Gray Television will transfer six TV stations to new minority and female owners through deals brokered by MMTC Media and Telecom Brokers, the brokerage arm of the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council, said the broadcaster in a news release Wednesday (http://bit.ly/1vStuhY). The stations had been operated under shared service agreements, all of which were unwound as part of the transfers, Gray Senior Vice President-Business Affairs Kevin Latek told us. “This proves that Sinclair didn’t have to turn in its licenses” for stations involved in sharing arrangements that were part of its deal to buy Allbritton’s TV stations, Georgetown Law Institute for Public Representation Senior Counselor Andrew Schwartzman told us. In working to sell the stations, MMTC was allowed to market them to “socially disadvantaged enterprises, such as businesses controlled by women, minorities, or innovative new entrants, or non-profit entities such as a school or religious institutions,” Gray said. The company said its KXJB-TV Fargo, North Dakota, will be transferred to Major Market Broadcasting, which airs programming from Diya TV, “America’s first South Asian broadcast television network.” KJCT-TV Grand Junction, Colorado, will be transferred to Jeff Chang and his wife Gabriela Gomez-Chang, and broadcast programming targeted toward the Hispanic population, said Gray. Female owned Legacy Broadcasting, a new company, will buy KHAS-TV Hastings, Nebraska, KAQY-TV Monroe, Louisiana, and North Dakota’s KNDX-TV Bismarck and KXND-TV Minot, said Gray. It’s “shown how a corporation can deploy its assets creatively for the great benefit of the industry and the public,” said MMTC President David Honig. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said he applauds Gray and MMTC’s “commitment” to finding buyers that increase diversity of ownership and programming. “Such actions demonstrate how our rules can actively promote both competition and diversity, keep stations on the air, and serve the public interest,” Wheeler said in a statement (http://fcc.us/1vStX3R

NAB’s petition for review of the FCC incentive auction order must be expedited to avoid placing “the entire broadcast industry at risk of committing to an expensive and legally flawed process that will be impossible to unwind fully,” said the association in an emergency motion filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Wednesday. “NAB does not believe that any court has ever vacated the results of a Commission auction after it has occurred.” That would leave broadcasters “forced to accept reductions in their coverage area and population served, with no practical remedy,” said NAB. Though low-power TV industry officials and others have told us other court challenges to the order are likely, NAB’s motion said the association isn’t aware of other likely challengers. It urged the court (CD Aug 18 p6) not to worry about future challengers in considering expediting the petition. The motion also revealed details of NAB’s objections to the order. Along with finding fault with the commission’s choice to use the updated TVStudy software to calculate interference, NAB also said the FCC violated the Administrative Procedure Act with the software. The FCC “did not make clear which version of TVStudy it intends to use in the incentive auction -- indeed, Commission staff continues to release updated versions of TVStudy -- thus precluding meaningful notice and comment by interested parties,” NAB said. It objected to the auction order only preserving populated coverage areas and not preserving broadcasters’ fill-in translator stations. Filed alongside the motion are declarations from Nexstar and Sinclair executives that the auction will reduce their stations’ coverage areas and cost them money. “If the auction occurs before this Court’s decision, and this Court sets aside the results because the Commission miscalculated coverage areas and populations served, the entire auction will have to be unwound,” said NAB. It requested a ruling on the motion by Sept. 5.

An informal process for handling consumer complaints of closed captioning issues generally works more quickly than forwarding actual complaints, said AT&T, Comcast and DirecTV in an ex parte filing posted Tuesday in docket 05-231 (http://bit.ly/1qKgruu). Forwarding complaints requires the parties to redact information before sending, the joint filing said. In situations where such a complaint is filed directly with the video programming distributor, the companies indicated that the VPD “could follow the practice that some companies follow today and relay the pertinent information to the programmer in question,” it said. The filing recounts a teleconference with Eliot Greenwald of the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau.

The FCC Media Bureau admonished two North Carolina Hearst stations for violations of FCC rules for advertising during children’s programming, according to letters issued Tuesday. WXII-TV Winston-Salem (http://bit.ly/1onxHEj) and WYFF Greenville (http://bit.ly/1p7ffjj) were admonished for the same October incident, when the Web address for a kids show on the NBC network was shown briefly at the end of the show’s broadcast. Because the website contains an online shop, it violates FCC rules for ads during kids’ TV shows, the letters said. “We note that while the commercial matter may have been inserted into the program by the Station’s television network, this does not relieve the Station of responsibility for the violations,” the bureau said. The stations were admonished because the incident appears “isolated,” the letters said. Hearst had no immediate comment.

The Protect Football on Free TV campaign submitted 4,800 additional letters from football fans to the FCC urging it to maintain the sports blackout rule. The total number of fans submitting these letters amounts to more than 16,400, the campaign said Monday in a news release. The campaign is led by former NFL player Lynn Swann, who said he asks that the FCC consider the fans’ petitions as it decides what’s in the public interest. Fans don’t want the agency “to needlessly make a rule change -- based on theory and speculation -- that jeopardizes their ability to follow football on free TV,” he said.

Gray Television signed long-term agreements with CBS and Fox that renew all 26 of Gray’s existing TV station agreements. The CBS agreements were renewed in 22 markets, CBS and Gray said Monday in a news release (http://bit.ly/1mJxbBd). The agreements with Fox include 10 stations serving eight markets, Gray said in another release (http://bit.ly/1wt8lyN).

The Rainbow PUSH Coalition wants the FCC to review and reverse the Media Bureau’s approval of Sinclair’s buying Allbritton Communications’ TV stations, said an application for review filed Monday. The request for review hinges on Rainbow PUSH’s 11-year-old contention that Sinclair has improper control over Cunningham Broadcasting, with which it is involved in several shared service arrangements, the application said. In 2002 and 2003, Rainbow successfully challenged Sinclair over its relationship with Glencairn, and the coalition maintains that Cunningham is a successor to Glencairn. Sinclair controls Cunningham’s financing, staffing and programming as it had for Glencairn, Rainbow PUSH said. “All of these protocols worked to the disadvantage of Glencairn and to the advantage of Sinclair for no apparent legitimate business reason.” In approving the Allbritton deal, the bureau didn’t correctly address Rainbow PUSH’s concerns about Sinclair’s conduct, the application said. By approving the Allbritton deal despite previously finding that Sinclair acted improperly with Glencairn, the commission has set a precedent that could encourage recidivism, Rainbow PUSH said. The Allbritton deal should be reversed and the full commission should hear arguments on whether Sinclair and Cunningham should be broadcast licensees and on the nature of Sinclair’s sharing arrangements, Rainbow PUSH said.

The FCC Enforcement Bureau admonished Jeannine Mason, licensee of KTZZ(FM) Conrad, Montana, for operating a studio-transmitter link station without a license. Due to Mason’s inability to pay and history of compliance, the bureau didn’t impose a forfeiture, it said in an order released Friday (http://bit.ly/1ttmHL8). The bureau initially proposed a $10,000 fine, it said.

The FCC Media Bureau let WCUZ (FM) Bear Lake, Michigan, upgrade its facilities from Channel 261A to Channel 264C3. To allow that, the bureau substituted Channel 260A for Channel 263A at Custer, it said in an order released Friday (http://bit.ly/1q2IjgU). The channel substitution at Custer would serve the public interest because it will accommodate WCUZ owner Roy Henderson’s proposed channel upgrade for the station, it said. Canada has concurred in the allotment of Channel 260A at Custer, which is within 199 miles of the U.S.-Canada border, the bureau said. The proceeding is terminated, it said.

Grant County Broadcasters opposed a proposal by SSR Communications to create a C4 class for FM stations. Creating a C4 class would result in a reduction in Zone II of FM translator and low-power FM opportunities “due to the additional protected coverage created for stations in the new class,” Grant County Broadcasters said in a filing posted Friday in docket RM-11727 (http://bit.ly/1lmcIY0). The stations to suffer the most from additional translator interference are the Class A stations that the original proposal was supposedly designed to “help,” it said. Such stations are the most likely to have significant audiences beyond their primary contours, like Grant’s Class A station WNKR Williamstown, Kentucky, it said. These are audiences that they can protect today, but would be lost and unrecoverable under the modified proposal, Grant County Broadcasters said. Adoption of the modified proposal also would cause major problems within the emergency alert system “as stations become cut off from their monitoring assignments due to the installation of new translators,” it said. Initial comments in the proceeding are due Sept. 18 (CD Aug 15 p10).