Monty Tayloe

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler isn’t seen as having made a decision on Comcast’s proposed buy of Time Warner Cable, said analysts, cable industry and public interest officials in interviews this week. Ex-FCC Chief of Staff Blair Levin doesn’t believe a decision on the merger has yet been made, he said in a conference call. The Department of Justice will decide if the deal should be approved, he said. Wheeler “may know where he’s leaning” but it’s “inconceivable” he would decide the fate of the deal before the Sept. 23 due date for Comcast and TWC’s opposition filings, said Georgetown Law Institute for Public Representation Senior Counselor Andrew Schwartzman. The FCC is also awaiting responses from Comcast, Charter Communications and TWC to the Media Bureau’s detailed information requests related to the deal and to Charter’s buying divested systems (CD Aug 26 p1), which were due Thursday, Schwartzman said. “Even if he made a decision, he doesn’t necessarily have the three votes” needed for a majority vote on the FCC, Schwartzman said.

Public interest groups opposing relaxation of FCC ownership rules “rely on the myth of the media mogul boogeyman,” said NAB in replies (http://bit.ly/1opj4l5) to a 2014 quadrennial review Further NPRM in docket 14-50 (CD Aug 8 p7). Broadcasters don’t have “a dominant hold on the attention of audiences” that warrants heavy regulation, NAB said. Public interest groups such as Common Cause chastised the FCC for not doing enough to increase ownership diversity. Other commenters said no evidence has been presented to justify the newspaper/broadcast cross-ownership rule, and several groups urged the FCC to regulate and require disclosure of shared service agreements (SSA).

Draft NPRMs on several items about the incentive auction will be circulated to FCC commissioners this week and as early as Tuesday, said agency and industry officials in interviews Friday and Monday, after a low-power TV (LPTV) official said he had heard the items were coming (CD Sept 8 p12). They said the draft NPRMs will concern the auction’s effect on LPTV, wireless mics, Part 15 unlicensed spectrum and aggregate interference issues affecting broadcasters. FCC staff overseeing the auction have suggested that issues such as wireless mics and LPTV would be taken up by the commission in advance, and NAB and other broadcast interests have been vocal about concerns over the FCC’s predictions for interference. “Each of these issues is thorny and complicated, so they will take time to sort out,” said NAB Executive Vice President-Strategic Planning Rick Kaplan.

An NPRM on the incentive auction and low-power TV will be circulated to the FCC commissioners’ offices next week, LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition Director Mike Gravino told us Friday. The information came from Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake, Gravino said. The FCC and bureau declined to comment. Lake said the NPRM was in the works at April’s NAB Show. Auction-related NPRMs on Part-15 unlicensed spectrum, wireless mics and aggregate interference will go on circulation at the same time, Gravino said. After the LPTV notice, the commission will also hold a LEARN (Learn Everything About Reverse-Auctions Now) session on the impact of the auction on LPTV, Gravino said the bureau told him. “While the exact date is not available, we anticipate this important event to be held in October or November 2014,” Gravino said in an email to coalition members (http://bit.ly/1xml6Mb). “We are glad the FCC has stepped up and is now giving LPTV their full attention for our very important rule making.” Though Fletcher Heald LPTV attorney Peter Tannenwald said it’s good that the FCC is moving quickly to address LPTV issues, he said the timing might also make the rulemaking more difficult, since many details of the auction still remain unclear. The LPTV rulemaking will include the issue of construction permits (CD Sept 5 p8), LPTV channel sharing, and how the commission will handle displacement filings, Gravino said. The Wireless Internet Service Providers Association, which had opposed an extension for LPTV CPs, “looks forward to participating in the Commission’s proceeding so that important issues about the rights of LPTV permittees and licensees can be fully considered in advance of the incentive auction,” said Vice President Alex Phillips.

The FCC will likely issue a blanket extension of construction permit deadlines for LPTV stations, several attorneys who represent such stations said in interviews Thursday. The reply comment period for a petition from Advanced Television Broadcasting Alliance requesting such an extension ended Friday (CD Sept 4 p13). All commenters in docket 03-185 supported such an extension, except the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association, which didn’t respond to our request for comment.

Pandora’s request for the FCC to waive foreign ownership rules so it can buy its first terrestrial radio station to get lower royalty rates could lead to further commission relaxation of such rules, said industry lawyers in interviews this and last week. The FCC should update its rules for foreign broadcast ownership to make it easier for “widely-traded, public entities” to comply, said NAB in response (http://bit.ly/1rLcegy) to Pandora’s petition for a declaratory ruling that it can buy KXMZ(FM) Box Elder, South Dakota, despite being unable to determine how many of its many shareholders are U.S. citizens. Comments were posted Thursday in docket 14-109 in response to Pandora’s petition to be allowed 100 percent foreign ownership (CD July 2 p6). The current rules are slanted to make it more likely that publicly traded companies will be treated as foreign owned, and changing them would be in line with the FCC’s relaxation of foreign ownership restrictions last year, said Minority Media and Telecommunications Council President David Honig, who supported relaxing the rules.

The FCC wants NAB’s petition for review of the incentive auction order expedited, the agency told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Thursday. It “would be in the public interest” to resolve NAB’s petition “as promptly as possible,” said the commission. The NAB filed an emergency motion Wednesday (CD Aug 28 p14) seeking a quick resolution. Though industry observers have told us they expect the case to be resolved through negotiations outside court (CD Aug 18 p6), it’s still in both the FCC’s and NAB’s interests to have the court proceeding go as quickly as possible, said Fletcher Heald broadcast attorney Frank Jazzo in an interview. He represents NAB members, but is not involved in the challenge of the auction order.

Gray Television will transfer six TV stations to new minority and female owners through deals brokered by MMTC Media and Telecom Brokers, the brokerage arm of the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council, said the broadcaster in a news release Wednesday (http://bit.ly/1vStuhY). The stations had been operated under shared service agreements, all of which were unwound as part of the transfers, Gray Senior Vice President-Business Affairs Kevin Latek told us. “This proves that Sinclair didn’t have to turn in its licenses” for stations involved in sharing arrangements that were part of its deal to buy Allbritton’s TV stations, Georgetown Law Institute for Public Representation Senior Counselor Andrew Schwartzman told us. In working to sell the stations, MMTC was allowed to market them to “socially disadvantaged enterprises, such as businesses controlled by women, minorities, or innovative new entrants, or non-profit entities such as a school or religious institutions,” Gray said. The company said its KXJB-TV Fargo, North Dakota, will be transferred to Major Market Broadcasting, which airs programming from Diya TV, “America’s first South Asian broadcast television network.” KJCT-TV Grand Junction, Colorado, will be transferred to Jeff Chang and his wife Gabriela Gomez-Chang, and broadcast programming targeted toward the Hispanic population, said Gray. Female owned Legacy Broadcasting, a new company, will buy KHAS-TV Hastings, Nebraska, KAQY-TV Monroe, Louisiana, and North Dakota’s KNDX-TV Bismarck and KXND-TV Minot, said Gray. It’s “shown how a corporation can deploy its assets creatively for the great benefit of the industry and the public,” said MMTC President David Honig. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said he applauds Gray and MMTC’s “commitment” to finding buyers that increase diversity of ownership and programming. “Such actions demonstrate how our rules can actively promote both competition and diversity, keep stations on the air, and serve the public interest,” Wheeler said in a statement (http://fcc.us/1vStX3R

Those wanting the FCC to deny Comcast’s planned buy of Time Warner Cable are likely to be disappointed when the agency likely approves it with conditions, cable operator and programmer officials told us Wednesday. Though several powerful commenters, including Dish Network, asked the FCC to deny the transaction, many others suggested possible conditions, said an industry official. Many other influential entities, such as large content companies and NAB, didn’t weigh in for or against the deal. “It’s very dangerous to come out against this deal because of the amount of influence Comcast will have if it’s approved,” said Georgetown Law Institute for Public Representation Senior Counselor Andrew Schwartzman, who filed comments opposing Comcast/TWC.

Critics of Comcast’s deal to buy Time Warner Cable are making “discredited arguments” that “don’t have any merit” said Comcast Executive Vice President David Cohen in a blog post responding (http://bit.ly/1p9Ffk7) to comments filed in docket 14-57 Monday (http://bit.ly/1wthpno). The deadline was 11:59 p.m. for comments on the transaction.