DBS, Broadcasters Spar Over Need for Orphan County Changes
With fervent support from members of Congress, state legislators, local government leaders and public interest groups, “targeted reforms” of the system of designated market areas (DMAs) face “significant opposition” only “from the broadcasters,” Dish Network said in reply comments filed at the FCC. The NAB offers “unsupported doomsday scenarios” about the results of changes that “falsely equate improvements to the system” with “outright abandonment,” Dish said. Allowing a statewide license that would permit TV providers to provide in-state broadcast stations to “orphan counties” would be an “incremental” change that would deal with problems without disturbing the market, the company said. Dish was responding to the Media Bureau’s request for comments on in-state local broadcast programming information and ways to resolve the problem of orphan counties, those at least partly outside the borders of a designated market area. The bureau is putting together a report on the issue that will be provided to Congress by Aug. 27 under the Satellite TV Extension and Localism Act.
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Giving in-state programming to orphan county residents wouldn’t hurt the local TV market and would have “relatively small effects on the total viewership of the relevant stations,” Dish said. The change probably would be gradual, and stations and advertisers should be able to adjust to new viewing patterns, the company said. Several filers pointed to comments from orphan county residents as proof of the need for change.
Broadcasters’ contention that TV providers can already solve the problem is mistaken, said DirecTV. While they propose to offer the TV providers privately licensed, part-time news feeds for orphan county subscribers, broadcasters may lack rights to license the feeds and satellite companies lack the capacity to carry them, DirecTV said. Redefining the DMAs themselves isn’t necessary to solve the problem, but Congress should give all TV providers flexibility in getting in-state programming to orphan counties, the DBS company said.
No change to the current DMA system is needed for TV providers to give viewers in-state programming, NAB said. Dish’s suggestions of presuming that the in-state programming is a significantly viewed station in orphan counties or using waivers to treat the programming as significantly viewed should be rejected for several reasons, NAB said. The FCC’s making the changes “would be contrary to the entire rationale of SV, that such signals can and are significantly viewed by viewers over the air,” said NAB. And “the proposals would subvert clear Congressional intent that Congress, not the Commission, should determine what, if any, substantive modifications should be made to existing television markets,” the association said. More than 99 percent of the U.S. population according to the 2000 census can get at least one in-state broadcast TV network, according to a study that NAB submitted and that BIA/Kelsey did.
The legal changes to the current system aren’t necessary, because cable and satellite operators already can expand viewers’ access to in-state programming, said the Joint Television Network Affiliates. Changes would harm viewers by “undermining the DMA system that is the basis for the local television advertising market, the revenues from which underwrite stations’ investments in providing local news and other programming,” the affiliates said.
The FCC should adjust the DMA boundaries to provide underserved views with in-state public TV programming, said the Association of Public TV Stations. Though the satellite TV law, Congress showed its understanding of the importance of giving residents in-state public TV programming, the association said. It said Dish is wrong, though, in saying the term “orphan county” should only apply to areas that lack access to stations affiliated with the big four networks.