One More LPFM Rulemaking to Come from FCC On Local Community Radio Act
The FCC has one more rulemaking to issue on putting into place new low-power FM rules from legislation last year that paved the way for the licensing of many more LPFMs, agency and industry officials said. They said the Media Bureau will circulate for a vote a rulemaking notice to implement the rest of the Local Community Radio Act. The forthcoming notice, which may not be finished yet and ready to circulate, is expected to deal with the technical details of licensing new LPFM stations that are closer to frequencies used by existing full-power FM broadcasters than the commission had permitted. Comments, meanwhile, came in to dockets 99-25 and 07-712 on another rulemaking implementing other parts of the act, including from members of the House and Senate who are proponents of LPFM.
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The next rulemaking dealing with the act will ask about details of technical issues and waivers to promulgate rules the act requires, agency and industry officials said. They expect the notice to ask about eliminating a ban on third-adjacent spacing, so LPFMs can be three notches on the dial away from a full-power station. Waivers also are expected to be asked about, agency officials said. A bureau spokeswoman declined to comment.
The bureau also is doing an economic study of how LPFMs could affect full-power stations in that band. It’s due this year under the act, said Policy Director Brandy Doyle of LPFM group Prometheus Radio Project. The commission needs to finish the current rulemaking and the forthcoming one to license new LPFM stations, which it has said it hopes to start licensing by next summer, she noted: LPFM backers “are eager to see the commission move swiftly toward a filing window” for such stations. They also want to ensure the regulator “leaves adequate time to prepare” before a so-called filing window for applicants to seek for them, Doyle said.
Prometheus and many other groups backing LPFMs differed with the NAB and other full-power broadcasters on how the commission ought to put into place Section 5 of the act, which deals with balancing the interests of low-power and translator outlets. That’s according to comments posted Tuesday and Wednesday in the dockets (http://xrl.us/bmcrdw). The NAB said it wants the FCC to take a different approach to dealing with translator applications made eight years ago and still pending than what the agency proposed, to not dismiss as many translator applications. NPR and others also sought a different tack. LPFM backers on the other hand said the commission should take another different approach than what the agency recommended: It should leave more space in urban areas for the newer stations.
"NAB believes the proposal jumps too quickly to dismiss pending applications for FM translators, which are often integral to the ability of many FM licensees (and AM as well),” to serve listeners, the association said. “The proposed approach could be a reasonable first step, if it is improved to more precisely limit the adverse effects on broadcasters with long-pending FM translator applications to situations where grant of those applications would preclude LPFM applications.” The group asked the commission to rely on Arbitron radio markets and not the grids the notice used.
NPR doesn’t want the agency to take its proposed approach that “would cast aside FM translator services that many applicants have spent considerable resources preparing to provide,” the public radio programmer said. “Rather than specifying minimum numbers of LPFM station opportunities on a market-specific basis and summarily dismissing or processing FM translators thereafter, the Commission should first address the backlog of pending FM translator applications to identify those which propose an FM translator service the applicant actually intends to provide.” The Educational Media Foundation, owner of hundreds of translators, sought “several minor tweaks” so more translators can be licensed than the FCC sought. The foundation asked for “at least some flexibility” for all translator seekers to move “limited distances” on the same channel and to change frequencies as part of a settlement.
The commission should “strengthen” its translator processing plan as Prometheus and two other LPFM proponents seek, said several dozen nonprofit groups jointly. They're concerned the FCC plan may not keep many channels free in urban areas, said Consumers Union, Free Press, the Future of Music Coalition, New America Foundation, Public Knowledge, United Church of Christ and others. “This is a critical issue in light of the alarming decrease in minority broadcast ownership” since the 1996 Telecom Act, with 7.2 percent of full-power radio stations owned by minorities, the groups said. Prometheus and LPFM backers Common Frequency and REC Networks asked the commission to use smaller areas as the basis for concluding whether pending translator requests should be granted or denied. “We ask that the Commission not count existing LPFM licenses against the channel floors, as this does not address the present disparity between LPFM stations and translators."
The co-sponsors of the Local Community Radio Act back the commission’s market-test proposal, they said. It’s a “fair solution to this difficult balancing test,” wrote Reps. Mike Doyle, D-Pa., and Lee Terry, R-Neb., and Sens. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and John McCain, R-Ariz. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski looks forward “to the moment when we can begin expanding LPFM opportunities for communities in all areas,” he responded. “The Commission is committed to completing review of the record as expeditiously as possible.”