FCC Eyes LPTV Digital Transition in Forthcoming Rulemaking
The FCC is no longer proposing 2012 as the year for all of the thousands of low-power TV stations to make the digital transition (CD June 10 p7), under recent changes to a draft rulemaking notice that’s likely to be made public soon, agency officials said. They said a recent draft of the item seeks comment on a transition for all low-power stations of 2012, 2015 as proposed in the National Broadband Plan, or other proposed dates. A version of the notice initially circulated in 2008 during Kevin Martin’s tenure as chairman with the 2012 analog cutoff. The current version may soon be approved by all FCC members and released as early as this week, agency officials said. Executives said the industry can meet a 2015 deadline, and may be able to do so for 2012.
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The Media Bureau item takes a step back from an earlier draft in not appearing to push for a 2012 cutoff of low-power broadcasters’ analog signals, agency officials said. Recognizing the need to free up spectrum in the 700 MHz band that’s been auctioned to wireless companies, the further rulemaking notice asks about establishing an earlier deadline for low-power stations to vacate channels 52-59, agency officials said. The item asks about exempting from whatever the final analog cutoff is broadcasters facing financial hardship, and about how to educate viewers about any low-power transition, they said. A bureau spokeswoman declined to comment.
A major question for low-power broadcasters is how they'll be impacted by the reallocation of 120 MHz of TV spectrum for wireless broadband that’s also envisioned by the plan, some industry officials said. Repacking TV spectrum to free up airwaves for use by wireless broadband would mean “there just isn’t going to be any space for” low-power TV, said President Ron Bruno of Bruno Goodworth Network, with 11 such stations. For the industry, “the real issue will be the spectrum repacking, not the digital transition,” said broadcast lawyer Peter Tannenwald of Fletcher Heald. Most of his low-power TV clients have gone all-digital, though some continue broadcasting in analog and rely on cable operators to reach viewers, he said. There were 7,536 U.S. low-power stations and translators as of June 30, figures collected by the bureau show.
"About the first question everyone asks me is, ‘how do I decide when or how I might do it if they might decide to shut me down,'” Tannenwald said of a DTV mandate. “'You can’t give us any deadline to buy digital equipment until you tell us what you're going to do with this spectrum repacking'” and “'why should we spend 5 cents on digital equipment unless we know what you're going to do with our spectrum?'” will be the sort of comments industry makes, he predicted. Low-power broadcasters generally want to go digital, officials said.
"Every single low-power is either turning digital or has turned digital,” Bruno said. A “deadline that’s fairly reasonable” like Dec. 31, 2012, and “if they give a few waivers for those who are left behind, like they did for the full-power [transition], you won’t see much of a fight,” he predicted. There are some pitfalls for moving off analog, an appraiser of broadcast properties said. “It probably is harmful, not economically, [but] to viewership” because “the captive market that analog low-powers still have is they have areas that may be heavily minority populated” and continue to use older, analog TVs, said President David Schutz of Hoffman Schutz Media Capital. “You've potentially wiped off all of the analog secondary sets that continue to exist."
"Oh Lord, we better be able to do it by” 2015, said Executive Director David Honig of the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council, which is getting a donation of low-power TV stations from Trinity Broadcasting Network (CD Aug 24 p3). “I am sure we could do it by then.” The council will get a total of 153 low-power stations from Trinity, versus the 155 that the non-profit, religious network and council said last month were up for donation, and will have filed paperwork for the transfers with the FCC late Monday or will do so Tuesday, Honig said. “Most of them should be fairly straightforward flash cuts” to DTV, he said. “But some of them may require new sites, some may require frequency changes, some may require community of license changes.”