Using analog TV channel 6 to provide primarily audio content as a “Franken FM” radio station is “a waste of spectrum,” said Mark Heller, president of Wisconsin AM licensee WTRW, in comments filed early in FCC docket 03-185. Low-power TV stations broadcasting signals receivable on FM typically air only a title slide and station identification on the visual portion of their transmission, Heller said. “There is absolutely no audience” for title slides or weather radar images, he said: Open up those frequencies for FM stations, Heller said. The approximately 50 LPTV stations running as “Franken FMs” could be converted to FM “without a single listener complaint” and cease “generating heat, wasting electricity” with unwatched visual feeds, Heller said.

Comments are due March 9, replies April 6 on an FCC proposal to allow all-digital AM broadcasting, says Tuesday’s Federal Register (see 1911240003).

Year-end totals show around 200 added FM translators since a year ago, per a release Friday. The report in Friday's Daily Digest shows 11,803 FM translators, compared with 11,606 in December 2018. No other category of broadcaster showed such a shift. There are 15,500 full-power radio stations and 1,762 full-power TV stations, compared with 15,508 full-power radio stations and 1,761 full-power TVs. There are now 1,892 low-power TV stations, down from 1,908, and 387 Class A's, unchanged.

FCC rejection of Channel 51 of San Diego’s low-power TV displacement application shouldn’t be overturned, though it cites an incorrect section of the rules (see 1911130048), said Los Angeles County in an opposition filing. The agency should have cited rules for protecting land mobile stations from LPTV interference, the county said. “Nevertheless, the Commission’s decision was correct and should stand.” The agency’s conclusion was based on interference analysis, the county said: Channel 51 was assigned a viable channel, so it doesn’t meet the burden required for waiver.

The FCC “placed the interest of a private equity firm ahead of everyday people” by approving Terrier Media’s buy of Cox Enterprises stations (see 1911220069) and Terrier’s plan to comply with newspaper/broadcast cross-ownership rules by reducing the Dayton Daily News publication schedule, wrote Dayton, Ohio, Mayor Nan Whaley (D) and former FCC Commissioner Mike Copps in USA Today Thursday. “A region of nearly 1 million people will bear the brunt of these devastating cuts to its primary news source.” The deal's OK “with its explicit endorsement of profit over the public interest demonstrates that the FCC has lost its way.” The FCC had done away with the cross-ownership rules when Terrier proposed the purchase, but the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ Prometheus IV restored the rule before the agency approved the transaction. Copps is a special adviser to Common Cause, a Prometheus petitioner. “FACT CHECK: The FCC eliminated the stupid and outdated rule that is leading to this outcome, but the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, at the urging of your co-author, reinstated it,” tweeted Matthew Berry, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai's chief of staff. “I suspect your co-author neglected to inform you that the very restrictions he supports are one of the major elements responsible for the decline in local journalism (in Dayton and elsewhere),” tweeted NAB General Counsel Rick Kaplan to Whaley. In the absence of the Prometheus "ruling we would not have revised the filing this way," emailed a Terrier spokesperson. "From the beginning, we saw our investment to improve services to local communities and this operational change was not our intent nor in our original filing.”

FCC rules allow “any party” to a proceeding to appear in person before the FCC, said Entertainment Media Trust trustee Dennis Watkins in a filing in docket 19-156 responding to Enforcement Bureau arguments that an official of a trust can't represent the trust pro se before the FCC (see 1912260042). Since Watkins is the trustee of EMT, he should be able to represent the trust in the broadcaster’s license hearing, he said. Watkins also said if Administrative Law Judge Jane Halprin disagrees that Watkins qualifies as a party, she should use the discretion she's given in another section of the rules to authorize his appearance. Halprin previously said if an EMT representative didn’t file a notice of appearance in the matter, the case could be dismissed. That would likely mean the loss of EMT’s licenses.

FCC Administrative Law Judge Jane Halprin should reject a notice of appearance filed by EMT Trustee Dennis Watkins as ineffective, said the Enforcement Bureau in an opposition filing posted in docket 19-156 Thursday. Watkins is an attorney, but his notice of appearance (see 1912190061) says he's appearing pro se, the designation usually used when non-attorney litigants appear on their own behalf. Trusts can't be represented pro se by their own trustees, the bureau said. “Whether EMT purports to be represented pro se, or by an attorney who continually refuses to appear as counsel of record, EMT has failed to fulfill its obligation to appear,” the bureau said. Halprin previously indicated if EMT didn’t file a notice of appearance by Dec. 20, the hearing proceeding could be dismissed. “EMT has continuously sought to delay and obfuscate its participation in this proceeding,” said the bureau, citing EMT’s requests for time extensions and aborted bankruptcy process. “Now that all final deadlines have passed, and in light of EMT’s 6-month-long history of thwarting this proceeding, EMT should be held accountable for failing to file an effective notice of appearance,” the bureau said. Watkins couldn’t be reached for comment, and the phone number on his appearance filing was disconnected.

The FCC unanimously affirmed a 2017 administrative law judge decision revoking construction permits and licenses for three California FM stations over allegations from the late 1990s about a lack of candor, said a docket 03-152 order in Thursday’s Daily Digest. Democratic Commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Geoffrey Starks submitted statements (attached to the order) emphasizing that broadcasters found to have dealt dishonestly with the FCC should have their licenses revoked. None of the Republican commissioners issued statements. “In the case of an unscrupulous licensee with multiple stations, misrepresentation and lack of candor constitutes ‘serious deliberate misconduct’ that could put all of a broadcaster’s licenses at risk,” said Starks. William Zawila -- licensee of one of the stations and representative for the estates of other parties in the case -- argued that too much time had passed since the offenses involved and that the Enforcement Bureau hadn’t correctly handled filings in the matter. Those challenges are invalid on their merits and untimely filed, the FCC said. “Long ago the Federal Communications Commission established that the ‘trait of truthfulness’ is a necessary element of the character required to operate a broadcast station in the public interest,” Rosenworcel said. Though Sinclair isn't mentioned in the order or Commissioner statements, both Starks and Rosenworcel have been critical of that broadcaster, which had an attempted deal with Tribune designated for hearing in 2018, over allegations the company may have shown a lack of candor. That ALJ proceeding ended in 2019 when the deal was withdrawn, but several broadcast attorneys said they expect the candor issue to re-emerge as license renewals for Sinclair’s stations come up in 2020 (see 1903050075). “This year, a decision from the agency revisited that notion and concluded that honesty with the FCC is a foundational requirement for holding a license,” Rosenworcel said. Sinclair didn’t comment.

Comments are due Jan. 21 on Liberman Broadcasting’s petition for a declaratory ruling allowing it to be up to 100 percent foreign owned, said an FCC Media Bureau public notice in Monday’s Daily Digest. Liberman wants the ruling because of an upcoming bankruptcy reorganization that will lead to its being controlled by SLA, which is ultimately controlled by other Cayman Islands-based entities whose owners who are residents of the U.K., the PN said. Reply comments on the petition in docket 19-386 are due Feb. 5.

Broadcasters will be able to start filing children’s television reports in the FCC’s licensing and management system by Jan. 30, after OMB approved the FCC’s form revisions Friday, said the Media Bureau in a docket 18-202 public notice and in Monday’s Daily Digest. The information collection aspects of the kidvid rules take effect Jan. 21, the PN said (see 1910070064). The bureau plans a webinar Jan. 23 on changes to children’s television reports, the PN said.