NEWS                                                     September 30, 1994

                      FCC CELEBRATES 60TH BIRTHDAY 

     On October 4-7, the FCC will be observing 60 years of serving the "public interest,
convenience and necessity."  Several events are planned to mark this anniversary, including
an exhibit in the FCC's meeting room (856)  that will commemorate the last 60 years in
telecommunications;  a cake cutting ceremony with the Chairman and Commissioners on
October 6 at 1 p.m. in Room 856; an FCBA reception at the Mayflower Hotel  on October 6
honoring the Chairman, Commissioners and several Members of Congress; and an FCBA
sponsored tour of telecommunications facilities for D.C. school children. 
     
     In 1934 President Franklin D. Roosevelt approved legislation establishing the Federal
Communications Commission.  Now, sixty years later, the Communications Act of 1934, as
amended, and the FCC, continue to be the backbone of our nation's telecommunications
regulation structure.  And the backbone is still flexible.  The recent introduction of auctioning
as a way to issue licenses has resulted in getting the licenses quickly to the companies who
most value them and has raised over $800 million for the U.S. Treasury.    In providing quick
and efficient access to licenses, the Commission is performing its crucial role in the creation
of new markets that will become lanes on the information highway.  

     Chairman Reed E. Hundt marked the Commission's 60th birthday by saying "I am
honored to be the latest in a distinguished line of FCC Chairmen dating from 1934 that have
been charged with regulating an ever-changing, increasingly sophisticated communications
industry in a manner that serves the "public interest, convenience and necessity.'  There is no
way to overstate the enormous changes in our industry over the last 60 years.  I wonder if
any members of that original Commission could have imagined that, before the turn of the
century, the FCC would have gone from regulating the nascent broadcast, telephone and
telegraph services to auctioning spectrum for industries that have the potential to link every
person in the world instantly."

     In 1934 the FCC was an agency with 233 employees, including seven Commissioners,
and a budget of $1.14 million.  It regulated a broadcast business which then consisted of 623
radio stations and a telephone industry with 14 million phones and total revenues of $940
million.  Today there are five Commissioners, 1,964 employees and a budget of $160.3
million.  


                                                   
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     The FCC's task has increased enormously.  Today the broadcast industry has grown to
21,640 stations (radio, TV and LPTV).  There are more video programming outlets than we
can count.   Spurred on by faxes, 800 numbers, data transmission and fiber optics, this year
the total revenues of the telephone industry will approach $200 billion.   

     If the FCC's rate of growth had kept up with, for instance, the growth of the telephone
industry,  it would currently have almost 50,000 employees.  The FCC is obviously leaner
that it was in the beginning and will continue this trend as the FCC takes the lead in
implementing President Clinton's "reinvention of government" in the years to come. 

                                                            - FCC -