The Sinclair/Tribune merger deal should be rejected by the FCC and can’t be made more palatable with merger conditions, said an ‘informal coalition” of Dish Network, Common Cause, the American Cable Association, the Competitive Carriers Association, Computer and Communications Industry Association and One America News Network, in a press call Monday.
The FCC should allow radio boosters to originate programming so radio stations will be better able to target advertisers, said numerous companies in replies in the media deregulation docket 17-105 Friday (see 1707060060). Allowing radio broadcasters to compete with other industries that can geo-target ads cheaply “could significantly increase radio revenue, said Monroe Capital. Similar comments were filed by CSREM, Geo Broadcast Solutions, Spanish Broadcasting System, Edgewater Broadcasting and others. The Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood and the Center for Digital Democracy opposed requests in the docket to loosen children’s TV rules and advertising restrictions. “The proposals by industry commenters to relax the advertising limits and children’s program requirements would harm children by exposing them to excessive and unfair marketing and depriving them of quality programming,” the groups said. Reynolds Technical Associates, like many broadcasters, backed loosening the rural radio rule, and said the FCC’s use of reference coordinates led to “extortion.” Rules allow some owners to demand fees in exchange for consenting to a change in reference numbers, RTA said. The Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council supported proposed changes to rules governing equal employment opportunity forms and public filing requirements, but said the FCC should leave in place rule that motivates broadcasters to seek employees at “entitlement sources.” In broadcasting, “most hiring is done face-to-face and is based on relationships,” MMTC said. “Entitlement sources should be embraced as a window into these relationships -- an opportunity to facilitate diverse hiring in the digital age.”
The FCC Media Bureau denied requests from the American Cable Association, Public Knowledge and Dish Network for more time to comment and more information on Sinclair's buying Tribune Media (see 1707250045), said an order released Friday in docket 17-179. The bureau agreed with Sinclair and Tribune arguments that the requests for more information and third-party data should properly be filed as part of a petition to deny, during the time frame for such petitions. The motion for additional information is “misplaced,” the bureau said. “Movants do not need access to the wide-ranging and highly confidential information movants request the Commission to demand in order to file a petition to deny.” The movants and Sinclair/Tribune conceded it's up to commission staff to issue information requests in the merger proceeding, so the motion for more information is dismissed, the order said. Because of the dismissal, the bureau didn’t consider whether a previous case on confidential documents in a deal, CBS v. FCC, applies to this matter. ACA, PK and Dish also didn’t establish a basis for an extension of time, the order said. Though they had asked for the extension to have more time to go over the additional information requested, the denial of that request makes the time extension moot, the bureau said. Several other entities had filed in support of the request, including Common Cause and NTCA. A spokesman for ACA said the movants were "disappointed but not surprised." Commissioner Mignon Clyburn indicated with a tweet she hadn't been informed 48 hours ahead of the decision to deny the request. "I've asked about the @FCC majority’s policy of providing 48 hours notice but it doesn’t seem to apply here," Clyburn said of the order. "The 48-hours policy does not apply to requests for extension of time, which are routinely handled at the Bureau level," an FCC spokeswoman emailed. "That said, the offices were given notice." Representatives from Dish, ACA, Common Cause, the Computer & Communications Industry Association and other supporters of the motion plan a news-media call Monday on their opposition filings to Sinclair/Tribune, said a news release: "As a group, these representatives will call for the Sinclair-Tribune merger to be rejected."
The FCC's going from three to five commissioners (see 1708030060) isn’t likely to alter Chairman Ajit Pai’s momentum and main policy agenda, but it could lead to shifts on lower-profile items and possibly a slightly slower-moving commission if Pai seeks to include all the members in deliberations, industry officials said Friday. Former officials said the additions likely means Commissioner Mike O’Rielly’s role will grow in stature. Telecom, cable and satellite representatives expect little to no learning curve given the experience the two bring. Commissioner Brendan Carr may not trigger any notable change in Pai’s agenda, since pet interests of his very likely could be baked into Pai’s priorities.
The LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition said it's “declaring a truce” in the debate over a proposal to reserve vacant channels in the TV bands for unlicensed use (see 1707110015). The declaration came in an email newsletter Tuesday. Though NAB and Microsoft have been actively pressing the FCC on the matter, a broadcast industry official told us the two sides remain far apart, and the coalition announcement doesn’t indicate any of the other parties active in the vacant channel proceeding have reached an agreement with the coalition. The group is working on a plan under which licensees would be offered “economic opportunities to utilize their spectrum rights to participate in the solving of national problems,” the email said. LPTV spectrum could be used for rural broadband, and to assist in the rollout of ATSC 3.0, the email said. Microsoft didn’t comment. NAB "remains strongly opposed to the Microsoft proposal," a spokesman said in response to the coalition announcement. "Microsoft’s proposal could damage TV reception for tens of millions of people living in both rural and urban America.”
Ion's seeking changes to FCC repacking reimbursement processes comes as the payment plan is a problem for many, broadcast industry officials and their attorneys told us. Ion’s petition in docket 12-268 asks the FCC to change its plans for reimbursing station owners (see 1707310068) to give them access to 100 percent of estimated reimbursement funds upfront, plus changes to what modifications are considered upgrades for stations, and restrictions on how an operator can adjust its signal.
Emergency alert system entities, EAS participants and law enforcement organizations divided over whether incidents involving danger to police should have their own EAS code, in comments in FCC docket 15-94 by Monday’s deadline. Most commenters -- including APCO, DOJ (see 1707310045) and the National Public Safety Telecommunications Council (NPSTC) -- support creating the alert code. Others believe existing codes can serve the same function, and adding another will further dilute effectiveness of the EAS system or increase expense. The proposed BLU event code is “another vanity Event Code intended to meet the needs of the one/few at the expense of further eroding the intrinsic value of mass alerting for more significant and substantive mass call-to-action notifications,” said broadcasting technical service provider McCarthy Radio Enterprises.
The post-incentive auction repacking hasn’t been afflicted by a lack of enough engineers, materials and resources to go around, but that could change once broadcasters have more certainty about what will be reimbursed, broadcast engineers and industry officials told us. Though industry officials said some orders for new equipment have come in, most broadcasters are waiting for results from the FCC’s review of their expenses and for news from Capitol Hill and the agency about how far their reimbursement funds will go (see 1707260061 and 1707310050), said Dennis Wallace, broadcast engineer at Meintel, Sgrignoli. Dielectric Antenna Sales Executive Christine Zuba expects a push once stations have access to their reimbursement funds. Broadcasters likely will “wait until they have a confirmed outcome as to what’s going to be approved,” Wallace said. The IATF said reimbursement funds are expected to be available in Q4 (see 1707270051).
The FCC is considered likely to act on updating its rules on FM translator interference with full-power stations through an upcoming adjudication rather than through a rulemaking, several radio industry officials said in interviews. The FCC has a pending application for review on an interference complaint between an FM translator and full-power station in Indiana that involves the issues (see 1611040051) raised in recent petitions for rulemaking from NAB and Aztec Capital Partners (see 1706010063), industry officials said. The FCC’s latest FM translator license application window, which opened Wednesday, is likely to exacerbate interference issues between translators and full powers, industry officials said.
FCC reimbursement fund administrator EY had to press broadcasters for additional information on their repacking reimbursement requests because many are upgrading to ATSC 3.0-compatible equipment and didn’t submit actual price estimates, said FCC Incentive Auction Task Force Chair Jean Kiddoo and industry officials in interviews.