This document is scheduled to be published in the Federal Register on 05/13/2021 and available online at 6712-01 federalregister.gov/d/2021-10119, and on govinfo.gov FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION 47 CFR Part 1 [MD Docket Nos. 20-105; MD Docket Nos. 21-190; FCC 21-49; FRS 26021] Assessment and Collection of Regulatory Fees for Fiscal Year 2021. AGENCY: Federal Communications Commission. ACTION: Notice of proposed rulemaking. SUMMARY: In this document, the Federal Communications Commission (Commission) seeks comment on revising the fee schedule of FY 2021 regulatory fees. DATES: Submit comments on or before June 3, 2021; and reply comments on or before June 18, 2021. ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file comments and reply comments identified by MD Docket No. 21-190, by any of the following methods below. 1. Electronic Filers: Comments may be filed electronically using the Internet by accessing the ECFS: http://apps.fcc.gov/ecfs/. 2. Paper Filers: Parties who choose to file by paper must file an original and one copy of each filing. 3. Filings can be sent by commercial overnight courier, or by first-class or overnight U.S. Postal Service mail. All filings must be addressed to the Commission’s Secretary, Office of the Secretary, Federal Communications Commission. 4. Commercial overnight mail (other than U.S. Postal Service Express Mail and Priority Mail) must be sent to 9050 Junction Drive, Annapolis Junction, MD 20701.U.S. 5. Postal Service first-class, Express, and Priority mail must be addressed to 45 L Street, N.E. Washington DC 20554. For detailed instructions for submitting comments and additional information on the rulemaking process, see the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section of this document. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Roland Helvajian, Office of Managing Director at (202) 418-0444. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: This is a summary of the Commission's Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), FCC 21-49, MD Docket No. 20-105, and MD Docket No. 21- 190, adopted on May 3, 2021 and released on May 4, 2021. The full text of this document is available for inspection and copying during normal business hours in the FCC Reference Center, 45 L Street, NE, Washington, DC 20554, and may also be purchased from the Commission's copy contractor, BCPI, Inc., 45 L Street, NE, Washington, DC 20554. Customers may contact BCPI, Inc. via their Web site, http://www.bcpi.com, or call 1-800-378-3160. This document is available in alternative formats (computer diskette, large print, audio record, and braille). Persons with disabilities who need documents in these formats may contact the FCC by e-mail: [email protected] or phone: 202-418-0530 or TTY: 202-418-0432. Effective March 19, 2020, and until further notice, the Commission no longer accepts any hand or messenger delivered filings. This is a temporary measure taken to help protect the health and safety of individuals, and to mitigate the transmission of COVID-19. See FCC Announces Closure of FCC Headquarters Open Window and Change in Hand-Delivery Policy, Public Notice, DA 20-304 (March 19, 2020). https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-closes-headquarters-open-window-and- changes-hand-delivery-policy. During the time the Commission’s building is closed to the general public and until further notice, if more than one docket or rulemaking number appears in the caption of a proceeding, paper filers need not submit two additional copies for each additional docket or rulemaking number; an original and one copy are sufficient. I. PROCEDURAL MATTERS 8. Ex Parte Information. This proceeding shall be treated as a “permit-but-disclose” proceeding in accordance with the Commission’s ex parte rules. Persons making ex parte presentations must file a copy of any written presentation or a memorandum summarizing any oral presentation within two business days after the presentation (unless a different deadline applicable to the Sunshine period applies). Persons making oral ex parte presentations are reminded that memoranda summarizing the presentation must (1) list all persons attending or otherwise participating in the meeting at which the ex parte presentation was made, and (2) summarize all data presented and arguments made during the presentation. If the presentation consisted in whole or in part of the presentation of data or arguments already reflected in the presenter’s written comments, memoranda, or other filings in the proceeding, the presenter may provide citations to such data or arguments in his or her prior comments, memoranda, or other filings (specifying the relevant page and/or paragraph numbers where such data or arguments can be found) in lieu of summarizing them in the memorandum. Documents shown or given to Commission staff during ex parte meetings are deemed to be written ex parte presentations and must be filed consistent with section 1.1206(b) of the Commission’s rules. In proceedings governed by section 1.49(f) of the Commission’s rules or for which the Commission has made available a method of electronic filing, written ex parte presentations and memoranda summarizing oral ex parte presentations, and all attachments thereto, must be filed through the electronic comment filing system available for that proceeding, and must be filed in their native format (e.g., .doc, .xml, .ppt, searchable .pdf). Participants in this proceeding should familiarize themselves with the Commission’s ex parte rules. 9. Initial Regulatory Flexibility Analysis. An initial regulatory flexibility analysis (IRFA) is contained in this summary. Comments to the IRFA must be identified as responses to the IRFA and filed by the deadlines for comments on the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. The Commission will send a copy of the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, including the IRFA, to the Chief Counsel for Advocacy of the Small Business Administration. 10. Initial Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 Analysis. This document does not contain new or modified information collection requirements subject to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (PRA), Public Law 104-13. In addition, therefore, it does not contain any new or modified information collection burden for small business concerns with fewer than 25 employees, pursuant to the Small Business Paperwork Relief Act of 2002, Public Law 107-198, see 44 U.S.C. 3506(c)(4). I. INTRODUCTION 1. Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, we seek comment on the Commission’s proposed regulatory fees for fiscal year (FY) 2021. Specifically, we propose to collect $374,000,000 in regulatory fees for FY 2021, pursuant to sections 9 and 9A of the Communications Act of 1934, as amended (Act or Communications Act), and the Commission’s FY 2021 Appropriation. 2. In this Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, we seek comment on several specific regulatory fee issues: (i) including non-geographic numbers in the calculation of the number of subscribers for each commercial mobile radio service (CMRS) provider; (ii) ending our phase in of direct broadcast satellite (DBS) regulatory fees, and instead including the Media Bureau-based DBS regulatory fee in the same fee category as cable television and Internet Protocol Television (IPTV); (iii) assessing regulatory fees for full service broadcast television using the same population-based methodology that we used for FY 2020 and continuing the changes we adopted previously for stations in Puerto Rico; (iv) adopting new regulatory fees for the new NGSO fee subcategories for “less complex” NGSO systems and “other” NGSO systems; and (v) extending our streamlined waiver provisions adopted last year for FY 2021. 3. Each year the Commission issues a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to seek comment on its regulatory fee methodology and proposed regulatory fees for the fiscal year. The Commission also seeks to improve the regulatory fee methodology. Since 2013, the Commission has made numerous reforms to the regulatory fee schedule. In 2019, the Commission adopted several rule amendments to conform them to the RAY BAUM’S Act of 2018. Last year, the Commission added non-U.S. licensed space stations with United States market access grants to the regulatory fee schedule. The Commission concluded that assessing the same regulatory fees on all space stations with U.S. market access, whether U.S. licensed or non-U.S. licensed, would better reflect the benefits received by these operators through the Commission’s adjudicatory, enforcement, regulatory, and international coordination activities, and would promote regulatory parity and fairness among space station operating in the United States. II. NOTICE OF PROPOSED RULEMAKING A. Methodology for Allocating FTEs 4. Congress requires us to collect $374,000,000 in regulatory fees for FY 2021. In doing so, section 9 of the Act requires us to set regulatory fees to “reflect the full-time equivalent number of employees within the bureaus and offices of the Commission adjusted to take into account factors that are reasonably related to the benefits provided to the payor of the fee by the Commission’s activities.” We implement this directive by looking first to the core bureaus, i.e., the bureaus that conduct work that directly benefits fee payors, in order to establish the number of direct FTEs from each bureau. The remaining non-auction FTEs and other Commission costs are categorized as indirect. Once we have identified the direct FTEs for each core bureau, we look within each core bureau to allocate fees to specific fee categories. These proportional calculations allocate all Commission non-auction related costs across all fee categories. We seek comment on this methodology. 5. The Commission identifies the number of FTEs within each of the four core bureaus (i.e., Wireline Competition Bureau, Wireless Telecommunications Bureau, International Bureau, and Media Bureau) and then further subdivides within each core bureau to account for its regulatory fee categories. As a general matter, we expect that the work of the FTEs in the four core bureaus will remain focused on the industry segment regulated by each of those bureaus.