WASHINGTON-Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Tuesday morning he plans to offer an amendment to set the hard date for completing the digital TV transition at the end of 2006 or early 2007-not April 7, 2009, as proposed by Senate Commerce Committee staff.
“Can we really afford to wait until 2009?” McCain rhetorically asked at a breakfast sponsored by the New America Foundation.
McCain later told reporters he is not sure he has the votes in the Senate Commerce Committee to pass his amendment, and he has not talked to Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, about his amendment. Stevens’ staff is driving the April 2009 date.
In addition to McCain’s plea for a hard date for the DTV transition, the New America Foundation breakfast featured advocates for more public-safety spectrum and an allocation of unlicensed spectrum in the 700 MHz band.
McCain offered legislation earlier this year setting the hard date at Jan. 1, 2009, but after Hurricane Katrina he said he was going back to his original idea of Jan. 1, 2007.
In 1997, Congress said that in 2007 broadcasters would have to return the extra 6 megahertz of spectrum in the 700 MHz band that was given to TV broadcasters to facilitate the DTV transition. But TV broadcasters could keep the spectrum if more than 15 percent of the homes in their viewing areas could not receive digital signals. Removing the caveat has become known as establishing a hard date and has been encouraged widely by the wireless industry, which wants access to some of the spectrum.
Congress is expected to consider a hard date for the DTV transition as part of the 2006 budget reconciliation process. Due to the focus on Hurricane Katrina, the budget reconciliation process, which usually occurs in September, was delayed by a month. The Senate Commerce Committee is scheduled to begin its process Thursday afternoon at a markup that also will include 911 and emergency alert bills. The House is expected to consider its proposal, which currently sets the hard date at Jan. 1, 2009, the next week.
There likely will be two bills passed by Congress dealing with the DTV transition, one that establishes a hard date and sets a timetable for auctioning the spectrum and one that deals with related issues not specifically tied to the budget. McCain indicated he might also offer other non-hard date amendments at Thursday’s meeting.
