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NTCH urged the FCC to ensure that the...

NTCH urged the FCC to ensure that the FCC order streamlining tower construction rules near AM stations prohibits retroactive rule application. The order was approved by commissioners this year (CD Aug 20 p4). The order has changed the legal landscape…

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for existing tower owners and operators “by promoting unlawfully retroactive application of the new rules in certain situations,” said NTCH in a petition for reconsideration posted Thursday in docket 93-177 (http://bit.ly/1dxstCq). The FCC’s retroactive action injects a potentially massive new cost into the tower financial equation “that could never have been anticipated by either the tower owners or the tenants on the towers; the entire basis of the economic relationship will have been upset,” it said. “Neither NTCH nor the public at large was provided notice of the potential for retroactive application of the new protection scheme.” The FCC had no comment.