C-Band Earth Station Freeze Leaves Operators Worried They're Iced Out
With the FCC 27-month-and-counting freeze on new C-band fixed satellite service earth station registrations (see 1804200003), operators with stations not on the list -- particularly operators who never had a chance to register earth stations they bought after the freeze -- are concerned they'll have to shoulder the expense of the relocation. The commission hasn't said how it will handle the dozens of filings it received this month after it solicited corrections (see 2007070037). That public notice said the International Bureau won't take applications seeking to qualify for incumbent status but instead is looking for "minor corrections" such as site address or GPS coordinate fixes. The FCC didn't comment Monday.
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Not getting access to relocation expenses for the C-band transition could mean having to end providing video service in the Wyoming and Ohio communities where WinDBreak Cable filed about two earth stations sites being omitted, CEO Bill Bauer told us. Both were bought after the freeze began, and the previous owners never registered the Wyoming earth station, and the Cleveland owners filed but never paid registration, he said. He said in recent weeks, even though the FCC said it's not doing any more registrations, he logged onto the International Bureau filing system site, went through the registration process and didn't get rejected. "Now we don't know what's going to happen," he said. The commission is "going to have to do something" because excluding headends bought after the registration window closed doesn't make sense.
"You are leaving people high and dry with expenses that won't be reimbursed," echoed broadcast lawyer Anne Crump of Fletcher Heald. The FCC's push on earth station registration made it seem it was for interference protection, and many operators don't have the kind of detailed specifications the applications ask for, she said. For earth stations that end up not on the list, transition choices are either to expend money out of pocket or lose programming abilities, Crump said.
"There have to be a lot of these out there," MCTV President Katherine Gessner said, citing the Woodsfield, Ohio, cable system and its unregistered earth station MCTV bought in late 2018. Inability to add them to the incumbent list punishes the new owners, she said. Added MCTV retired President Bob Gessner, the video business is difficult for small rural operators, and without sharing in the C-band auction proceeds for moving costs, "they just may very well leave the video bushiness completely."
The FCC should reopen the registration window through the end of August because some National Translator Association members mightn't have received the message about registering, President John Terrill told us. Noting the post-incentive auction repacking, he said getting the database right in advance "is going to save a whole lot of time, money and tears."
ACA Connects emailed that the filings "present legitimate, reasonable reasons for the FCC to amend its preliminary list to include operators’ earth stations and/or antennas. Not only are these amendments consistent with the FCC’s intent that no earth station operator or customer of an operator be harmed by the C-band transition, but no one -- including space station operators -- has relied on the list’s omissions to their detriment. As a result, the FCC should immediately grant the requests of these filers and others that may come in over the next few weeks and include them."