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 Federal  Communications  Commission  FCC  06-  83 
 STATEMENT  OF  CHAIRMAN  KEVIN  J.  MARTIN 


 Re:  Recommendations  of  the  Independent  Panel  Reviewing  the  Impact  of  Hurricane  Katrina  on  Communications  Networks,  EB  Docket  No.  06-  119 
 I  would  like  to  thank  the  members  of  the  Independent  Panel  for  taking  the  time  to  study  the  impact  of  Hurricane  Katrina  on  communications  networks.  I  would  also  like  to  thank 
 Nancy  Victory  for  agreeing  to  Chair  the  Independent  Panel.  We  all  appreciate  the  hard  work  that  went  into  studying  the  lessons  of  this  terrible  disaster  and  developing 
 recommendations  for  improving  our  response  in  the  future. 
 The  devastation  of  Hurricane  Katrina  highlighted  the  importance  of  telecommunications  and  media  to  our  daily  lives,  and  our  dependency  on  our  national  communications 
 infrastructure.  For  the  past  six  months,  experts  from  public  safety  organizations,  the  communications  industry,  and  public  interest  groups  have  worked  together  to  study  the 
 impact  of  Hurricane  Katrina  on  the  telecommunications  and  media  infrastructure  and  to  review  the  sufficiency  of  the  recovery  effort  with  respect  to  this  infrastructure. 


 In  its  final  report,  the  Independent  Panel  has  presented  recommendations  for  increasing  the  readiness  of  the  communications  industry,  improving  response  and  recovery  after 
 major  disasters,  enhancing  the  operability  and  interoperability  of  public  safety  and  911  communications,  and  strengthening  our  emergency  alert  communications.  I  am 
 particularly  pleased  to  see  the  Independent  Panel’s  recommendations  to  provide  a  Readiness  Checklist  for  the  communications  industry,  to  inform  the  public  safety 
 community  about  technologies  to  improve  the  operability  and  interoperability  of  their  communications,  to  strengthen  the  resiliency  of  Public  Safety  Answering  Points  (PSAPs) 
 and  other  911  infrastructure,  and  to  take  actions  to  ensure  the  public  gets  timely  information  in  times  of  emergency. 


 With  this  Notice  of  Proposed  Rulemaking,  we  are  asking  for  comments  and  suggestions  from  the  public  on  how  to  best  address  and  implement  the  Independent  Panel’s 
 recommendations.  I  look  forward  to  studying  the  Independent  Panel’s  report  and  to  reviewing  the  public’s  responses  for  additional  follow-  up  action  so  that  we  can  improve 
 our  response  and  recovery  efforts  for  the  future. 
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