REMARKS OF MATTHEW BERRY, CHIEF OF STAFF TO FCC COMMISSIONER AJIT PAI, AT THE FLORIDA ASSOCIATION OF BROADCASTERS
2015 ANNUAL CONVENTION -
MIAMI, FL
"In our nation's capital, where I work, the phrase "public interest" is thrown around a lot. Indeed,
there is a cottage industry of lawyers and lobbyists who pursue a narrow and extreme ideological agenda under the guise of promoting the "public interest." But to broadcasters, serving the public interest isn't empty rhetoric or a self-aggrandizing political slogan. It is what you do each and every day, in ways large and small, to make your communities better places to live.
That, among other reasons, is why the FCC shouldn't be your enemy. Our mission shouldn't be
to saddle you with onerous and outdated regulatory burdens. Our goal shouldn't be to interfere with new business arrangements that allow you to compete in an increasingly crowded media marketplace. And our role shouldn't be to lecture you on how you should change your business model.
Rather, our objective should be to create a regulatory environment that allows the broadcasting
industry to thrive and enables you to do what you do best. That means we should modernize our rules to update or eliminate regulations that no longer make sense. It means that we should promote regulatory parity between broadcasting and other industries. And it means that issues of concern to broadcasters, like pirate radio, shouldn't be ignored."
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