Comments are due June 28, replies July 5, on a Warner Bros. Discovery petition seeking a waiver from the FCC requirement that its TBS and TNT networks provide a certain amount of audio-described programming per quarter. The requested waiver would run July 1, 2024, through June 30, 2027, and cover multichannel video programming distributors carrying the WBD networks, according to a public notice Friday.
Petitions asking the FCC to reconsider authorizing radio geotargeting are “procedurally defective” and request changes that would affect all FM boosters, Geobroadcast Solutions (GBS) said in an opposition filing posted Friday (docket 20-401). REC Network’s recon petition asks the agency to prevent boosters from exceeding the signal strength of other nearby radio stations, while the Press Communications petition asks the agency to ban program-originating boosters in “embedded metros” -- radio markets located within the boundaries of a larger market. Neither petition “shows a material error or omission” in the original order and so the FCC should reject them, GBS said. REC’s request would create a technical standard that would apply to all FM boosters and is outside the bounds of the geotargeted radio proceeding, GBS said. “To the extent that REC wishes the Commission to adopt a new rule to protect [low-power] FM stations from all FM boosters, a petition for reconsideration is clearly not the proper vehicle,” GBS said. The FCC “carefully considered and addressed concerns pertaining to stations in embedded markets in the Order,” and the Press petition doesn’t introduce new facts, GBS said. “The Commission should continue pressing forward with program-originating boosters and dismiss the petitions,” GBS said.
Liberty Communications of Puerto Rico petitioned the FCC to waive certain USF reporting requirements for Q2. Liberty sought a waiver of the pretesting performance measurement, performance measures model system reporting requirements, and rules related to withholding disbursements. The company has "encountered numerous technical problems" with the performance measures module system "for multiple months," said its petition posted Friday in docket 18-143. Liberty also said it lacks enough time to deploy equipment to sampled subscribers and complete testing by June 30.
ClearCaptions urged the FCC to increase its rates for IP captioned telephone service (IP CTS) providers using communications assistants (CA). It also suggested establishing a $1 floor rate for automatic speech recognition. A "lack of rate certainty" has caused several providers to stop investing in marketing and outreach, ClearCaptions told an aide to Commissioner Geoffrey Starks. "This has resulted in three straight years of negative industry growth," ClearCaptions said in a filing posted Friday in docket 03-123. The company noted that a rate plan of "at least two years" would also provide rate stability for the industry.
The National Sheriffs' Association urged the FCC to include safety and surveillance costs in its final ratemaking for incarcerated people's communications services (IPCS), holding separate meetings with aides to Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel and Commissioners Nathan Simington, Geoffrey Starks and Brendan Carr. NSA also met with Wireline Bureau and Office of Economics and Analytics staff. It said that jails are "subject to a broad array of requirements that necessitate safety and security measures," in a filing posted Friday (docket 23-62). IPCS can also "expose jails to liability for failing to fulfill their obligations to the incarcerated," NSA said. "It is important to recognize that the commission does not have authority over jails," NSA said: "The commission must therefore take care not to interfere with the operation of jails as it develops an IPCS compensation plan." NSA also asked that the FCC "disregard proposals to use industry-wide average costs based on the general telecommunications industry," noting the industry is "largely deregulated." The group suggested developing separate rates for smaller jails "due to the unique cost structure of such facilities" and higher rates for jails based on average daily population.
With the FCC signing off on four of Tomorrow Companies' planned non-geostationary orbit satellites and deferred action on 14 more, Tomorrow is asking the agency's Space Bureau to modify its grant, going to six satellites and allowing the company to move on the remaining 12. The Space Bureau application posted Thursday included updated re-entry casualty risk information; the agency in granting the four weather satellites had deferred action on the 14 pending updated re-entry casualty information (see 2405200049). Tomorrow said it's trying to make redesigns that are part of the updated re-entry casualty information, but they don't appear to be practical to be implemented before the seventh and eighth scheduled missions. It said it anticipates an October launch for its third and fourth satellites, with another 10 launching in Q1 2025.
Given the expected growth in low earth orbit traffic, the FCC's pending 100 object-years metric proposal (see 2405290074), while a good idea, should be reduced to 25 to 50 years, Kall Morris said in docket 18-313 Thursday. It also urged data collection that it said would improve rulemaking. The data would include planned and actual total derelict time on orbit for failed and planned disposals for each object launched and tracked by the operator. It said the FCC also could play a role in fostering collaboration between insurance companies and in-orbit servicing, assembly and manufacturing operators. Operators' premiums could pay for ISAM services if relocation of a satellite is needed owing to damage or if it exceeded object-year time frames, it added.
Banning early-termination fees (ETF) and requiring prorated refunds would hurt consumers, but should the FCC go that route, it should ban only "unjust or unreasonable" whole-month billing, NCTA and cable operators said Thursday in docket 23-405. Recapping a meeting with Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel's office and Media Bureau Chief Holly Sauer, the cablers said that approach would "preserve the benefits of reasonable ETFs" and protect consumers from excessively high ETFs. Reasonable ETFs would be transparently disclosed, or cable companies could grant a grace period, letting consumers cancel video service without incurring a fee, they said. Moreover, the record would need further development before supporting extending ETF rules to bundled services, they added. Representatives of Comcast, Charter Communications and Cox Enterprises also met with the FCC on these items. In December, FCC commissioners 3-2 approved a video service fees NPRM that proposes banning ETFs and requiring prorated refunds when service is canceled (see 2312130019).
The FCC Media Bureau is seeking comment on a petition to create a more powerful Class-A FM station class known as A-10, a public notice said Thursday. The petition, from Commander Communication, asks the agency to allow existing Class A FM stations to upgrade to the higher power class where they wouldn’t interfere with other co-channel stations. Commander CEO Carl Haynes told us his proposal would follow the existing interference rules and allow many FM stations to be more economically viable and extend reach. “Implementing these proposals will enable stations to better serve the public with a more reliable signal for news and emergency weather notifications,” the petition said. A previous FM power increase proposal, creating a C4 class of FM station, has been stalled at the FCC since 2016. Comments on the A10 petition are due in docket 24-183 on July 22, replies Aug. 21.
The FCC Media Bureau approved a deal for Gray Television to sell two TV stations in Wyoming and Nebraska to Marquee Broadcasting in exchange for Marquee’s FCC-issued construction permit to build a station in Salt Lake City, an order in Thursday’s Daily Digest said. Because the swap includes transferring a Gray station that carries top-four affiliate channels -- KGWN-TV Cheyenne, Wyoming -- the deal falls under the agency’s new 2018 quadrennial order, which requires transactions involving multiple top-four programming streams to be considered on a case-by-case basis. The agency approved the deal because there doesn’t appear to be a commercially viable alternative home for KGWN’s CBS and NBC network affiliations, the order said. “Permitting Marquee to acquire KGWN with its two top-four network affiliations intact” is "in the public interest and would ensure the preservation of local news service and network-affiliated program distribution in the local market,” the order said.