- In a Press Release dated November 1, the Radio Music License Committee announced that its arbitration with SESAC over royalty
NCE point system
This Week in Regulation for Broadcasters: October 14, 2024 to October 18, 2024
- The FCC’s Enforcement Bureau released its second EEO audit notice for 2024. Audited stations and their station employment units (commonly
This Week in Regulation for Broadcasters: April 30, 2022 to May 6, 2022
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.
- Follow field testing by GeoBroadcast Solutions of its zonecasting system, the FCC opened a new comment period for interested parties
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This Week in Regulation for Broadcasters: March 5, 2022 to March 11, 2022
Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the last week, and a look ahead to events of importance next week, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.
- The Media Bureau this week released the first of what
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This Week in Broadcast Regulation – October 31, 2020 to November 6, 2020
While last Tuesday’s elections may well affect broadcast regulation in the future, there were several regulatory developments in the last week of immediate significance to broadcasters. Here is a summary of some of those developments, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.…
FCC to Examine the Process for Awarding Construction Permits for New NCE and LPFM Stations – And Some of the Rules that Apply Once a New Noncommercial CP is Awarded
As we wrote on Friday, the government shutdown affects many aspects of FCC operations – and could affect the ability of the FCC to hold its regular monthly meeting, now scheduled for January 30. With the FCC likely shut down for most of this week, just before closing, the FCC released its agenda for the January 30 meeting (which would normally have been released this week – 3 weeks before the meeting). One interesting item on the agenda was a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to change certain aspects of the criteria used to evaluate applicants for new noncommercial broadcast stations and LPFMs, and the operations of those new stations after a construction permit is issued. The draft NPRM is here. As with all draft items released with the agenda of an upcoming FCC meeting, the draft is subject to change before that meeting.
It appears that the NPRM was not prompted by any single group representing noncommercial broadcasters, but instead raises a number of issues and problems that have been raised before the FCC in comparative cases in the last decade, which use a “points system” process to determine which mutually-exclusive noncommercial applicant should have its application granted. The point system relies on paper hearings to determine which applicant has the most points, awarding applicants preferences on factors such as whether they have few other broadcast interests, whether they are local organizations, and whether they are part of state-wide networks. The NPRM also looks at the restrictions on what successful applicants can do, once they receive their construction permits to build new stations – including the length of LPFM CPs, the transferability of those CPs, and restrictions imposed on changes to certain NCE technical facilities after a CP grant.
Continue Reading FCC to Examine the Process for Awarding Construction Permits for New NCE and LPFM Stations – And Some of the Rules that Apply Once a New Noncommercial CP is Awarded
Thinking of Settlement in NCE Window? Do It Now as More FCC Point System Decisions are on Their Way
Last week, we wrote about a Commission decision that said that only one application in a noncommercial MX Group can be granted even if, when the first is granted, there are other applications in that group that would not be mutually exclusive with (i.e. would not create any prohibited interference to) the winning applicant. While…
FCC Says that Permittee of New Noncommercial FM Station Cannot Change Coverage Area if It Won the Permit Based on 307(b) Preference
A decision released by the FCC’s Media Bureau staff this week makes clear that the permittee of a noncommercial station, who was awarded the permit based on a 307(b) preference, cannot change transmitter sites so as to abandon service to the area that it promised to cover in order to get the preference –…