WASHINGTON—The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has loosened its rules to help facilitate the opening up of spectrum as TV transitions from analog to digital.
The new rules will allow TV broadcasters to continue to broadcast in analog past mandated deadlines if the broadcaster has agreed to give up one of its channels to auction winners. Specifically, broadcasters will be allowed to continue to transmit in analog until at least 70 percent of the households in their market are capable of receiving digital signals or 2005, whichever is later. Additionally, the FCC is pledging to process band-clearing applications within 90 days.
“The commission has struggled to balance the needs of the incumbent broadcasters and their analog viewers in these bands with the mandate to transition this spectrum prior to the end of the DTV transition. … The DTV transition is an expensive proposition. For some stations in this band, the funds made available through voluntary band clearing may make the difference between going digital and going dark. … It is also important to keep in mind that not a single broadcaster will ever be forced to relocate as a result of our decisions. … The commission has simply cleared away some regulatory uncertainty to permit licensees to act freely in the marketplace and to exercise more readily the bundle of rights inherent in their existing authorizations,” said FCC Commissioner Kathleen Q. Abernathy.
There has been an ongoing controversy since the 700 MHz band was first designated to be auctioned with the transition to digital. While broadcasters are scheduled to exit the spectrum involved—channels 60-69 on the TV dial—by 2007; it is unlikely they will do so. In 1997, Congress inserted language in the Balanced Budget Act that said they were not required to leave until 85 percent of the homes in their area were capable of receiving a digital signal.
While the FCC had originally been scheduled to auction off this spectrum in 2000, it has repeatedly delayed this auction while it attempted to give the wireless industry more certainty as to when the spectrum they will bid on in such an auction would be available for use.
