FCC Allots New DTV Station to Atlantic City
Atlantic City, N.J., will get a new DTV station (CD Feb 5 p12) because of an FCC ruling issued Wednesday. Channel 4 is being added to the Post-Transition Table of DTV Allotments, a Media Bureau order said. This is the first time the commission has authorized a new TV station in at least several years, said broadcast lawyers and an FCC official. Before last year’s analog cutoff, the commission had put a freeze on accepting applications for new DTV stations, they said.
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The ruling came after a request by PMCM to move one western U.S. TV station each to New Jersey and Delaware. Although the bureau denied PMCM’s request, which cited a section of the Communications Act that took effect with the analog cutoff, the decision acknowledges the validity of the broadcaster’s position, said broadcast lawyer Harry Cole of Fletcher Heald, representing that company. “We appreciate the fact that they agree with us that Section 331 applies and the DTV transition did in fact cause Section 331 to come into play.”
The bureau’s order pointed to Section 331(a), saying the FCC shall allocate VHF commercial channels in each state, if technically possible. New Jersey lacks a commercial DTV channel allotment because News Corp.’s WWOR-TV Secaucus moved to digital channel 38 in the UHF band from analog channel 9 with the June 2009 cutoff by full-power broadcasters, the order said. “Additionally, Atlantic City currently has two UHF commercial television allotments, and therefore the Commission has already determined that it is a community for allotment purposes,” it said at http://xrl.us/bgyyq9. WMCN-TV and WWSI are UHF stations licensed to Atlantic City, commission records show.
The licensee remains to be determined. Cole said an auction is possible. Nave Broadcasting was the only filer in a comment round to express interest. PMCM remains interested in moving to New Jersey, just not the Atlantic City area, Cole said. “Their goal is to serve the concentrated population centers in central and northern New Jersey that don’t have anywhere near the per-capita concentration of TV stations that other parts of the state do, particularly southern New Jersey.” An executive of PMCM didn’t reply right away to a message seeking comment. The NAB declined to comment on the allotment.
From Atlantic City, “I would think the signal would come pretty close to Philadelphia, and cover a lot of people,” said broadcast lawyer Erwin Krasnow of Garvey Schubert. “It’s a rarity to have a television channel available in Northeast metropolitan areas, so I would think there would be a lot of interest.” Cole isn’t so sure. “There’s no outpouring of support for the notice of proposed rulemaking” asking about interest in Atlantic City, he said. “If the commission is still trying to figure out what it’s doing with spectrum, whether or not the commission is going to want to create some sort of contractual arrangement now with a new licensee, only to do something down the line” is uncertain, Cole said, referring to the National Broadband Plan.