A Year After Gathering Multilingual EAS Data, FCC Action Seen Unlikely

The FCC Public Safety Bureau told us it urges “state and local governments to consider the needs of non-English speakers in their disaster communications,” but FCC data shows Santa Barbara is an exception. Few broadcasters transmit or have plans to eventually offer multilingual alerts during emergencies, but EAS officials and broadcasters don’t expect the FCC to become more active anytime soon. Human lives are being treated as a “non-priority,” said League of United Latin American Citizens CEO Sindy Benavides.

Though it’s been about a year since the agency gathered information from state emergency communication committees (SECCs) on the state of multilingual alerting, EAS and broadcast officials don’t expect any upcoming FCC action on the issue because it's technically and legally complicated. It would take “some kind of disaster” to spur an FCC move, one industry official said.

In a 2017 majority opinion in the FCC's favor against the Multicultural Media Telecom and Internet Council (see 1710170036), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit nonetheless chided the FCC for inaction on multilingual EAS. “The FCC should move expeditiously in finally deciding whether to impose a multi-lingual requirement on broadcasters, or instead to leave the issue with alert originators and others,” said the opinion from now-U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. “At some point, the FCC must fish or cut bait on this question.”

“We will continue to work with stakeholders to ensure they are aware of the alerting capabilities that can help them keep their communities informed,” a Public Safety Bureau spokesperson said in response to questions about agency plans for multilingual EAS. Multilingual EAS is “something that remains under consideration,” said Deputy Chief Nicole McGinnis at NAB 2019, responding to a question from Communications Daily.

FOIA Documents

Documents show the challenges of broadcasters rolling out alerts in other languages. “Impracticality, danger of delay, and risk of error” are reasons broadcasters can’t translate EAS alerts themselves, the Illinois SECC told the FCC in a report obtained by the Multicultural Media Telecom and Internet Council via the Freedom of Information Act. Communications Daily recently filed its own FOIA request for information about FCC efforts to enact multilingual EAS rules. Of the 44 SECC reports on multilingual EAS we viewed, 19 reported zero multilingual EAS messages, and very few of the states with stations broadcasting multilingual alerts reported more than 2 percent of respondents doing so.

California, Texas and Florida are the most active in multilingual EAS, according to the reports. They're also the most populous states, with large, non-English-speaking populations. The latter two states are prone to hurricanes and California at risk of earthquakes and fires.

“Our current plan in English only is the best and least disruptive messaging for the public’s safety,” said the Tennessee SECC. It reported 4 percent of Tennessee residents are Latino.

In Santa Barbara, Uhl’s office originates its own Spanish-language alerts, using a patchwork of translating EAS equipment, on-site Spanish speakers and translation services. Most localities don’t have that capability and the FCC doesn’t oversee alert originators. “The FCC has no jurisdiction over the states,” the agency told the U.S. Court of Appeals, defending inaction on multilingual EAS in 2017 (see 1705110061). “The major impediment to the expansion of such non English alerts is the capability of the emergency alert originators themselves,” the Illinois SECC told the FCC. NAB and many EAS officials support multilingual EAS but take the position that the best way to achieve multilingual alerting is for emergency originators like Uhl to provide them.

Solutions

There are ways for broadcasters to translate alerts, EAS officials told us. Some EAS equipment manufacturers make “boxes” that allow broadcasters to auto translate legacy EAS alerts in a few preselected languages, said Monroe Electronics Senior Director-Strategy and Government Affairs Ed Czarnecki.

In Minnesota, Twin Lakes PBS created an outreach program for immigrant populations that allowed them to receive alerts in Spanish, Hmong and Somali along with English. Those were the languages most common among the communities served by the broadcaster, Managing Director Lillian McDonald told us. “The effort should be made” to communicate alerts in a variety of languages, McDonald said. Such projects require a high level of local enthusiasm, because ultimately, alerting is overseen by local officials, she said.

In September during Hurricane Florence, MMTC and LULAC were part of an effort to have a Spanish-language radio station provide translations of emergency information that were aired over other, nominally English-language broadcasters’ airwaves (see 1809170046). MMTC Senior Adviser David Honig calls this the “designated hitter” system, and believes it could be used to bring multilingual EAS to other communities with FCC support. The agency should make such systems “a requirement,” Benavides said. “It could save lives.”

Designated Hitter

Emails obtained through MMTC’s FOIA request show Public Safety Bureau staff rejecting a designated hitter proposal brought to them by Honig in 2017 as “premature” since the agency hadn’t received the data on multilingual alerting from the SECCs. “The DC Circuit stated in its opinion that the FCC, once the reports came in, would decide whether and on whom to impose a multilingual requirement,” wrote bureau staff. Honig told us MMTC plans to bring another proposal based on the designated hitter idea and the success in Florence to the bureau.

MMTC’s proposal would be “extremely burdensome” for the FCC to impose because it would require broadcasters to allow other outlets to use their facilities, Czarnecki said. Such a system would involve numerous practical complications and likely lead to legal challenges, he said. It would also require a great deal of advance warning of impending disasters, which isn’t always available, broadcasters said. All of those problems are magnified for areas with more diverse populations that would require a host of other languages. Uhl, a proponent of multilingual alerting, said his jurisdiction’s ability to provide alerts is greatly assisted by having to be concerned only with English and Spanish. Santa Barbara County would have more limited options if other languages were involved, he said.

Stations also don’t agree that technical options on their end are widely available. In New Hampshire, respondents to the SECC “universally pointed out there is no practical way for stations/franchises to translate EAS into other languages.” The New Hampshire SECC report said “many broadcasters and the majority of cable franchises are unstaffed.” There's “no one available to make a timely decision to translate EAS into languages other than English.”

Wireless emergency alerts in a variety of languages sent directly to phones are part of the emergency alerting arsenal, but Uhl said many vulnerable populations, such as senior citizens, are better reached with broadcast alerts. The Advanced Warning and Response Network Alliance emergency alerting tech associated with ATSC 3.0 could enable geotargeted multilingual alerts, EAS officials told us, but would require widespread adoption to be effective.

“Virtually nobody at the state level and the municipal level” is using multilingual alerting to the degree it should be, said Honig. The FCC acknowledges the importance of providing information in multiple languages -- its TV rescan pages can be viewed in English, Spanish, Tagalog and Vietnamese, and a recent bureau report touted an increase in retransmission of a Spanish-language version of the 2018 nationwide emergency alert test. “It is vital that all communities have access to emergency alerts,” the bureau spokesperson said.