Lack of qualified tower crews will start delaying projects and affecting subsequent phases by the end of Phase 2 of the repacking, American Tower Corp. told FCC Incentive Auction Task Force Chair Jean Kiddoo and IATF staff Tuesday, recounted a filing in docket 16-306. ATC said the tower company and broadcasters made progress in repack efforts, but stations are “limited by the number of qualified broadcast tower crews.” The presentation pointed to a lack of qualified RF engineers as limiting the ability of broadcasters to meet the 39-month repack timeline. The large number of complex projects in Phase 2 “presents a major challenge to ATC and those affected repack stations,” the company said. ATSC 3.0 won’t impact the schedule, it said, and a “majority” of repacked broadcasters are “adding vertical polarization to their new channel antennas in anticipation of conversion" to 3.0. ATC said it and broadcasters are “waiting on the release of reimbursement funding approvals to fully engage material vendors and construction crews.”

CBS and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers reached an early contract renewal agreement covering 3,500 technicians, the broadcaster said in a news release Wednesday. The IBEW represents CBS workers in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, St. Louis, San Francisco, Dallas, Miami and Atlanta, the announcement said. The contract was ratified by the affected workforce and will be effective Feb. 1 and goes through April 30, 2021, it said. The current contract was scheduled to end Jan. 31 and the new deal includes pay increases, increased benefit contributions and “a path forward for new media,” said the company.

The second filing window for full-power and Class A stations to seek alternate channels and expanded facilities will open Oct. 3 and close Nov. 2, the FCC Incentive Auction Task Force said in a public notice in docket 16-306 Wednesday. The first filing window closed Friday. During the second, stations can amend or modify their initial construction permit application, the PN said. Such requests have to protect applications from the first window or from the initial channel reassignments, it said. “Additional costs incurred in constructing alternate channels or expanded facilities are not reimbursable under the TV Broadcaster Relocation Fund and must be paid by the station.”

The NTIA is repealing rules for the Public Telecommunications Facilities Program (PTFP), it said in Wednesday's Federal Register. The PTFP grant program helped nonprofit organizations and local governments build public TV and radio stations, but no funds have been available for PTFP grants since FY 2011, it said. “The regulations are unnecessary and obsolete.” The repeal was effective Wednesday.

Conducting the nationwide emergency alert system test following hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Jose and Maria “will provide insight into the resiliency of our national-level alerting capabilities in impacted areas,” the Federal Emergency Management Agency said in a news release Tuesday. The test is set for Sept. 27 at 2:20 p.m., but could be moved to Oct. 4 if the September date is canceled because of another emergency. The EAS test also will provide data on how the Integrated Public Alerts and Warning System performs “during and following a variety of conditions,” the agency said. “With two major hurricanes already making landfall, and a potential for two more impacting our nation, we need to have the ability to maintain the continuity of critical infrastructure under various conditions.”

Washington, D.C., launched a government noncommercial radio station that will provide information on community affairs, current events and government resources, Mayor Muriel Bowser’s (D) office said in a news release Tuesday. DC Radio will be run and broadcast from the city’s Office of Cable Television, Film, Music and Entertainment, and is part of a broadcasting partnership between Howard University’s WHUR-FM and the city. The station is one of two municipally owned full-power radio stations in the country, the release said.

A call by top House Commerce Committee Democrats for the FCC to investigate whether Russian government-owned radio service Sputnik broadcasts propaganda over U.S. airwaves aimed at influencing the 2016 presidential election and other contests is “the newest intellectual height reached by the US establishment,” said Sputnik parent Rossiya Segodnya Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan in a statement. House Commerce ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., House Communications Subcommittee ranking member Michael Doyle, D-Pa., and Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., sought the FCC probe Monday, citing concerns about potential violations of the Communications Act's public interest standard. Sputnik began terrestrial broadcasts in July in the Washington, D.C., area using 105.5 FM, which it leased from owner Reston Translator (see 1709180054).

All full-power and Class A TV stations changing channels in the post-incentive auction repacking have to file transition progress reports, the FCC Incentive Auction Task Force said in a reminder public notice Wednesday. The first deadline is Oct. 10, the PN said. “Stations must file quarterly reports starting with the first full quarter after release of the Closing and Channel Reassignment Public Notice on April 13, 2017.” Reports must provide information on steps stations took toward construction of new facilities in Q3, the PN said.

Sony Friday lifted the wraps off its first 8K broadcast camera to include three 8K sensors. It developed the UHC-8300 with “customer input provided by NHK,” which is planning the launch of 8K commercial broadcast services in 2018 as a prelude to 8K Super Hi-Vision coverage of the Tokyo Olympics in July 2020, Richard Scott, head of media solutions at Sony Professional Europe, told a news conference webcast live from Sony’s IBC booth in Amsterdam. “We expect this camera to be used not only for 8K production, but also for 4K production.” The Sony DADC New Media Solutions business, which offers digital supply chain services and physical disc replication, is being put under the wing of the Sony Professional Solutions Group, said Adam Fry, vice president-Sony Professional Europe. The move is in keeping with Sony Professional’s strategy to convert itself from a company known exclusively as a broadcast hardware products supplier to “one offering an equal balance of hardware and services within just a few years,” Fry said: It "will accelerate Sony to being a true services company.”

The full FCC rejected two applications for review by PMCM and one by Viacom appealing Media Bureau decisions on the broadcaster's effort to transmit a signal on virtual channel 3.10, an order released Friday said. PMCM appealed bureau rulings that its WJLP Middletown Township, New Jersey, be assigned to virtual channel 33, because 3 already is assigned to another station in the area (see 1607260059). Viacom’s application for review sought to keep WJLP from being carried on channel 33 by local MVPDs. The FCC concluded that bureau assignment of channel 33 was correct, and that Viacom’s and PMCM’s other filings were procedurally defective. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in April denied a PMCM request for a writ of mandamus on the matter (see 1704050063). PMCM and Viacom didn't comment.