FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION

Answer to questionnaire submitted to Federal executive departments and independent agencies by Government Information Subcommittee of the House Government Operations Committee

Questions 1-4

I. GENERAL

The following information is not ordinarily made available by the Commission to the general public, including the press, business, and trade groups, and research and scientific groups (except to the extent noted below all information that is made available to business and trade groups and research and scientific groups is also made available to the press media serving the general public):

1. Classified security information: This includes all information relating to the national defense and is classified as "confidential," "secret," and "top secret," pursuant to Presidential Executive Order 10501, 18 Federal Register 7049 and the Commission's Regulations for the Safeguarding of Official Information (mimeo 98972), a copy of which is attached. All procedures and policies for classifying, handling, reviewing, and access to such information is contained in the above Executive order, and the Commission regulations.

This Commission does not originally classify much security information, although a considerable amount of such material originally classified by other agencies is used by the Commission in the course of its work. As indicated in the Executive order and the Commission's regulations, supra, classified material originally classified by another agency cannot be made available by the Commission to anyone except duly authorized employees of this agency without the approval of the originating agency.

To the extent that research and scientific groups and business and trade groups have legitimate need for classified information and the personnel involved have the necessary security clearance, such information may be made available to them in accordance with the provisions of the Executive order and the Commission's regulations, supra. 2. Nonclassified information: The Commission's policies with respect to public inspection of its files are set forth in section 0.406 of the Commission's rules and regulations, which provides as follows:

SEC. 0.406. Inspection of records: Subject to the provisions of section 4 (j), 213 (f), 412, and 606 of the act, the files of the Commission shall be open to public inspection as follows:

(a) Tariff schedules required to be filed under section 203 of the act, all documents filed in connection therewith, and all communications relating thereto; valuation reports, including exhibits filed in connection therewith, unless otherwise ordered by the Commission, with reasons therefor, pursuant to section 213 of the act; and annual and monthly reports required to be filed under section 219 of the act.

(b) Contracts, agreements, or arrangements between carriers, filed pursuant to section 211 (a) of the act, except such contracts relating to foreign wire or

radio communications which are marked "not for public inspection" by the Commission: Provided, however, That the Commission will give appropriate consideration to a petition filed by any person showing that any such contract, agreement, or arrangement relates to foreign wire or radio communication; that its publication would place American communication companies at a disadvantage in meeting the competition of foreign communications companies; and that public interest would be served by keeping its terms confidential.

(c) All applications and amendments thereto filed under title II and title III of the act, including all documents and exhibits filed with and made a part thereof, and all communications protesting or endorsing any such applications, authorizations, and certifications issued upon such applications; all pleadings, depositions, exhibits, transcripts of testimony, reports of examiners or presiding officers, exceptions, briefs, proposed reports, or findings of fact and conclusions; all minutes and orders of the Commission. The information filed under section 1.341 (47 C. F. R. 1.341) and network and transcription contracts filed pursuant to section 1.342 (47 C. F. R. 1.342) shall not be open to public inspection. The Commission may, however, either on its own motion, or on motion of an applicant, permittee, or licensee, for good cause shown, designate any of the material in this paragraph as “not for public inspection."

(d) All petitions for issuance, amendment, or repeal of any rule or regulation, including all documents and exhibits filed with or made part thereof and all communications protesting or endorsing any such petitions; all pleadings, depositions, exhibits, transcript of testimony, reports of examiners or presiding officers, exceptions, briefs, proposed reports, or findings of fact and conclusions; all minutes and orders of the Commission. The Commission may, however, either on its own motion, or on motion by petitioner or those filing comments, for good cause shown, designate any of the material in this paragraph as "not for public inspection.”

(e) In the discretion of the Commission, other files, including those excepted in paragraphs (a), (b), and (c) of this section, upon written request describing in detail the documents to be inspected and the reasons therefor.

(f) For provisions relating to inspection of files relating to Presidential licenses for submarine cables, see appendix No. 1 to part 1 of the Commission's Rules and Regulations.

Moreover, under sections 0.322, 0.241 (e) (7), 0.257 (a) and 0.291 (b) (2) of the Commission's rules, the General Counsel and the Chiefs of the Broadcast, Common Carrier and Safety and Special Radio Services Bureaus, are delegated authority to act on requests for inspection of records not open to public inspection, pursuant to the provisions of section 0.406. Any person aggrieved by any staff action, taken pursuant to delegated authority, may petition the full Commission for reconsideration of the action in accordance with section 5 (d) of the Communications Act of 1934, and section 0.202 of the Commission's rules.

The terms, other than security terms, used by this Commission to designate information not to be made public are "for FCC use only," "not for public inspection." and "not for publication." Moreover, items prepared by the staff for the Commission agenda, which are not made available to the public, while not marked with a specific term, are prepared on a distinctive colored paper which makes them readily distinguishable.

Only the Commission is authorized to designate categories of information which are not to be made available to the public, and only the Commission is authorized to remove such restrictions from any category of information. However, the General Counsel and the chiefs of the Commission's functional bureaus, as noted above, have been delegated authority to rule on certain specified requests for information subject to review by the Commission.

The restrictions upon the availability of information to the public are reviewed in connection with specific request for permission to inspect material which has been designated as unavailable.

It is impossible to determine the proportion of material handled by the Commission which is not made public without making an extensive and lengthy analysis of all this material, and such an analysis has never been made. However, the vast majority of the information concerning the Commission and its functions is available to the public.

(a) Information filed with the Commission on a confidential basis: The Commission receives certain types of information dealing with finances, business contracts, and equipment from its licensees and manufacturers. It is necessary that this information be received on a confidential basis in view of the fact that it contains trade secrets and financial data which would be of benefit to competitors of those who submitted the information, and it is not made public in order to protect the business interests of the persons who submit it. Section 4 (b) (4) of the Federal Reports Act of 1952 (5 U. S. C., sec. 139 (b)) is applicable with respect to the question of making any of this information available to the public.

The following are examples of the types of information which are filed with the Commission on a confidential basis:

(1) Financial reports and contracts required to be filed by broadcast licensees pursuant to sections 1.341 and 1.342 of the Commission's rules. ́ While the Commission does not make these reports and contracts available for public inspection, it does issue statistics with respect to the broadcast industry which are compiled from the data furnished by individual licensees.

(2) Experimental reports: Pursuant to sections 5.204 (b) and 5.255 (b) of the Commission's rules, the Commission, on request, withholds from public inspection reports filed by holders of experimental licenses, unless the public interest requires disclosure.

(3) Files concerning equipment submitted to this Commission for type acceptance or type approval: Pursuant to section 2.542 of the Commission's rules the Commission will withhold information about equipment submitted by manufacturers for type approval and type acceptance.

(4) Field strength measures with respect to television broadcast stations which the person filing does not wish to be made public. See enclosed public notice of the Commission dated June 2, 1955.

(6) Working papers: In general, see Sanders Brothers Radio Station v. Federal Communications Commission (70 App. D. C. 297, 106 F. 2d 321, affirmed on this point, 309 U. S. 470, and Attorney General's Manual on the Administrative Procedure Act, pp. 24-25). (1) Interoffice memoranda.

(2) Complaints concerning licensees of the Commission (if such complaints are made the basis for subsequent Commission action, the substance of such complaints are, of course, made available to interested parties).

(3) Reports of investigations, inspections, and monitoring activities (wherever a formal investigation is instituted by the Commission, a report thereon is made in accordance with sections 4 (1) and 404 of the Communications Act).

(c) Matters relating solely to the internal management of the Com

mission:

(1) The files on individual employees of the Commission which concern the personnel security program. (See Presidential directive of March 13, 1948, 13 F. R. 1359.)

(2) The personnel files of the Commission. While the files themselves are not made public, pertinent information from those files may be made available to parties with a legitimate interest in them, such as prospective employers, credit agencies, etc. (d) Executive communications: See question 11, below.

B. Congress: All of the information that is available to the general public is, of course, available to individual Congressmen and congressional committees.

All of the information listed above as not being normally available to the general public may be made available by the Commission to committees of the Congress where the information is pertinent to the official duties of the particular committee and concerns matters coming within its jurisdiction, with the following qualifications:

1. Information concerning finances, trade secrets or equipment filed with the Commission on a confidential basis by licensees, manufacturers, or other persons. The Commission's policy with respect to making such information available to the congressional committees is governed by the opinion of the Attorney General set forth in a letter of June 15, 1955, to the President. (A copy of that letter is enclosed.)

2. The files on individual employees of the Commission which concern the personnel security program. These files are not made available to the Congress pursuant to a Presidential directive of March 13, 1948 (13 F. R. 1359).

3. Executive communications. (See question 11, below.) C. Other Federal agencies: All of the information listed above as not being normally available to the general public may be made available by the Commission to other agencies of the Federal Government to the extent that the Commission finds that such information is necessary for the performance, by the other agency, of its official duties. The only exception to this policy concerns information filed by licensees, manufacturers, or other persons with the Commission on a confidential basis. The availability of such information to other Federal agencies is governed by the provisions of section 4 (b) (4) of the Federal Reports Act of 1952 (5 U. S. C., sec. 139 (b)).

Question 5

The annual cost to this Commission of administering security provisions applying to information held by this agency is nominal (not exceeding $1,000 per year).

Question 6

All categories and types of information about the activities of the Commission, not excepted above, are available to the organizations and individuals listed in question 1. (See 0.406 of the Commission's Rules and Regulations.)

Question 7

Pursuant to section 3 of the Administrative Procedure Act and section 4 (m) of the Communications Act of 1934, this Commission must make available to the public its official reports and decisions. The office in this agency through which this statutory duty is discharged is the Office of Reports and Information. In addition to this duty, under the law, this Office is also the organization which makes available to the press and to Congress Commission decisions,

orders, reports, and other releases which have been mimeographed or otherwise reproduced. The normal staff of this Office consists of 4 persons, and its current annual cost is $25,435. Details concerning this Office and its operations are contained in the attached Office of Reports and Information Staff Manual.

The Commission also maintains public reference rooms where official dockets and records of the Commission may be inspected by the public. In view of the fact that these dockets and other records would have to be maintained regardless of whether they were made available to the public, the Commission is not able to provide a cost figure for making such material available for public inspection.

Various members of the Commission's staff also help to supply information concerning matters coming within the scope of their official duties in response to specific requests from the press or the public. The Commission is not able to estimate the cost of supplying such information.

Question 8

To the best of the Commission's knowledge, no information possessed by this Commission reaches groups or individuals not entitled to it by law, Executive order, regulations, or policy.

Question 9

The Commission does receive information from other agencies when requests are submitted to them. We are not aware of any instances where information desired by the Commission from other agencies was denied or where the Commission denied requested information to other agencies during the period July 1, 1954, to July 1, 1955. On occasion there have been delays in receiving information requested from agencies because of security or other reasons. Based upon the Commission's experience, the flow of information among Federal agencies is now satisfactory, and we have no recommendations to make at this time concerning its improvement.

Question 10

In the Commission's opinion, timely, factual, and pertinent information concerning the affairs of this agency is now being made available to all interested persons and we have no recommendation to make at this time concerning this matter.

ADDENDUM TO SECTION I-INDEPENDENT AGENCIES

Question 11

All of the information with respect to the quasi-judicial functions of this agency is made available to the public with the following exceptions:

(a) Before hearings or formal proceedings: Before formal adjudicatory proceedings are instituted, complaints filed with respect to licensees of the Commission and reports of investigations which may be made by the Commission's staff, as well as memoranda from the staff to the Commission concerning the institution of such adjudicatory proceedings, are not made public.

(b) During the course of hearings or formal proceedings: As soon as the Commission institutes formal adjudicatory proceed