A disappointing legacy.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Outgoing Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell has done at least three things during his tumultuous tenure for which consumers should be deeply grateful:

As an unabashed champion of deregulation and big media mergers, Powell has demonstrated how much damage the FCC can do to consumer access to diverse sources of news and information. Think AOL-Time Warner.

As a former free speech champion who vowed when he became FCC chairman in 2001 that he would not become the nation's nanny, his unprecedented crackdown on indecency has demonstrated the power of prudish social conservatives to hijack the FCC agenda. Think Janet Jackson.

As an acknowledged technological visionary who promoted digital communications, Powell proved that unrestrained faith in the free market tends to produce telecommunications and television technology that favors the wealthy. Think broadband Internet and digital TV.

Given those dubious achievements, consumers ought to be most grateful that the controversial Powell has announced that he will step down in March. The 41-year-old former Army officer and son of Secretary of State Colin Powell joined the FCC in 1997 and took over as chairman in January 2001.

With an unshakable commitment to deregulation, Powell pushed the FCC's Republican majority to adopt new media ownership rules in 2003 that would have severely limited the number of voices and independent sources of news and information available to citizens. On a 3 to 2 party-line vote, the FCC approved relaxed rules that would have allowed one corporation to own the local newspaper, up to three TV stations, up to eight radio stations and the local cable system in a single media market.

More than 2 million letters, e-mails and faxes opposing the new rules poured into FCC headquarters prior to the vote. Then the Prometheus Radio Project, a tiny Philadelphia nonprofit that promoted broad access to the airwaves through low-power community radio stations, sued the FCC in federal court and won.

A federal judge ruled that the commission had failed to justify such sweeping changes and ordered the FCC to revisit the rulemaking without a presumption that favored deregulation. Congress also intervened and rolled back some of the FCC's proposed changes.

It's too bad that Powell, widely regarded as an extremely bright, capable administrator, couldn't maintain more independence from the political pressures that plagued the FCC. He is likely to be remembered most as a brilliant bureaucrat who greased the skids for big business while levying record-breaking fines on TV networks that let the f-word slip through on live TV shows.

President Bush should keep that inauspicious legacy in mind in his quest to find Powell's replacement. The FCC chairman's challenge in the digital age is to strike a better balance between the needs of the businesses that deliver information technology and the consumers who depend on it.