A draft item set for April’s commissioners' meeting that would allow some public broadcasters to hold fundraisers for third-party nonprofits (see 1703300066) was enthusiastically supported by its original proponents, the National Religious Broadcasters. It likely won’t be welcomed by its longtime opponents in public media, according to FCC filings and interviews. “It would be a disservice to public broadcasters’ mission to become a fundraising outlet for others,” said Todd Gray of Gray Miller, who represents public broadcasters. The draft item is an outgrowth of an FCC policy that granted temporary waivers to public media stations to raise funds for disaster relief, NRB said. “We’ve seen how well these stations do in connecting those who want to give with charitable causes; we see a benefit in connecting them to everyday causes," said NRB Vice President-Government Relations Aaron Mercer.
Public media advocates, station managers and a Republican senator on the Appropriations Committee told us they believe the CPB will maintain its funding in the face of President Donald Trump’s FY 2018 budget proposal. A huge national campaign is drumming up support for meeting CPB’s funding request, including an online petition asking legislators to support public media that’s up to more than 250,000 signatures, said America’s Public Television Stations (APTS) President Patrick Butler. “I’m increasingly confident that we’ll be able to win this battle,” said Butler, conceding the struggle over the budget almost certainly will go on for months. Funding for public media has “strong bipartisan support” in Congress, said Rick Johnson, general manager of WGCU Fort Myers, Florida. “Though I would never want to take that for granted.”
The FCC's planned review of the national TV ownership cap could influence how broadcasters react to the expected restoration of the UHF discount, said Wells Fargo analyst Marci Ryvicker at a Media Institute lunch Monday. Commissioners tentatively are to vote April 20 on bringing back the discount (see 1703300066), Though analysts initially thought the ownership cap could be pushed high enough to make some very large combinations possible, Ryvicker said she no longer believes that's likely. Companies could begin announcing deals the day after the FCC’s April 20 meeting, Ryvicker said. Numerous large broadcast entities are expected to seek acquisitions, she said, including Cox, Tegna and Scripps. “Everybody’s a buyer,” Ryvicker said, though she said Tribune is an exception, and is seen as looking to sell. With the NAB Show the week after the April FCC meeting, more dealmaking than usual could happen there, she said. Though investors see ATSC 3.0 as a positive concept, there’s too much uncertainty about the future of the new standard for it to do much to move the needle on broadcast investment, Ryvicker told us. It’s not clear if plans for broadcasters to begin offering up wireless spectrum will materialize, she said. Though Ryvicker said the Wall Street view of broadcast regulation under FCC Chairman Ajit Pai has been “positive,” she said unrealistic expectations for the Trump administration's pro-business policies and the recent failure to repeal the Affordable Care Act made investors leery. Investors are anxious about the growth of streaming media hurting broadcasting, and about ratings showing general decline in TV viewership and increased time shifted viewing, she said. Broadcasting is considered dependent on live viewership, she said: “That’s why there’s a perception that broadcast is dying.” Though spending on political advertisements during the presidential campaign was down, Ryvicker expects those numbers to rebound in 2018, saying the low spending in 2016 was a onetime fluke. Recent negative attention about the placement of online ads could be a boon to broadcast advertising, she said. Total audience measurement for broadcast would help compete with pay-TV and online, Ryvicker said.
The FCC will vote whether to eliminate the UHF discount at commissioners' April 20 meeting, as expected (see 1703070055). They will take up two public media issues -- third-party fundraising, and reversing a rule approved under the previous FCC that would require public media board members to submit personal identification information, said the tentative agenda. Broadcasters anticipated UHF discount’s restoration since Ajit Pai took over the agency, and the item originally was expected in March (see 1703010074). In a blog post, Pai said one reason to restore the discount is that the way the FCC eliminated it is vulnerable to litigation, and he pledged to launch “a comprehensive review” of the national ownership cap “later this year.” The draft text of each item was released Thursday, in keeping with the chairman's transparency plans.
There are signs the FCC is more proactive about pirate radio enforcement, broadcast industry officials said in interviews. They didn’t cite examples, but broadcasters facing a high volume of pirate activity said their encounters with officials about unlicensed broadcasters have been more positive under the new administration. Enforcement officials are “taking a more proactive role” and the commission has undergone “an attitude change” toward pirate radio, said David Donovan, president of the New York State Broadcasters Association.
Advocates for unlicensed use of TV white spaces are concerned ATSC 3.0 could be a future threat, but supporters of the new standard say no such threat exists and the FCC shouldn’t put unlicensed use of spectrum ahead of broadcast licensees. “The idea that you would constrain broadcasting to protect unlicensed service is anathema to the purpose of the FCC,” said Pillsbury Winthrop communications attorney John Hane, who represents broadcasters pushing for the new standard.
A group of net neutrality supporters engaged in a silent protest “walk-out” from Thursday’s FCC commissioners' meeting during remarks by Commissioner Mignon Clyburn on contraband cellphones. The dozen or so protesters abruptly stood up from the audience as Clyburn spoke, all wearing white T-shirts that said “Protect Net Neutrality.” They then left the meeting room, escorted by security. The protesters were representatives from Free Press, Popular Resistance OpenMedia, Women’s Institute for Freedom of the Press and Demand Progress, said a tweet from Free Press Campaign Director Candace Clement. In a video that Clement linked on Popular Resistance’s Facebook page, one of the protesters describes the walk-out as “an action to let the FCC know the movement is watching and a campaign is beginning to protect net neutrality.” The protesters didn’t interrupt Thursday’s meeting, which continued as they were escorted out. Also Thursday, the Senate OK'ed an override of FCC net neutrality privacy rules (see 1703230070).
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said he wouldn't “wade into” the argument over fake news (see 1703150063) because it's a “political debate." His remarks came during a news conference Thursday. News media “perform an important job,” Pai said, declining to respond to questions about whether he agreed with President Donald Trump that media outlets such as The New York Times and ABC News were fake news. “I’ve been very clear about the importance I place on First Amendment freedoms,” Pai said. “This is a political debate that is happening with political actors.”
FCC rules for channel sharing were approved Thursday on yes votes from Chairman Ajit Pai and Commissioner Mike O’Rielly. Commissioner Mignon Clyburn approved in part and concurred in part, over a change to the draft item’s effect on must-carry rules for low-power TV stations. “What disappoints me is that today we have actually closed the door on the very rare instances in which a secondary station could gain must-carry rights as a result of channel sharing,” she said. That alteration was praised by O’Rielly. “The commission is making clear with changes made to the text before us compared to the circulated version that television station must-carry rights are not being expanded in any aspect,” O’Rielly said. “As someone who is not necessarily the biggest supporter of must carry, we are correctly deciding not to reopen that can of worms here.”
FCC Chairman Ajit Pai is seen as receptive to a petition from NAB (see 1703170055) for changes to the post-incentive auction repacking plan, but any changes to the repacking timeline are likely to face considerable pushback from industry, said broadcast officials and analysts in interviews. Though broadcasters repeatedly praised Pai, his previous positions in their favor -- on ATSC 3.0, and his perceived plans to roll back media ownership rules -- haven’t faced strong opposition from a competing industry. On the repacking, NAB’s requests for a looser timeline are diametrically opposed to calls for a faster transition from wireless providers such as T-Mobile, said Roger Entner, analyst at Recon Analytics: “They need that spectrum tomorrow!”