Comments on an FCC proposal that extends a mandatory disaster information reporting system filing requirement to broadcasters and satellite providers are due April 29, replies May 28, according to a notice in Friday's Federal Register. The proposal stems from a further NPRM the FCC unanimously approved in January (see 2401250064).

Six radio broadcasters seek leave to intervene in support of the four petitions for review consolidated in the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that challenge the FCC’s Dec. 26 quadrennial review order for allegedly violating Section 202(h) of the Telecommunications Act (see 2403050075), said their unopposed joint motion Monday. The consolidated petitions pending in the 8th Circuit are from Zimmer Radio (docket 24-1380), Beasley Media Group (docket 24-1480), NAB (docket 24-1493) and Nexstar Media Group (docket 24-1516). The radio broadcasters seeking to intervene in support of those petitions are Connoisseur Media, Mid-West Management, Midwest Communications, Sun Valley Radio, Eagle Communications and Legend Communications of Wyoming. The radio broadcasters, owners and licensees collectively of nearly 200 stations across the U.S., would see their interests “adversely affected” by the implementation of the FCC’s order, said their motion to intervene. It would harm them “by arbitrarily restricting their ability to compete in their markets against larger, less regulated digital content providers and advertising platforms,” they said. The platforms, including those owned by some of the largest U.S. companies, have been “siphoning away” listeners and advertising revenue from traditional radio, it said. The ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox affiliates associations sought leave Friday to intervene in support of the four petitions, arguing that the FCC’s order “refused to loosen” the commission’s “decades-old regulation of local television ownership to reflect today’s increasingly competitive media landscape (see 2403220041). NCTA on Monday came to the defense of the order, arguing that it rightfully retained the commission's local television ownership rule, which generally limits the number of full-power television stations an entity may own within the same local market (see 2403250064).

The full FCC -- with Commissioner Brendan Carr concurring in part -- proposed a $612,395 forfeiture against Nexstar for violating the 39% national ownership cap and taking de facto control of Mission Broadcast’s WPIX New York station without agency permission, said a notice of apparent liability issued late Thursday. The NAL also proposes requiring Mission within 12 months to either divest WPIX to a third party or apply to the FCC to sell it to Nexstar, which in turn would have to divest stations to come in under the national cap. The FCC “is prohibited from allowing a company to own or control broadcast stations that in total reach more than 39 percent of the national television audience,” said Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel in a brief statement released with the NAL. “The record here reflects a situation where a company exceeds this threshold. Unless and until Congress changes this law, it is the responsibility of this agency to enforce it.” Nexstar is a client of Wiley, Commissioner Anna Gomez's former law firm. Late last month, she received an ethics waiver that allows her to vote on enforcement items involving Wiley clients (see 2403150055). Nexstar’s relationship with Mission and WPIX was the focus of multiple court and FCC proceedings (see 2402130023), one of which was recently decided in Nexstar’s favor (see 2403210027). “NALs are not final decisions on the merits,” said Carr’s concurrence, in which he objected to the NAL citing aspects of Nexstar's relationship with Mission, which past FCCs approved, as part of the company's violations. “And I will keep an open mind as the FCC reviews the record in response to this document. Part of that will require the FCC to ensure that any remedies the agency finds necessary are ones that are appropriate given the procedural posture of this enforcement action.” Nexstar is “extremely disappointed in today’s action by the Federal Communication Commission regarding our relationship with WPIX-TV and we intend to dispute it vigorously,” said CEO Perry Sook in a release. “We believe the FCC has been misled by the often distracting noise in the media ecosphere and that it has completely misjudged the facts.”

The 60-day settlement process to resolve mutually exclusive applications from December's low-power FM station construction permit application window began Friday and stretches to May 14, said an FCC Media Bureau public notice Friday. The PN also identifies 109 groups of mutually exclusive application, involving 264 applications. Two applications were dismissed for having “significant technical and/or legal defects,” the PN said.

Sinclair Broadcast will provide free carriage of virtual channels from public TV stations that haven’t transitioned to ATSC 3.0 -- sometimes called NextGenTV -- in markets where Sinclair stations are broadcasting 3.0, Sinclair and America’s Public Television Stations said in a joint release Wednesday. Virtual channels are essentially websites accessible by 3.0-enabled devices; to a viewer using a 3.0-enabled television they appear similar to other ATSC 3.0 channels but aren’t delivered over airwaves and don’t take up spectrum capacity (see 2203300052). The virtual channel would allow the public TV stations to take advantage of 3.0 capabilities such as high dynamic range video, said the release. Many public TV stations have been slower to transition to 3.0 due to the expense and a lack of channel-hosting partners in their markets. “This partnership with Sinclair will help serve local communities while we work with other public television stations to transition to NEXTGEN TV to advance their public service missions,” said APTS CEO Patrick Butler in the release. Sinclair has 3.0 stations in 43 markets, 36 of which have public TV stations without 3.0, the release said.

NAB launched a website and ad campaign aimed at helping broadcasters find and hire talent and increase the industry’s diversity and inclusiveness, an NAB news release said Tuesday. Called You Belong Here, the campaign seeks to attract “fresh and diverse talent” and inform job seekers about the variety of careers in broadcasting. The effort includes 30-second customizable spots for broadcasters, a longer video for classrooms and career fairs, and assets for social media and digital ads. Those materials direct candidates to the You Belong Here website. “Our goal is to attract a broad range of talent, showcasing broadcasting as a career that provides unique opportunities to make meaningful contributions to local communities across the country,” said NAB President Curtis LeGeyt in the release.

NAB filed a challenge Friday to the FCC's Dec. 26 quadrennial review order in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, joining a number of similar challenges filed in other circuits (see 2402250001). The cases are all to be consolidated in the 8th Circuit under the order of the Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation (see 2403050075). The FCC failed to meet its statutory obligation to review ownership rules every four years, exceeded its authority by tightening rules rather than relaxing them, and violated the First Amendment by limiting stations from airing multiple top-four networks on multicast channels, alleged NAB in its petition for review (docket 24-1055). The new rules are content-based restrictions on television stations outside the FCC's authority, said the petition. The FCC also ignored the will of Congress and violated the Administrative Procedure Act by not considering evidence in the record on competition faced by broadcasters. “The record shows that advertisers are increasingly diverting resources away from local radio and television stations in favor of digital promotions,” the petition said. “But the Quadrennial Order disregards these bedrock changes in the media and advertising landscape.” The court should vacate and set aside the order, NAB said.

Sixteen Pennsylvania House of Delegates Democrats and Drexel University law professor Tabatha Abu El-Haj are supporting calls for the FCC to approve the license renewal of Fox’s TV station WTXF Philadelphia, according to ex parte filings in docket 23-293 last week (see 2403060088). “If the FCC removes FOX 29’s broadcasting rights, it will deny Pennsylvanians a local outlet that helps increase political engagement,” said Abu El-Haj's letter. “The FCC should not go down this dangerous path and allow FOX 29 to get back to serving the state of Philadelphia without distraction.” The TV station “provides high-quality, unbiased coverage of Philadelphia and Delaware County’s news and reports on important issues affecting some of the most vulnerable groups in our state,” said the legislators' letter.

The numerous testimonials from local residents and public officials supporting the renewal of Fox's TV station WTXF Philadelphia “stand in stark contrast” to the “continued stunts” of the Media and Democracy Project, Fox said in an ex parte filing posted in docket 23-293 Wednesday. FCC rules require the agency to consider "four specific categories of non-FCC conduct" as relevant to the character of a licensee, “none of which pertain to anything alleged by MAD,” Fox said. Those categories are criminal convictions, mass-media antitrust violations, crimes involving false statements to other government entities, and “egregious” misconduct. MAD’s recent request that the FCC grant it access to nonpublic court documents related to defamation cases against Fox (see: 2403040080) to bolster its arguments shows that MAD admits it hasn’t adequately made its case, Fox said. “Whether ‘bolster[ed]’ or not, such allegations are irrelevant to this proceeding,” Fox said. “Put simply, there is no justification for continued delay, and the Commission should move swiftly to conclude this proceeding by granting Fox 29 Philadelphia’s license renewal application.” MAD didn’t comment.

FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks should ask the Media Bureau to develop a fuller record on the FM nonduplication rules before restoring them (see 2402270019), NAB said during an ex parte meeting with an aide to Starks last week, according to a filing posted Tuesday in docket 19-310. The agency should “pause” action on a circulated reconsideration order because three years have passed since the rules were eliminated, the filing said. “The benefit of this significant passage of time is that the Commission can actually collect and analyze information to better understand whether, and in what circumstances, broadcasters are taking advantage of the rule’s elimination,” NAB said.