FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai put his support behind noncommercial stations using...
FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai put his support behind noncommercial stations using on-air time to raise funds for third-party charities and proposing regulatory changes to improve the AM band. Allowing noncommercial educational stations to use up to 1 percent of their…
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annual airtime to raise funds would allow stations “to help meet the humanitarian needs in their local communities and around the world, and it wouldn’t undermine the noncommercial nature of their operations,” he said Tuesday in a speech to the National Religious Broadcasters board in National Harbor, Md. A proceeding on the rule change, suggested by NRB, is still pending (CD Feb 4 p8). He rejected arguments that such a rule change would put stations in the position of having to approve some requests for airtime while denying others, or that audiences will be driven away. Broadcasters make plenty of decisions every day, “and I'm sure they can handle this one without antacid,” he said. “I don’t think that less than 15 minutes a day of charitable fundraising will alienate those who listen to or watch noncommercial stations.” If it does, “stations have every incentive to change course,” he said. He also encouraged broadcasters to participate in the comment period for the forthcoming NPRM on revitalizing the AM band (CD Sept 20 p11). The commission will have to act quickly “to give AM broadcasters relief while we come up with more permanent fixes for the band’s difficulties,” he said. The commission should go further in helping AM stations secure FM translators, he added: “We should open up a window where any AM station without an FM translator can get one so long as there is available spectrum."