by Tech Daily Dose, can be found below:

AT&T, Tim McKone Amazon, Emmett O'Keefe CDT, David Sohn Cisco, Jeff Campbell CompTel, Jerry James Consumers Union (CU), Joel Kelsey CTIA, Jot Carpenter CWA, Debbie Goldman Dish, David Goodfriend Free Press, Derek Turner Free State Foundation, Randolph May Google, Johanna Shelton ITI, Dean Garfield ITIF, Rob Atkinson Level 3, John Ryan MAP, Andy Schwartzman Microsoft, Paula Boyd NARUC, Brian O'Hara NASUCA, Brenda Pennington NCTA, James Assey NTCA, Tom Wacker OIC, Markham Erickson PFF, Dan Horowitz Phoenix Center, Larry Spiwak Public Knowledge, Ernesto Falcon Qwest, Melissa Newman RCA, Tim Donovan Sprint, Bill Barloon TIA, Grant Seiffert US Telecom, Walter McCormick Verizon, Peter Davidson

As leaders in Congress announced a series of hearings this June to tackle huge telecommunications issues with a focus on the Internet, the top phone and cable organizations that control the majority of the access to the Internet have hired 276 former government officials to lobby both the Congress and the executive branch.

According to data obtained from lobbyist disclosure forms and the Center for Responsive Politics, seventy-two percent of the lobbyists hired by AT&T, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Verizon, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association and the US Telecom Association have previous government experience. These organizations combined to spend $20.6 million lobbying the federal government in the first quarter of 2010.

Eighteen of the 276 revolving door lobbyists are former members of Congress. These include the powerful former senators John Breaux and Trent Lott. The Breaux Lott Leadership Group reported spending $150,000 lobbying on behalf of AT&T in the first quarter of 2010.

Both Breaux and Lott served in the leadership of their respective parties while in the Senate with Lott serving as Majority Leader. Lott also served on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, the committee with jurisdiction over the telecommunications industry.

The eighteen former lawmakers include a heavy representation from the House Committee on Energy & Commerce, the House committee with telecommunications jurisdication. In 2010, the organizations hired former Energy & Commerce Committee members Jim Davis (AT&T), Jack Fields (Verizon), Ron Klink (Comcast), Chip Pickering (Comcast and National Cable and Television Association) and Al  Wynn (US Telecom Association).

The organizations are also hiring former lawmakers with previous clout in both the House and the Senate. Former Sen. Don Nickles, hired to lobby for Comcast, was the Republican Majority Whip from 1996 to 2001. Comcast also hired the former House Majority Whip William H. Gray.

Aside from Breaux and Lott, AT&T has hired two other lawmakers with strong resumes, former House Republican Conference Chair J.C. Watts and longtime California Democrat Vic Fazio.

The top telecom organizations are also hiring a number of lobbyists who previously worked on the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation or the House Committee on Energy & Commerce. Fourteen lobbyists used to work on the House committee and thirteen previously worked at the Senate committee. In addition, the six organizations employ 26 former staffers of current members of the House committee and 22 former staffers of current members of the Senate committee.

These staffers include the former chief of staff, Lane Bailey, and deputy chief of staff, Patrick Robertson, to Sen. Jay Rockefeller, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation. Robertson lobbies for Comcast and Bailey lobbies for the National Cable and Television Association.

The former counsel to Sen. John Kerry, the number two Democrat on the committee, Barry LaSala, is registered to lobby for Verizon.

Comcast and Time Warner Cable lead the way in hiring former government officials as lobbyists. Ninety percent of lobbyists hired by Time Warner Cable previously worked in government. Two Time Warner lobbyists served as congressmen and two others served as staffers to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation.

In first quarter lobbyists disclosure filings for 2010, eighty-eight percent of all lobbyists hired by Comcast had previous experience in government. While this percentage is slightly lower than Time Warner's, Comcast hired more than twice as many lobbyists with former government experience as Time Warner did—82 to 38. This includes five former members of Congress and four Energy & Commerce Committee staffers. Comcast, as it seeks government approval of its purchase of NBC Universal, has also hired six former officials from the Department of Justice.

Broadband regulation has been a major issue over the past few years as many Democrats, including President Obama, have called for the institution of net neutrality rules to govern broadband transmission. Net neutrality regulations would prevent broadband service providers from blocking or slowing transmission to certain sites, services and users.

In April, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was rebuffed by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit after trying to stop Comcast from slowing broadband access to users using the BitTorrent file-sharing service. The court ruled that the FCC did not have sufficient regulatory authority to require Comcast to provide equal access to all sites and services online.

In the wake of the court's decision, four committee and subcommittee chairmen announced a series of meetings with industry players to discuss a rewrite of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. The meetings will focus on the changes in telecommunications brought on by the revolution in Internet technologies over the past fifteen years. Much of that time is expected to be spent on the regulation of broadband routes.

A group of 74 Democratic lawmakers recently sent a letter to FCC Commissioner Julius Genachowski asking that the FCC not institute net neutrality rules without specific instruction from Congress. The 74 Democrats were comprised of a mix of Blue Dog Democrats, New Dems and members of both the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC).

At least, six of the letter signatorees—Reps. Joe Baca, Allen Boyd, Corrine Brown, Baron Hill, Eddie Bernice Johnson and Ciro Rodriquez—have former staffers lobbying for the top telecom organizations.

The Federal Communications Commission, in fulfilling their obligation to create broadband plan, is required (pdf) to lay out "a plan for the use of broadband infrastructure and services" in a series of contexts, including civic participation and other national purposes.

As the FCC has prepared their highly anticipated broadband plan (holding a variety of public events), they have heard from a number of transparency advocates, and recognized the role technology has to play in creating a more open, accountable government.  (Andrew Rasiej and I testified at an earlier FCC workshop on e-government.)

As the FCC discusses and announces their findings, they seem committed to the sort of government policies that can help turn Internet access into a transformative tool for citizenship.  Slides from a Commission meeting on 2/18/10 underscore this comittment:

Increasing the quantity and quality of civic engagement • Make the federal government more open and transparent - Release more government data and information on digital platforms • Create a more robust digital public media ecosystem - Support public media’s transition to digital platforms for content and delivery • Engage citizens using online and social media channels - Implement broadband-enabled tools to increase civic participation • Engage citizens to increase innovation in government • Modernize democratic processes

While they describe the goals in broad terms, this is the sort of commitment necessary for our vision of empowered digital citizenship to become a reality.

Update: Sunlight submitted comments to the FCC to the same effect last June, which can be read here.

Today the Federal Communications Commission released "reboot the FCC," an ambitious attempt to "improv[e] citizen interactions with the Federal Communications Commission." The new website features the FCC's new agency-wide blog, many new media tools, and an innovative approach to bringing in the public to share ideas on improving the FCC.

The reboot is a significant attempt to instill the principles of openness, collaboration, and participation into everything that the FCC does. It's not the website redesign that we called for in October -- although they are asking for comments and suggestions on upgrading their website -- but it is a good step forward towards centering the FCC around citizens.

I'm still discovering new things in the reboot website, including this interesting attempt to pull all of the FCC's data into one spot. Take a look and let me (and them) know what you think.

Sunlight's John Wonderlich gave remarks before the Federal Communication Commission yesterday. I'm posting his full remarks below:

8/6/09 -- Remarks to the Federal Communication Commission

Good Morning.  Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today.  My name is John Wonderlich; I am the Policy Director for the Sunlight Foundation, a non-partisan nonprofit dedicated to using the power of the Internet to catalyze greater government transparency.

At the heart of all of the Sunlight Foundation's work is a deep appreciation for the transformational power of online technology.  Our pairing technology with a vision for government transparency is visible in our organization, which digitizes data and creates tools for presenting information, engages communities in advocacy for more information, and makes sure tools and information are in the hands of journalists, citizens, government employees, and everyone in between.

Technology's role as the driver of disruptive change has become culturally familiar, as our roles as consumers, family members, and businesspeople have evolved over the last few decades. The Internet's role in shaping governance and citizenship, however, is only just starting to develop.

As technology redefines how we interact, our government now has an opportunity to help redefine civic life -- to live up to President Obama's vision for a technologically empowered society, by creating a more transparent, connected democracy.

There are two primary constraints that will determine just how connected and transparent government can become as we adjust to new technology.

First, digital citizenship will only be available to those Americans who have access to the tools and infrastructure necessary to be a part of the growing national digital sphere. As the FCC addresses its mandate to promote access, broadband policy should be driven in part by what Internet access makes possible.

Digital technology creates new forms of agency for all citizens.  Online access to government information allows curiosity to become expertise, disparities to become investigations, and expertise to become guidance and policy.  Citizenship can only transform into a more mature, relevant form, fulfilling the potential of a nationally connected citizenry, when government is willing make our vital national information truly public -- online, in real time.

Most fundamentally, government must commit to modernized disclosure of ethics and influence data.  Among government's primary responsibilities is to preserve the public trust on which it is built.  The Sunlight Foundation has maintained a particular focus on creating digital access to this information, which includes campaign contributions, earmarks, lobbying records, and personal financial disclosure statements.  President Obama clearly shares this priority, promising, in Change We Can Believe In to build

"a centralized, online database of lobbying reports, tax earmarks, congressional ethics records, campaign finance filings, and information on how much federal contractors spend on lobbying..."

If fulfilled, this vision for online accountability can deepen the public trust in government, and empower private citizens and government overseers alike in exposing and deterring public corruption.  Ethics.gov, when created, will need to be built on new interoperable databases, to allow searches to function across different bodies of ethics information, many of which will only be posted online after a real commitment to public access overcomes discomfort at increased scrutiny.

In addition to checking influence and realigning incentives, public attention to government information can empower citizens to become more relevant participants in governance. If essential public notifications are accessed in practice only through expensive commercial publishers, even for government employees, we should expect only moneyed interests to have the information necessary for participation.  When agencies and offices broadcast opportunities for public participation beyond traditional means, only then will the distributed expertise of citizens across the country become an asset for governance.  Solving this problem will take effort from individual agencies and offices -- reaching out to citizens and stakeholders where they are available -- and also will take unlocking the public information now collected in unapproachable repositories like the Federal Register or FedBizOpps (FBO.gov).

In order to unlock citizens' fuller digital potential, the government must also recognize an emergent body of technological expertise growing throughout the country.  Programmers, web developers, and designers, both amateur and professional, are discovering that their skills are relevant to many of our government's problems, and are looking for ways to help.  Data.gov helps to establish their relevance as stewards of our national digital sphere, by offering the raw data necessary for innovation outside government, which in turn, can inspire change within government.  The successful Apps for America and Apps for Democracy contests demonstrate the potential of the citizen developer, creating dozens of applications at little or no cost to the government.

Influence data, procedural information, and data access can all help empower citizens to more fully participate in governance.  These three spheres of public information represent a large part of our government's new opportunity -- and new responsibility -- to serve the needs of a digitally empowered citizenry.

Just as a successful national broadband policy is necessary to fulfill our shared vision for a transparent, connected democracy, government transparency is necessary to allow digital citizenship to develop to its full potential.