Disability Groups Seek FCC Clarity on ACM Closed Captioning Petition
When considering the Alliance for Community Media 2016 petition seeking waiver of certain FCC registration and certification requirements for public, educational and government access video producers, the FCC should make clear such a waiver doesn't make PEG channels generally exempt…
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from closed caption provision rules, disability interests said in a docket 05-231 filing Wednesday. They said the FCC should also make clear that any PEG programmer exemption wouldn't preclude eliminating exemptions that could apply to PEG channels if the agency narrows or eliminates categorical exemptions. They said the agency should make clear that PEG channels carrying at least some nonexempt programming must certify which programs are exempt. And they said the FCC should reaffirm it will hold video programmers ultimately responsible for violating relevant captioning rules. The disability interests included Telecommunications for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, National Association of the Deaf and the Hearing Loss Association of America. ACM asked for waiving registration and certification for PEG video producers distributing video programs over PEG or other exempt channels. It said such certification and registration is "needless" for the legions of average citizen program owners using PEG access channels if they're distributing on channels exempt from captioning rules, as many such channels are.