Nextel’s “Let’s make a deal”

In a white paper filed with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Nextel Communications has proposed an “expansion, realignment and further protection of public safety communications.”

According to Nextel, the proposal describes a public-private partnership designed to facilitate two important public safety objectives. First, it would provide a framework for mitigating interference to public safety communications from commercial services at 800MHz. This would be accomplished by separating the channel blocks used by cellular and other CMRS providers from those used by public safety communications systems. Second, it would double public safety’s spectrum allocation at 800MHz, thereby providing opportunities to increase capacity, deploy advanced technologies and enhance interoperability among police, fire and rescue personnel.

Nextel believes the proposal would result in a more efficient use of spectrum by all parties through a realignment of radio frequencies in the 700MHz, 800MHz and 900MHz bands. If adopted, public safety communications systems would have access to a 20MHz block of contiguous spectrum in the lower 800MHz band — more than double public safety’s current allocation of 9.5MHz of non-contiguous spectrum at 800MHz.

This spectrum would be adjacent to the 700MHz frequency band already allocated by the FCC for future public safety usage.

Under the proposal, Nextel would exchange 16MHz of its current licensed spectrum to make the realignment possible. Specifically, Nextel would exchange 4MHz in the 700MHz band, approximately 8MHz of current SMR spectrum in the lower non-contiguous channels of the 800MHz band, and about 4MHz of spectrum in the 900MHz band.

In return for this spectrum, Nextel would receive 16MHz of spectrum, comprised of 6MHz in the upper 800MHz band and 10MHz in the 2.1GHz band. Nextel’s current, contiguous spectrum holdings of 10MHz in the upper 800MHz band would be unaffected

Under the proposal, Nextel would maintain its net spectrum allocation, and does not anticipate any adverse impact on its ability to serve its existing or future customers.

In addition, Nextel is willing to provide financial and other resources to the public safety community to facilitate implementation of the proposal. Specifically, Nextel would contribute up to $500 million to help cover the public safety community’s costs of retuning incumbent operators to the new public safety spectrum block and other expenses associated with the realignment, provided the FCC adopts the proposal substantially as submitted.