Ohio’s WYSO to boost signal power, move to better facility

WYSO-FM in Yellow Springs, Ohio, will move to renovated studios and increase its signal strength from 37,000 watts to 50,000 watts before year’s end, thanks to a $1 million grant from its licensee, Antioch University, approved by the school’s board Sept. 23. The upgrade will extend the station’s reach in southwest Ohio and improve signal quality. The FCC has approved the changes, university officials said in a statement. “Fifty thousand watts is a big deal,” WYSO General Manager Neenah Ellis said in the release.

As clock ticks, Native groups ask FCC for more time

Native Public Media and the National Congress of American Indians are warning the FCC that many tribal licensees may be unable to meet deadlines for station construction permits granted since 2007. For one week that October, the FCC accepted applications for new full-power noncommercial educational stations — the first time the agency had done so in seven years. Native American groups spread the word about the rare opportunity to claim a share of FM spectrum. Tribal organizations filed 58 applications and won 38 construction permits (CPs). If built, the stations will more than double the 33 currently broadcasting to tribal lands nationwide (Current, Nov.

Fed role: help ‘nonprofit news operations … gain traction”

The new report to the FCC about the state of the media and the future of American journalism estimates that filling gaps in local reporting would cost from $265 million to $1.6 billion a year. It also suggests various ways in which the government could help nonprofit media afford to bridge that chasm. “The main focus of government policy should not be providing the funds to sustain reporting but helping to create conditions under which nonprofit news operations can gain traction,” the report advises. But observers point out that the FCC has no power to make many of those changes, which include adjusting tax laws for pubmedia organizations, getting foundations to fund more journalism, and rethinking CPB’s legislated spending proportions to allot more money to nonbroadcast and multimedia innovators. “Information Needs of Communities: The Changing Media Landscape in a Broadband Age” was released June 9.

Adrift, mute and helpless

Why everyone but public broadcasters is making federal policy for public media

The FCC’s recent National Broadband Plan and its Future of the Media initiative have highlighted a chronic problem in U.S public broadcasting: The system has no long-term policy planning capacity, and therefore it always has had great difficulty dealing with the periodic efforts by outsiders to critique and “reform” it. Public broadcasting ignores most media policy research, whether it originates in academia, think tanks or federal agencies, and it often seems out of touch with major national policy deliberations until too late. That disengagement is highly dangerous because it allows others to set the national legal and regulatory agenda for communications without assuring adequate policy attention to public-service, noncommercial and educational goals. Such policy initiatives also can negatively affect the funding and operating conditions of every public licensee. This article, the first of two, examines the history and recent serious consequences of that disengagement.

It’s a plan

Comic recreation of a gripping behind-the-scenes drama playing itself out at the Federal Communications Commission, animated using Xtranormal technology.

Indecency’s winding road, 1978-2006

July 3, 1978
FCC v. Pacifica Foundation: The Supreme Court upheld the FCC’s right to ban indecent speech when children could be expected to be in the audience. Pacifica’s WBAI in New York had aired George Carlin’s “Filthy Words” monologue in the afternoon of Oct. 30, 1973. Upshot: Confirmed both the FCC’s right to regulate indecent language and its definition of such speech as that which depicts “sexual or excretory activities or organs in terms patently offensive as measured by contemporary community standards for the broadcast medium.” Indecent material falls short of obscenities, which are banned at all hours. Aug.

Hundt: System needs openness of 4 kinds

Attorney and former FCC chairman Reed Hundt , a co-chair of the PBS-appointed Digital Future Initiative, previewed his thinking in a Current commentary seven months before the panel issued its recommendations at the end of 2005. See also Co-chair James Barksdale’s commentary. Jim Barksdale said at the very first meeting of the Digital Future Initiative that one thing that he learned in his different business successes is that the main thing is to make the main thing always be the main thing. I’m going to try to do that today by telling you the main thing on my mind after working for months with our distinguished panel and bringing in lots of other people to talk to us. I’ll tell you straight from the shoulder: I think public broadcasting is in one of those slowly developing, hard-to-spot situations that is, in fact, a real crisis.

Required filing: a chance to show your stuff!

Quick — what’s your reaction when someone asks to see your station’s public file? A smile or a wince? And why does it matter? Read on.In November the New York Times published a series on nonprofit accountability, once again parading before the public the missteps of the American Red Cross post-9/11 and the malfeasance of various United Way agency executives. You could imagine nonprofit leaders across the country in a collective cringe.

Dereg struggle seen assisting public TV

There’s hope for public broadcasting in the upwelling of citizen opposition to FCC deregulation of commercial TV, broadcast historian Robert McChesney said in a keynote address at the PBS Annual Meeting June 7. “It’s this movement of an aroused and engaged citizenry that really is the future that will genuinely expand and enhance public-service media in the United States,” McChesney asserted. Dereg became a matter of public debate as the FCC adopted new rules June 2, loosening limits on station ownership. A single company can now own stations reaching up to 45 percent of the country’s population, up from 35 percent (and the real reach permitted is greater, since the FCC by policy counts only half of UHF viewers). The changes are expected to excite a frenzy of station purchases by media giants.

Will Senate loosen definition of ‘educational’ channels?

Public broadcasters are ramping up efforts to secure support of their position in the Senate after the House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved legislation that could force the FCC to permit religious broadcasters to use reserved noncommercial educational channels without determining whether they carry educational programs or not. The Noncommercial Broadcasting Freedom of Expression Act, H.R. 4201, passed the House 264-159 on June 20, with six Republicans and 153 Democrats opposed. The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Charles W. “Chip” Pickering (R-Miss.) but largely rewritten by House telecom subcommittee Chair Billy Tauzin (R-La.), gives nonprofit organizations the right to hold noncommercial educational (NCE) radio or television licenses if the station broadcasts material the organization itself deems to serve an “educational, instructional, cultural or religious purpose.” The bill notes that religious programming “contributes to serving the educational and cultural needs of the public,” and dictates that the FCC treat it the same way it treats educational programming. Before the legislation’s passage, the House rejected an alternative offered by Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) that would have mandated the reserved channels be primarily educational.

In fights for noncommercial channels, FCC gives an edge to the locals

Until recently, it seemed that Simon Frech’s squabble with two religious broadcasters over an FM frequency would never end. In 1995, the FCC stopped considering competing applications from noncommercial broadcasters for radio and television frequencies, leaving Frech and many others in bureaucratic limbo. Adding it up
The FCC’s new point system for choosing among noncommercial broadcasters vying for the same frequency will reward several characteristics:

3 points if the applicant is locally based, which the FCC defines as being physically headquartered, having a campus, or having three-fourths of its board members within 25 miles of the community;

2 points if the applicant owns no other local broadcast stations. An applicant that can’t claim this credit but is part of a statewide network providing service to accredited schools can also claim 2 points;

1-2 points to an applicant whose frequency covers significantly more area and population than the next best proposal. “It’s frustrating,” says Frech, g.m. of KMUD in Garberville, Calif., who was about to launch a campaign to persuade the religious broadcasters to back off.

NPR asks FCC to delay, rethink low-power FM

NPR took a different tack March 16 in the ongoing assault on the FCC’s controversial plan to license low-power FM (LPFM) stations. Lawmakers and the National Association of Broadcasters have opposed the measure outright, but in a petition for reconsideration and a motion for stay, NPR asked the agency to take another look at some aspects of LPFM and delay implementing the proposal until July 15. Specifically, NPR requested greater protections for translators, radio reading services, full-power stations on third adjacent channels from LPFM stations, and potential digital radio technology. The network says the motion for stay would allow more time for NPR and FCC lab and field tests of interference expected to be caused by LPFM stations. On Feb.

FCC rejects petition to alter DTV modulation standard

The argument over the digital TV standard will continue, though the FCC tried to put it away Feb. 4 [2000], unanimously denying Sinclair Broadcast Group’s petition to permit the use of a different transmitter modulation scheme. Public TV has taken no official position on the issue — engineering managers in the system are divided on the issue. Though informal Sinclair tests found that first-generation DTV receivers have trouble getting pictures with indoor antennas, the FCC said in its letter to the Baltimore-based station chain, “we believe that Sinclair has done no more than to demonstrate a shortcoming of early DTV receiver implementation, rather than a basic flaw in the ATSC standard . .

Temporary Commission on Alternative Financing, 1993

The Temporary Commission on Alternative Financing for Public Telecommunications (TCAF) delivered its recommendations to Congress on Oct. 1, 1983, after extensive research, including an Advertising Demonstration Program at a number of public TV stations. Documents below:
Letter of transmittal
Membership of TCAF
Executive Summary

Chairman’s letter of transmittal

To the Congress of the United States:

In accordance with Congress’ direction in the Public Broadcasting Amendments Act of 1981, Public Law Number 97-35, the Temporary Commission on Alternative Financing for Public Telecommunications hereby submits its Final Report. This report describes the Advertising Demonstration Program in which selected public television stations experimented with the carriage of limited advertising. The report includes findings, conclusions, and recommendations to Congress concerning the financing of public broadcasting.

Uneasy dilemma for public TV: stick with DTV standard?

Which would be worse? Raising ungrounded fears about DTV technology that spook the public and delay the transition for years? Or ignoring those worries and finding out later that the system is a dog? Public TV’s engineers are divided on question of reopening the three-year-old U.S. standard for DTV transmission, a course of action championed by Sinclair Broadcast Group and now festering on the body technological. “I’m conflicted — it’s a thing that an engineer doesn’t like to be,” admits Bruce Jacobs, chief technology officer at KTCA in Twin Cities.

FCC OKs noncommercial low-power FM over broadcasters’ objections

The FCC’s establishment of two low-power FM (LPFM) classes of stations — 10-watt and 100-watt — could populate radio dials with more than a thousand tiny noncommercial broadcasters, assuming the plan weathers possible challenges from Congress and existing broadcasters. FCC officials say the initial LPFM proposal, unveiled a year ago, generated a record volume of public comment, with churches, high schools, minorities, microradio activists and others defending the plan against attacks from established broadcasters. The plan that won approval by a 4-1 vote is more modest than its predecessor. It nixed the idea of commercial LPFM stations — which may allow a boom in noncommercial radio beyond the reserved band. And it dropped the 1,000-watt class of low-power stations, allowing a max of 100 watts — broadcasting about three miles.

Nonprofits courting DBS for set-aside channels

A ground-floor chance to secure channel space on direct broadcast satellites is opening up for noncommercial organizations that have the wherewithal to deliver educational or informational public-service programming. DirecTV, the largest DBS system, has set a Sept. 1 [1999] application deadline for prospective programmers to be considered in its initial selection of new channels. PBS, Internews, and Free Speech TV are among the nonprofits vying for the space. DBS services–a once-crowded field of competitors that has merged down to two major players–are under orders from the Federal Communications Commission to allocate 4 percent of their video channel capacity for noncommercial educational programming.

FCC denies former staffers’ nonrenewal request for KPTS, Wichita

The FCC decided in July 1999 that it did not have grounds to get involved in an extended staff-management conflict at public TV station KPTS in Wichita/Hutchinson, Kan., but it fined the station $5,000 for not reporting two staffers’ gender discrimination complaints. Before the
Federal Communications Commission
Washington, D.C. 20554

In re Application of )
)
Kansas Public Telecommunications Services, Inc.) File No. BRET-980129KG
)
For Renewal of License for )
Station KPTS(TV) )
Hutchinson, Kansas )

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER AND NOTICE OF APPARENT LIABILITY

Adopted: July 28, 1999; Released: July 28, 1999

By the Chief, Mass Media Bureau:

I. INTRODUCTION

1. The Commission, by the Chief, Mass Media Bureau, pursuant to delegated authority, has
before it for consideration: (i) the license renewal application of Kansas Public Telecommunications Services,
Inc. (“KPTS, Inc.” or “licensee”) for Station KPTS(TV), Hutchinson, Kansas; (ii) an informal objection to
the renewal application filed by Candyce Hoop (“Hoop”) and Som Chanthabouly (“Chanthabouly”)
(collectively “informal objectors”), former employees of KPTS(TV); (iii) licensee’s “Motion For Extension of
Time” to file its opposition; (iv) an opposition to the informal objection filed by the licensee; (v) one letter filed
by both informal objectors and another letter filed by Hoop in response to the licensee’s opposition; (vi) an
amendment to the station’s renewal application filed on August 18, 1998, by the licensee; (vii) a “Motion For
Leave to File an Additional Pleading” and a pleading titled “Motion to Dismiss” filed by the licensee; (viii) a
letter filed by the informal objectors in response to the licensee’s two motions; and (ix) copies of the
discrimination complaints that the informal objectors filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of
Kansas.

FCC Notice on DBS Public Interest Obligations, November 1998

Before the FCC 98-307

FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION
Washington, D.C. 20554

In the Matter of Implementation of Section 25 of the Cable Television Consumer Protection and Competition Act of 1992 Direct Broadcast Satellite Public Interest Obligations

MM Docket 93-25

REPORT AND ORDER

Adopted: November 19, 1998
Released: November 25, 1998

By the Commission: Chairman Kennard issuing a statement; Commissioners Furchtgott-Roth; Powell and Tristani dissenting in part and issuing seperate statements. TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. INTRODUCTION

II. BACKGROUND

III. SUMMARY

IV. DISCUSSION paragraph

A. Definition of Providers of DBS Service

1.