Pirates
in Suits?
by Katy Bachman
FCC's backing of microradio may cause confusion on the airwaves
Last year, the Federal Communications Commission
crowed about the 250
pirate radio stations it shut down. Last
week, the Democrat-controlled
Commission moved to legitimize the impulse
for community radio by
establishing thousands of low power FM
(LPFM) stations, commonly referred
to as "microradio."
Last Thursday's 4 to 1 vote to adopt a
Notice of Proposed Rulemaking
opens up an already heated industry discussion
over a proposal to change
FCC rules and allow a system of as many
as 4,000 low-power radio stations.
The vote put in motion an indefinite period
of time during which the FCC
will receive comments from all parts of
the industry.
Microradio has been a pet project of FCC
Chairman William Kennard of
late. Though most broadcasters are up
in arms--the National Association of
Broadcasters has vocally condemned the
concept--Kennard came up with
microradio as a panacea to consolidation
a year ago. "We have an
obligation to explore ways to open the
doors of opportunity to use the
airwaves, particularly as consolidation
closes those doors for new
entrants," said Kennard to broadcasters
at last October's NAB convention
in Seattle. Kennard sees a microradio
system as a way for churches,
schools, universities, minorities and
other community groups to have a
voice on the airwaves.
"Good intention, bad idea," responds Dick
Ferguson, vp/COO, Cox Radio and
NAB Board chairman. "I'm not opposed to
[Kennard's] underlying desire to
see people have access. But they're playing
with the laws of physics. We
find it bewildering that you can jam all
these stations and not interfere
with the existing system."
Interference was the main reason Republican
commissioner Harold
Furchtgott-Roth, who has consistently
and openly criticized the FCC for
trying to undo Congress' passage of the
Telecommunications Act of 1996,
cast the lone negative vote. In his dissenting
statement, Furchtgott-Roth
said he was troubled that certain signals
would be "loosened," causing "a
severe incursion on the rights of current
licenseholders."
The FCC reassured the industry in last
Thursday's open meeting that
there would be "interference protection
criteria" to prevent lower power
radio stations from interfering with existing
stations or with the radio
industry's ability to move to digital
broadcasting (known as in-band
on-channel or IBOC).
Broadcasters aren't buying it. According
to IBOC developer USA Digital
Radio's one-inch thick petition for establishing
a digital radio broadcast
standard, 60 percent of FM stations already
experience some sort of
interference from other stations close
to them on the dial. "This proposal
threatens the transition to IBOC digital
radio, will likely cause
devastating interference to existing broadcasters,
and will challenge the
FCC as guardian of the spectrum," said
Edward Fritts, NAB president/CEO.
Markets are already over-radioed, say broadcasters,
as a result of
another FCC action in the mid 1980s, known
as Docket 80-90, which dumped
more than 2,000 additional radio signals
into the spectrum. Microradio
would exacerbate that, noted the NAB.
"There are now nearly 12,500 radio
stations--3,500 of which have been added
since 1980."
So who gets to have a voice? Plenty of
special interest groups--13,000 of
them by the FCC's own count--might like
to get their hands on a radio
signal, but they may not all be the ones
Kennard has in mind. "While many
proponents of this rulemaking see it as
a means of increasing broadcast
ownership by minorities and women, there
is in all likelihood no
constitutionally sound way to assure such
a result," said Furchtgott-Roth.
Broadcasters, who remember the days before
the Telecom Act when more
than half the stations in the U.S. lost
money, are scratching their
heads. "I don't get it," said Larry Wilson,
chairman/CEO, Citadel.