The FCC has authority to require multilingual emergency alert sys...
The FCC has authority to require multilingual emergency alert system (EAS) announcements, said the Minority Media & Telecom Council (MMTC), Independent Spanish Bcstrs. Assn. and other groups. The Commission can opt only to approve local and state govt. EAS…
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proposals that “reasonably provide for widespread multilingual communications” in disasters, MMTC said in a FCC filing released Tues. While multilingual EAS broadcasts are a “laudable” goal, NAB said in a response filed last week, “statutory and practical questions” remain. NAB questioned whether the FCC, rather than FEMA, has authority to require multilingual emergency broadcasts. While raising practical questions about which Spanish-language station alerts would have to be re- broadcast, the group had no immediate comment on MMTC’s filing. The EAS issue is “non-controversial,” MMTC Exec. Dir David Honig claimed. “The NAB didn’t say that this was unimportant… or that the commission doesn’t have jurisdiction,” he told us. “We think we've made a very strong case that the Commission should step up and address this right now.” Still, there’s no indication such action is forthcoming. More than 150,000 Spanish-speakers in the New Orleans area were without a source of information in their language during Hurricane Katrina (CD Sept 21 p5). “The Commission has both the jurisdiction and the moral authority” to require multilingual EAS, MMTC said.