State regulators at their summer meeting advanced four more telecom policy resolutions, on numbering, broadband data collection, IP relay fraud and broadband over power line cost accounting. The Telecom Committee of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) decided against resurrecting a fifth policy matter, a controversial resolution narrowly defeated by its staff subcommittee that would have urged that federal Universal Service Fund reforms be neutral regarding providers and technologies.
The International Trade Commission’s (ITC) order barring imports of new wireless devices containing Qualcomm chips could mean a $21.1 billion hit to the U.S. economy, said consultants to the company. The contention by the Brattle Group comes as Qualcomm and wireless carriers led by CTIA turn up pressure on President Bush to veto the ITC order.
The FCC hopes broadcasters and minority groups soon agree on how to alert non-English speakers to disasters, storms and the like using stations’ emergency alert systems (EASs). In six months, the FCC will issue a rulemaking on the matter, it said Thursday in an order voted on at its May meeting (CD June 1 p6). At the gathering, commissioners held off voting on a Minority Media & Telecom Council petition on Spanish-language EAS alerts to give the group and broadcasters time to compromise. The Council and other advocates wanted stations to translate warnings into Spanish and other tongues when a foreign-language station in a market is knocked off the air. Broadcasters want to get translations from authorities.
The FCC noted $15,000 in broadcast fines late Friday. WQMA(AM) Marks, Miss., was fined $7,000 for improperly enclosing an antenna tower and WUVM Atlanta, a low-power TV station, drew an $8,000 penalty for lacking an emergency alert system decoder, said Enforcement Bureau forfeiture orders.
ATIS published an IPTV High Level Architecture standard, it said Thurs. The document provides a reference architecture for IPTV functional specifications being developed by the ATIS IPTV Interoperability Forum (IFF), it said. The standard considers architecture scaling from local to regional and national service offerings, identifying interfacing components that deliver IPTV, it said. “The High Level Architecture marks a major step in introducing IPTV into homes globally,” IFF Chmn, Daniel O'Callaghan said. ATIS said work is underway on specifications for linear/broadcast TV service, consumer-domain initialization and attachment, media protocols, consumer-domain device remote management and an IPTV emergency alert system.
The Cal. PUC plans workshops Tues.-Sun. to fulfill a 2006 legislative directive that the PUC deal with needs for telecom backup power systems for customer premises equipment in homes and small businesses, and for standard emergency notification protocols for all Cal. carriers. The directive noted that many telecom devices won’t work without commercial electric power, which could leave customers with no way to dial 911 in power failures. The Tues. and Wed. workshops in Case R 07-04-015 will deal with respective responsibilities of carriers and customers and options for backup power. The session Sun. will cover carriers can alert the public to local emergencies.
Telcos must provide emergency announcements to pay-TV customers under a broad FCC emergency alert system (EAS) order requiring pay-TV providers to carry state and local warnings. Broadcasters, cable operators, DBS providers and telco TV services must accept alerts in a new format within 6 months of getting FEMA standards, Homeland Security Bureau Deputy Policy Div. Chief Tom Beers told the Thurs. agenda meeting. FEMA is to issue Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) guidelines in early 2008 (CD May 30 p2). As expected, the Commission punted on a controversial request by advocacy groups to require stations to broadcast alerts in multiple languages.
The FCC may require pay-TV providers and broadcasters to use a new emergency alert standard to relay govt. information on disasters, said agency and industry officials. The FCC seems set to adopt an emergency alert system (EAS) order (CD May 18 p9) at the Thurs. agenda meeting that will require use of common alerting protocol (CAP) -- once FEMA is done working on the system. CAP allows distribution of a single warning message by multiple sources including cable systems, radio and TV. The U.S. govt. permitted CAP testing in 2005. Last-min. 8th floor negotiations on the emergency alert rulemaking’s wording concern how to address multilingual alerts, said media advocacy, broadcast and FCC officials.
The FCC reduced fines levied against 3 broadcasters by $11,950 total at their request, declining to cancel them, in Enforcement Bureau forfeiture orders. A $7,000 penalty to low-power TV station KHLU Honolulu fell to $5,600 thanks to its “history of compliance with Commission rules,” said the Bureau. The station broke FCC rules by running a main studio outside Honolulu, where it’s licensed, and not having running water, windows or a phone there. The Bureau cut by 40% a fine to KSPZ(AM) Ammon, Ida., because it tried to repair fences surrounding antenna towers. The new penalty is $4,200. A fine against KBZB(FM) Pinoche, Nev., for lacking emergency alert system gear shrank 97% to $250 because station owner Gla-Mar showed it couldn’t pay the original $8,000 penalty.
The FCC is to consider a broad emergency alert system (EAS) rulemaking at its May 31 agenda meeting, said industry and agency officials. The order is expected to address a 2005 Minority Media & Telecom Council petition that the Commission require alerts in Spanish. It was filed after Hurricane Katrina knocked KGLA(AM) Gretna, La., off the air; listeners couldn’t get emergency news in Spanish from other New Orleans- area stations (CD Sept 21/05 p5). It’s not clear the extent to which the Commission will require emergency announcements in languages other than English. Details of the EAS order seem to be under debate on the 8th floor. The order likely will deal with broader emergency alert issues such as the kinds of technology that broadcasters can use, an industry lawyer said. - JM