February 18, 2025

lascala-agadir

Equality opinion

December Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters – License Renewals, EEO Reports, Rulemaking Comments on Foreign Government Programming and EAS, and More

Even with the holiday seasons on us, regulation in no way stops.  There are several regulatory dates in December to which broadcasters need to spend heed to avoid having the FCC participate in Grinch for lacking some vital deadline.

December 1 is the deadline for license renewal apps for tv stations (comprehensive ability, Class A, LPTV and Tv translators) licensed to communities in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont.  Renewal purposes should be accompanied by FCC Form 2100, Routine 396 Broadcast EEO Plan Report (apart from for Television set translators).  Stations submitting for renewal of their license should make absolutely sure that all files expected to be uploaded to the station’s on the web general public file are complete and had been uploaded on time.  Note that your Broadcast EEO Plan Report need to involve two yrs of Annual EEO Community File Studies for FCC critique, except if your work unit employs fewer than five complete-time employees.  Be absolutely sure to go through the guidelines for the license renewal software and consult with with your advisors if you have questions, especially if you have seen any discrepancies in your on the internet public file or political file.  Issues with the public file have now led to fines imposed on Television set broadcasters throughout this renewal cycle.

December 1 is also the deadline by which radio and television station work units with five or much more entire-time staff members accredited to communities in Alabama, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, and Vermont will have to add Once-a-year EEO Public File Studies to station on line general public inspection files (also, the FCC has issued an extension that permits stations in Florida that endured the effects of Hurricane Ian to upload their Yearly EEO General public File Experiences by December 12).  This yearly EEO report covers using the services of and employment outreach functions for the prior 12 months.  A backlink to the uploaded report have to also be incorporated on the household website page of a station’s site, if it has a web site.

In addition, by December 1, digital television stations that provided ancillary or supplementary expert services between October 1, 2021 and September 30, 2022 must post FCC Variety 2100, Schedule G, and pay out a charge equal to 5% of the gross revenue derived from any ancillary or supplementary products and services they provided.  Noncommercial digital Tv stations that furnished such products and services on a nonprofit, noncommercial, and academic foundation ought to file the sort but are expected to fork out only 2.5% of the gross income derived from those people providers.  Ancillary and supplemental services do not include non-subscription online video channels delivered directly to the community (i.e., multicast channels), but they do include any other providers delivered in excess of the station’s spectrum from which the station receives payment, such as “computer software program distribution, facts transmissions, teletext, interactive materials, aural messages, paging companies, or audio signals, [and] membership online video.”  Stations that supplied no this kind of products and services do not need to have to file a report.

Radio broadcasters who, in all but the very last months of 2022, entered into consent decrees with the Media Bureau to resolve problems about files relating to the purchase of political promoting time that had been uploaded late to a stations on the web public file have till December 9 to file their compliance reports.  These studies certify that the station complied with the training and oversight demands of the consent decrees, and they need to consist of a spreadsheet showing when all political advertising and marketing product bought in the 90 days before the November 2022 election was uploaded to the public file.  For additional info about these consent decrees, see our post below.

December also contains deadlines for remarks in particular FCC rulemaking proceedings. A person of the most controversial is the Next Detect of Proposed Rulemaking trying to get remark on proposals to enrich the FCC’s necessities that each and every broadcaster validate that any method time bought to third events (or any pre-produced programming been given for free) does not arrive from a “foreign federal government entity,” i.e., a foreign govt or a person of its brokers.  Various disclosure obligations use if the programming does in reality come from a foreign federal government entity.  First opinions on the 2nd NPRM are because of by December 19, 2022 and reply remarks need to be submitted by January 3, 2023.  In the Second NPRM, the FCC proposes, amongst other things, that a licensee certify that it has knowledgeable any purchaser of application time of the foreign sponsorship identification procedures and attained, or sought to receive, a certification from the system buyer stating, with standardized language proposed by the FCC, no matter whether the customer is or is not a “foreign governmental entity.” The FCC also proposes to require that all of these certifications, even when the program customer is not a foreign authorities entity, be bundled in a station’s on the net community inspection file.  For more qualifications on this continuing and its implications for broadcasters, see our articles here and below.

By advantage of an extension Order jointly issued by the FCC’s Wi-fi Telecommunications Bureau and Office of Engineering and Know-how, December 12 and January 13 are now the remark and reply remark deadlines, respectively, for the FCC’s Observe of Inquiry that explores options to open up the 12.7-13.25 GHz (12.7 GHz) band for subsequent-generation wireless solutions.  Certified providers at the moment in the 12.7 GHz band whose operations could be impacted by any improve in the works by using permitted in the band include satellite communications and cellular Television set pickup functions (for far more qualifications, see our article content here and here).

The Crisis Alert Program (“EAS”) is the topic of other probable modifications in the FCC policies.  On December 23 and January 23, respectively, remarks and reply responses are because of on the FCC’s Detect of Proposed Rulemaking  on potential rule improvements supposed to enrich EAS and Wi-fi Crisis Alerts (“WEA”). The FCC seeks remark on, among other matters, no matter whether to call for EAS Participants (such as broadcasters) to report to the FCC incidents of unauthorized accessibility to EAS tools inside 72 hrs of when the participant understood or ought to have identified that the incident transpired.  The NPRM also asks no matter whether EAS Individuals (which includes broadcasters) need to be essential to submit an once-a-year cybersecurity certification that demonstrates how the participant identifies the cyber dangers that it faces, the controls it takes advantage of to mitigate individuals threats, and how it makes certain that these controls are used successfully.  We wrote much more extensively about this proceeding, listed here.

On the issue of EAS, December 12 is the productive date of a recently adopted FCC Report and Get aimed at creating emergency alerts sent above tv and radio stations more enlightening and simpler to realize by the community. The effective day offers broadcasters a person 12 months (i.e., by December 12, 2023) to update their techniques to comply with the new rules. Among the other modifications, the up to date regulations will have to have broadcasters, cable programs, and other EAS Contributors to transmit the World-wide-web-based variation of crisis alerts (i.e., people transmitted through the world wide web based Integrated Community Notify and Warning Program, “IPAWS,” working with the Prevalent Alerting Protocol or “CAP”) when the station gets alerts from each IPAWS and from the traditional in excess of-the-air “daisy chain” program.  For extra details on these new guidelines and on other proposed modifications in EAS demands for broadcasters, see our article, here.

Hunting forward to January, licensees of whole-electrical power stations need to have to don’t forget that Quarterly Troubles Plans lists are to be uploaded to the general public file by January 10.  The lists should really determine the issues of value to the station’s local community and the courses that the station aired in October, November and December that resolved people difficulties.  As you finalize your lists, do so meticulously and properly, as they are the only formal documents of how your station is serving the public and addressing the demands and pursuits of its service space.  See our submit here for more on the great importance of the Quarterly Challenges Applications checklist obligation.

As always, this record of dates is not exhaustive and comment deadlines can change.  Review these dates with your authorized and complex advisors, and note other dates not listed in this article that may perhaps be appropriate to your functions.