Discussion of FCC, copyright, advertising and other legal issues of importance to radio and television broadcasters and other media companies
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
As we enter the last quarter of the year, the broadcasters’ October calendar is full of important regulatory dates and deadlines. We share some of those dates below and urge you to stay in close touch with your lawyers, engineers, and consultants for the dates and deadlines applicable to your station’s operations.
On or before October 1, radio stations in Alaska, American Samoa, Guam, Hawaii, Marianas Islands, Oregon, and Washington and TV stations in Iowa and Missouri must submit their license renewal applications. Pay close attention to the contents of your online public file and be sure that all required documents are complete and were uploaded on time. Stations filing their renewals (other than LPFMs) are also required to file a Broadcast EEO Program Report (FCC Form 2100, Schedule 396), submitting two years of EEO Public File reports for FCC review unless your employment unit employs fewer than 5 full-time employees. As you are putting the final touches on your applications, be sure to read the instructions for the license renewal application (radio, TV) and consult with counsel if you have questions.…
Continue Reading October Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters: License Renewals, Broadcast Ownership Filings, Quarterly Issues/Programs Lists, Rulemaking Comment Dates and More
Here are some of the regulatory developments from the last week of significance to broadcasters , with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
Comments are due on September 30 on the FCC’s Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking looking to bring back some form of the old FCC Form 395B, the Annual Employment Report. That form required broadcasters to report on the racial and gender make-up of their workforce in various employment categories. The use of the form has been on hold for almost two decades after two rulings from the US Court of Appeals that found it was unconstitutional for the FCC to use the information collected from the Form 395B to determine if a broadcaster’s license renewal application deserved extra scrutiny. In effect, the court found using the reports in this way compelled broadcasters to make hiring decisions based on the race and gender of employment candidates, which was discriminatory and thus could not be compelled by the FCC.
This created a tension between a law requiring that the FCC gather information on the racial and gender make-up of the broadcast workforce to determine if affirmative action efforts should be made on an industry-wide basis, versus the prohibition on gathering this information on a station-specific basis where the temptation would always be to look at a specific station’s data and make assumptions about whether it had been in making employment decisions in color blind manner. While the FCC has over the last two decades repeatedly considered bringing back the form to collect information on an industry-wide basis, questions have always arisen as to how the accuracy and completeness of that information could be assured if the information gathered did not identify the station providing it. And, once that information was in hand, would it be subject to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) obligations that could force its disclosure which could lead to it potentially being used in an enforcement context?…
Continue Reading The Return of FCC Form 395B? – The FCC Looks at Reviving Reports on the Race and Gender of Broadcast Employees
As Fall approaches and kids head back to school, be sure not to lose track of the regulatory dates and deadlines in September. We outline some of those dates below. One date is applicable to all commercial broadcasters, the obligation to pay regulatory fees. While the exact due date has not yet been announced, look for that announcement any day as the Commission adopted the decision setting those fees last week. See the Report and Order, here, for more details and to see what your station owes. As part of that proceeding, the FCC also decided to seek comment on assessing fees in the future on users of unlicensed spectrum, especially large tech companies. Many such users manufacture devices or provide other applications that use spectrum or otherwise benefit from FCC regulation, but right now do not pay fees. Watch for comment dates on this proposal in the near future. The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking begins on page 38, here.
Comment dates have been set for parties that want to weigh in on the FCC’s media ownership rules. They have until September 2 to file their comments in the 2018 Quadrennial Review proceeding, which focuses most heavily on local radio ownership regulation. These comments are to refresh the record with updated information about the state of the media marketplace since initial comments in the proceeding were filed over two years ago. Reply comments are due by October 1. We wrote more about this review of media ownership, here.…
Continue Reading September Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters: Regulatory Fees, Media Ownership and Sponsorship Identification Comments, Auction Applications, and More
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
On Friday, the FCC released another of its regular EEO audit notices (notice and list of affected stations available here), asking approximately 200 radio and TV stations, and the station employment units with which they are associated (i.e., commonly owned stations serving the same area), to respond to the audit notices by September 20, 2021. Audited stations must upload their response to their online public inspection file. The response should include copies of the employment unit’s EEO Annual Public File reports for the last two years, as well as backup data showing that the station in fact did everything that was required under the FCC rules. This is the second audit of 2021 (see our article here on the first audit commenced earlier this year). It appears that this audit targets stations in states who have recently had license renewals reviewed, as stations in states with recent license renewals would already have their EEO record under review as part of the renewal process.
Audited stations must provide representative copies of notices sent to employment outreach sources about each full-time vacancy as well as documentation of the supplemental efforts that all station employment units with 5 or more full-time employees are required to perform (whether or not they had job openings in any year). These non-vacancy specific outreach efforts, which are outlined as “menu options” in the FCC’s rules, are designed to educate the community about broadcast employment positions and to train employees for more senior roles in broadcasting. Stations must also provide information about how they self-assessed the performance of their EEO program. Answers to certain other questions are also required. …
Continue Reading FCC Audits Another 200 Broadcast Stations on EEO Performance
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
…
While the regulatory deadlines in August may be a bit lighter than other months, there are still several important regulatory dates to keep track of, some of which are detailed below. All broadcasters should have August 11 circled and highlighted on their calendars as the date of the next National EAS Test. And there are renewal and EEO deadlines, as well as several comment dates on FCC regulatory proposals.
After skipping last year’s annual test due to the pandemic, FEMA and the FCC chose August 11 to hold this year’s National EAS Test. All broadcasters should work with their engineers and technical staff to make sure their EAS equipment is operating properly and is set to monitoring the stations that they are required to monitor by their state EAS plan. By the day after the test, August 12, broadcasters must file Form Two in the EAS Test Reporting System (ETRS) portal with “day of test” information. Then, by September 27, broadcasters must file in ETRS Form Three with detailed post-test data. The information shared with FEMA and the FCC allows them to determine the successes and failures of the test.…
Continue Reading August Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters: National EAS Test, License Renewals, EEO Reporting, Political Broadcasting Rules Proposals, Media Ownership Comments, Annual Regulatory Fees, and More
