Barry D. Umansky is co-executive director, senior fellow, senior policy advisor and board member/secretary of the Digital Policy Institute (“DPI”) and a professor in the Telecommunications Department at Ball State University (“BSU”). Umansky formerly held the Edmund F. and Virginia B. Ball Chair in Telecommunications at BSU. He is a communications lawyer who has represented broadcasters and other electronic media and has had an extensive communications career in government and industry.
After work at radio and TV stations in the Midwest during college and law school, he served for seven years as an attorney doing communications policy work at the Federal Communications Commission (“FCC”) in Washington, D.C. Mr. Umansky then became Deputy General Counsel with the National Association of Broadcasters (“NAB”) in Washington, D.C. During his twenty years at the NAB Legal and Regulatory Affairs Department, he had responsibilities for radio and television new technology and spectrum allocation issues, environmental and land use issues, station licensing and other regulatory matters. He edited and co-authored many NAB publications, including several editions of the NAB Legal Guide to Broadcast Law and Regulation, the NAB Broadcaster’s Guide to FCC RF Radiation Regulation Compliance and the NAB Contests, Lotteries and Casino Gambling Guidebook. Mr. Umansky served as a member of the boards of the former Washington-based Electromagnetic Energy Association and the National Antenna Consortium.
He has been an active member of the Federal Communications Bar Association. He is a Past-President of the Kansas Association of Broadcasters Foundation, where he still serves as a board member. He also is a Past-President of the Broadcast Education Association.
In April 2012, he was appointed by the Chairman of the FCC to serve on its Consumer Advisory Committee. In March 2013, he was reappointed to that federal advisory committee and was named co-chair of that federal advisory committee’s “Internet Protocol Transition Working Group.” In May 2015, he again was reappointed to the FCC’s Consumer Advisory Committee and was named co-chair of the CAC “Media Working Group.” He completed this latest CAC appointment during 2016.
In addition to his DPI duties and undergraduate and graduate teaching responsibilities at Ball State, Mr. Umansky is faculty advisor to two Ball State student organizations: “Station WCRD” (a student-managed and FCC licensed broadcast radio station) and the university’s “Pre-Law Interest Group.”
Mr. Umansky is a frequent speaker at communications industry meetings and often is quoted on communications policy matters in industry and general press and on radio and television programs. He is a graduate of Carleton College and the Washington University School of Law. Umansky also is a member of the District of Columbia and Missouri bars.