Congress Expected to Wait for More Definitive FCC Estimates on Need for Additional Repacking Funding
The timeline for House and Senate Commerce committees to act on legislation to provide additional funding for post-incentive auction repacking appears to hinge on when the FCC can provide more concrete estimates of how much repacking costs will exceed the $1.75 billion allocated in the Broadcaster Relocation Fund, lawmakers and lobbyists told us. House Republican Conference Chairman Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., and Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-Calif., are circulating a letter that could heat up the debate over whether Congress should grant the FCC more authority to not penalize broadcasters that can't meet the existing 39-month repacking timeline, lobbyists said.
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Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., who spearheaded the Viewer and Listener Protection Act (S-1632), told us any Senate Commerce movement on the bill “will be based upon the timing of additional information, when the FCC is able to tell us whether they've verified the amount of additional funding that's necessary” to reimburse broadcasters. Moran led bipartisan sponsorship of S-1632 in July after the FCC preliminarily estimated the expense of the post-incentive auction repacking at $2.12 billion, $365 million above the repacking fund (see 1707140054, 1707140070 and 1707260059). House Commerce ranking member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., led sponsorship of the Viewer Protection Act (HR-3347) (see 1707200051). Both bills would establish funds to supplement the $1.75 billion reimbursement allocation.
Senate Commerce appears likely to pursue some version of S-1632's language once the FCC provides more definitive funding overage estimates, a communications sector lobbyist said. Chairman John Thune, R-S.D., “has said some very positive things about the repacking issue from the broadcasters' perspective,” and others on the committee share that view, particularly on funding, the lobbyist said. House Commerce members have also shown an interest in pursuing additional repacking funding, though they may wait until Senate Commerce acts on S-1632 since that bill is bipartisan, while HR-3347 is a solely Democratic-backed proposal, another lobbyist said.
A House aide pointed to the range of issues that Communications Subcommittee members raised during a September repacking hearing (see 1709070058), saying House Commerce will need to consider how those issues should be factored into legislation it considers. The aide noted the Radio Consumer Protection Act (HR-3685), which would establish a Radio Consumer Protection Fund to reimburse the 678 terrestrial radio stations affected by the repack for related costs through the end of 2022.
“Until the FCC comes back to Congress” with a definitive estimate on the amount of extra funding needed, “we just don't know” when lawmakers will act, said LPTV Coalition Executive Director Mike Gravino. Congress has to navigate between a range of repacking-related narratives, including recent concerns about how Sinclair's proposed buy of Tribune (see 1709290063) and T-Mobile’s possible merger with Sprint could impact the repacking process, he said. “You've got two huge sectors competing against each other” on repacking, along with Microsoft's proposals for reserving channels for white space use in the TV band, Gravino said.