Federal Communications Commission DA 11-382
Before the
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20554
In the Matter of
Ottawa County, Ohio
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WT Docket No. 02-55
ORDER
Adopted:  February 28, 2011 Released:  February 28, 2011
By the Deputy Chief, Policy Division, Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau:
1. By this Order, we dismiss the October 10, 2010 petition for reconsideration filed by 
Ottawa County, Ohio (Ottawa) for lack of standing.  Ottawa seeks reconsideration of the September 28, 
2010 Memorandum Opinion and Order1 in which the Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau 
(Bureau) resolved a dispute between the City of Parma, Ohio (Parma) and Sprint Nextel Corporation 
(Sprint) in Sprint’s favor.
2. Under Commission precedent a party seeking reconsideration of a Commission action 
must show that its “interests are adversely affected” by the order.2 In evaluating the “adversely affected” 
prong of the standard, the Commission has “applied the same test that courts employ in determining 
whether a person has standing under Article III to appeal a court order:  the person must show (1) a 
personal injury ‘in fact’; (2) that the injury is fairly traceable to the challenged action; and (3) that it is 
likely, not merely speculative, that the requested relief will redress the injury.”3  Moreover, Courts have 
consistently held that “the mere precedential effect of an adjudicatory order within an agency is not 
enough to confer standing.”4  
3. Here, Ottawa has suffered no injury in fact.  It only is apprehensive that the City of 
Parma Order may affect it in a future adjudication of its case—an adjudication that may never take place 
if Ottawa successfully negotiates an agreement with Sprint or resolves its differences with Sprint in 
mediation.  Ottawa’s interests have not been adversely affected.  Its concerns about future injury are 
remote and speculative.  Thus, Ottawa lacks standing to seek reconsideration of the City of Parma Order. 
4. This is not the first time the Bureau has ruled that licensees, such as Ottawa, lack 
standing when they allege that Bureau decisions on de novo review in other cases may affect their 
rebanding negotiations.  In 2007, we dismissed a similar petition for lack of standing because the 
  
1 City of Parma, Ohio and Sprint Nextel Corp., Memorandum Opinion and Order, 25 FCC Rcd 13485 (PSHSB 
2010).
2 AT&T Corp. v. Business Telecom, Inc., Order on Reconsideration, 16 FCC Rcd 21750, 21751-52 ¶ 5 (2001) (ATT 
v. BTI).   
3 Id. at ¶ 7.   
4 Id. citing, inter alia, Airtouch Paging v. FCC, 234 F.3d 815, 818 (2d Cir. 2000); Sea-Land Service, Inc. v. 
Department of Transportation, 137 F.3d 640, 648 (D.C. Cir. 1998); Shell Oil Co. v. FERC, 47 F.3d 1186, 1202 
(D.C. Cir. 1995); Crowley Caribbean Transport, Inc. v. Pena, 37 F.3d 671, 674 (D.C. Cir. 1994); 
Telecommunications Research and Action Center v. FCC, 917 F.2d 585, 588 (D.C. Cir. 1990).  
Federal Communications Commission DA 11-382
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petitioners there were not adversely affected.5 In the Order dismissing the petition, the Bureau explicitly 
stated that its findings in the underlying Memorandum Opinion and Order were “limited to the specific 
facts presented to the Bureau in the record before it,” and did not preclude licensees in other cases from 
asserting that the specific facts in their cases warrant a different result.6 More recently, we dismissed a 
petition for declaratory ruling on the grounds that the petitioners there lacked standing for failure to show 
they had been adversely affected by the underlying order.7
5. The Commission’s resources are unnecessarily burdened by pleadings of the type 
submitted by Ottawa that ignore the Commission’s procedural rules and are foreclosed by clear precedent.  
Accordingly, we are dismissing Ottawa’s petition and cautioning parties to the 800 MHz proceeding that 
procedurally deficient filings—such as Ottawa’s—may be dismissed summarily.  Moreover, we advise 
parties that the expense of preparing and filing procedurally barred pleadings is not recoverable from 
Sprint as a prudent and necessary rebanding cost.
6. Accordingly, pursuant to the authority of Section 4(i) of the Communications Act of 
1934, as amended, 47 U.S.C. § 154(i); and Section 1.106 of the Commission’s rules, 47 C.F.R. § 1.106, 
the Petition for Reconsideration, filed October 10, 2010 by the County of Ottawa, Ohio IS DISMISSED.
7. This action is taken under delegated authority pursuant to Sections 0.191 and 0.392 of 
the Commission’s rules, 47 C.F.R. §§ 0.191, 0.392.
FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION
Michael J. Wilhelm
Deputy Chief, Policy Division
Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau
  
5 City of Boston, Mass., Order, 22 FCC Rcd 2361 (PSHSB 2007).
6 Id. at 2364.
7 New Jersey Transit et al., Docket 02-55, Order (DA 11-337, Released Feb. 24, 2011) (PSHSB 2011).  (Although 
styled a petition for declaratory ruling, the pleading was, in substance, an untimely petition for reconsideration and 
was treated as such.)