While there are a number of regulatory deadlines scheduled for broadcasters in the month of March, there is also the potential for some of those to shift if we have a federal government shutdown.  As of the date of the publication of this article, we do not know if a federal government shutdown will occur this month, with the FCC and FTC currently being funded only through March 8.  As we recently discussed here, the FCC and other government agencies may have to cease all but critical functions if they do not have any residual funds to continue operations during a shutdown.  Therefore, if Congress fails to extend funding of the FCC and other government agencies past March 8, many of the regulatory deadlines discussed below will likely be postponed. If there is a shutdown, and any of the deadlines below apply to you, be sure to research how the shutdown affects your operations.

There are certain technical deadlines likely not affected by any shutdown.  Those include the requirement that, by March 11, broadcasters using Sage EAS equipment implement the requirement that, when a station receives an over-the-air EAS alert, it must wait at least 10 seconds to determine if a CAP alert has been sent through the IPAWS system and, if it has, the station should rebroadcast that internet-delivered CAP alert rather than the one received over the air.  We wrote more about that requirement on our Broadcast Law Blog, here. For stations using other EAS equipment, the deadline was December 12, 2023 to implement this requirement but as Sage was delayed in pushing out its equipment update, users of that equipment were given until March 11 to comply with this requirement. Continue Reading March Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters – Sage EAS Compliance Deadline, Effective Dates of New FCC Rules, Comment Deadlines, Daylight Savings Time, Political Windows, and More

Here are some of the regulatory developments of significance to broadcasters from the past two weeks, with links to where you can go to find more information as to how these actions may affect your operations.

Even with the holidays upon us, regulation never stops.  There are numerous regulatory dates in December to which broadcasters need to keep in mind.  Furthermore, as the 2024 presidential campaign is already underway, there are political advertising deadlines to watch out for.  Here are some of the upcoming deadlines:

December 1 is the filing deadline for Biennial Ownership Reports by all licensees of commercial and noncommercial full-power TV/AM/FM stations, Class A TV stations, and LPTV stations.  The reports must reflect station ownership as of October 1, 2023 (see our article here on the FCC’s recent reminder about these reports).  The FCC has been pushing for stations to fill these out completely and accurately by the deadline (see this reminder issued by the FCC last week), as the Commission uses these reports to get a snapshot of who owns and controls what broadcast stations, including information about the race and gender of station owners and their other broadcast interests (see our article from 2021 about the importance the FCC attaches to these filings). Continue Reading December Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters – Biennial Ownership Reports, Annual EEO Public File Reports, LPFM Filing Window, LUC Political Windows for 2024 Election, and More