Filing Windows Announced for FM Translators to Become AM Fill-Ins

JANUARY 2016 AAntenna TM A N U P D A T E O N C O M M U N I C A T I O N S L A W & I S S U E S Filing Windows Announced LPTV Digital Deadline For FM Translators to Reset; Channel Become AM Fill-ins Sharing Allowed Following up on the FCC’s AM Revitalization Order The deadline for Low Power Television stations and released in October, the Media Bureau has released a Public television translator stations to complete the transition Notice to announce filing windows for applications to modify from analog to digital has been reset for the date one FM translator stations so as to qualify to be “fill-in” translators year after the conclusion of the 39-month post-incentive for AM stations. An AM station can be rebroadcast on an FM auction repacking transition. That is the period for full translator only if the translator qualifies as a fill-in. To qualify, power and Class A stations to complete construction of the 60 dbu contour of the translator must fall completely within their post-auction facilities that will have been repacked, the 2 mV/m daytime contour of the AM station, and must not where necessary, onto new channels and/or at new extend more than 25 miles from the AM antenna site. antenna sites. The 39-month transition period will begin when the FCC releases a Public Notice announcing the In these filing windows, the licensees and permittees of AM new full power and Class A channel assignments at the radio stations will have the opportunity to acquire FM translator completion of the reverse and forward auctions. stations (including construction permits) and relocate them up to 250 miles (from the old translator antenna site to the new That analog-to-digital deadline will also be the expi - translator antenna site). To be eligible for this procedure, the ration date for all remaining construction permits for translator must be authorized to operate on a non-reserved band new unbuilt digital LPTV stations. The FCC has Third Report and channel, i.e. above 92 MHz on the FM band. As an element of announced these new deadlines in the Order the move, the translator can be modified to operate on any other in Docket 03-185. non-reserved band frequency. Such applications will be The previous date for completing these digital processed as minor-modification applications despite proposing LPTV facilities had been set for September 1, 2015, but continued on page 3 that deadline was suspended when it became clear that New Rates Set for continued on page 7 Webcasting Royalties IN THIS ISSUE Flashing Lights....................................... 2 The Copyright Royalty Board has concluded its so-called “Web-IV” proceeding to establish the royalty rates to be paid for DTDRT Service Created......................... 2 transmission of copyrighted sound recordings on the Internet by Errant TBA.............................................. 3 eligible nonsubscription services and new subscription services Deadlines To Watch............................ 4-5 for the five-year period 2016-2020. These are the rates applicable FilmOn Is Not Cable............................... 6 to most (but not all) radio stations that stream their over-the-air JSAs Revived........................................... 8 programming on the Internet. These fees are collected by the SoundExchange. For more information about or help with any of The Board set specific rates for 2016 and announced that it the items reported in ANTENNA , please contact: would adjust them each subsequent year during the five-year rate period to reflect changes occurring in the cost of living. The adjustments are to be published in the Federal Register at least 25 days before the beginning of each new year. 1200 Seventeenth St. NW For 2016, commercial webcasters must pay $0.0022 per per - Washington, DC 20036 formance for subscription services and $0.0017 per performance for nonsubscription services. There is a minimum annual fee of Tel: 202.663.8184 Fax: 202.663.8007 $500 per channel or station. Noncommercial webcasters will E-mail: [email protected] continued on page 3 High Tower Lights Must Flash The Federal Aviation Administration has adopted new with lighting must use only flashing obstruction lights. lighting requirements for certain towers to change steady- The FCC’s Wireless Telecommunications Bureau has burning lights to lights that flash on and off. The agency issued a Public Notice encouraging owners of existing regis - promulgated these new rules recently in Advisory Circular tered antenna structures to eliminate the use of L-810 steady- for Obstruction Marking and Lighting 70/7460-IL, which burning lights as soon as possible. The Bureau suggests that cancels and replaces Advisory Circular 70/7460-IK. This in many cases, this change can be made without climbing the action by the FAA has the effect of amending the require - tower simply by extinguishing the steady-burning lights. ments for antenna structures subject to the FCC’s Antenna However, prior to changing the lighting on an existing Structure Registration system. Going forward, all new or antenna structure, the tower owner must request a new No altered antenna structures must comply with the new FAA Hazard Determination from the FAA under the new requirements in order to obtain FCC registration. Advisory Circular. After obtaining that, the tower owner The FAA-sanctioned Lighting Styles A, E and F for must file a Form 854 with the FCC to amend its antenna antenna structures no longer employ L-810 steady-burning structure registration to reflect the new lighting. side lights for communications towers that are taller than 350 The FAA instigated this change in an effort to reduce the feet above ground level. Effective immediately, all new com - harmful effects that antenna structures have on migratory munications towers taller than 350 feet that use lighting birds. Research suggests that birds are attracted to non- must use only flashing obstruction lights. flashing red lights much more than to flashing lights. The new Advisory also affects towers between 151 feet Millions of migratory birds suffer fatal collisions with towers and 350 feet above ground level that use Lighting Styles A in the United States each year – most of them among species and E. These towers will now also have to use flashing L-810 protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 and the side lights rather than steady-burning L-810 side lights. This Endangered Species Act of 1973. It is estimated that the elim - requirement will become effective on September 15, 2016. At ination of non-flashing lights may reduce migratory bird col - that time, all new communications towers taller than 150 feet lisions by as much as 70 percent. Digital TV Translator Replacement Service Created The FCC has created a new digital-to-digital replace - will have co-equal processing priority. These two types of ment translator service (“DTDRT”) that will enable eligible applications will have priority over all other LPTV and TV full power television stations to recover digital service area translator applications, including all new, minor change and losses resulting from the reverse auction and repacking displacement applications. All DTDRT and DRT displace - process. Reassignment to a different channel may preclude ment applications filed during the post-auction LPTV dis - the ability to precisely replicate a station’s pre-auction cover - placement window will be considered filed on the last day of age area. This action was part of the Commission’s Third the window, will have priority over all other displacement Report and Order in Docket 03-185. The DTDRT service will applications filed during the window by LPTV and TV trans - be similar to the analog-to-digital replacement translator lator stations, and will be considered co-equal if mutually service (“DRT”) that the Commission established in 2009 for exclusive. After the close of the LPTV displacement filing similar reasons during the digital television transition. window, applications for new DTDRT stations will be Eligibility to apply for DTDRT stations will be limited to accepted on a first-come-first-served basis. They will have full power stations that are reassigned in the repacking priority over all prior-filed LPTV and TV translator new, process. An applicant will have to show that it lost a portion minor change and displacement applications. They will of its pre-auction digital service area directly because of its have co-equal priority with displacement applications for reassignment, and that the proposed DTDRT facility would existing DRT stations filed on the same day. be used solely to fill in such loss areas (subject to an Construction permits for DTDRT stations will last for allowance for a de minimis expansion of the pre-auction three years. DTDRT stations will be secondary in that they service area). The “pre-auction digital service area” is cannot cause interference to, and must accept interference defined as the geographic area within the full power sta - from full power television stations, certain land mobile radio tion’s noise-limited contour. Eligible stations may file stations, and other primary services. These stations will be DTDRT applications during the period beginning with the permanently associated with the full power station’s main opening of the post-auction LPTV and TV translator dis - license. They may not be separately assigned or transferred. placement filing window and ending one year after the con - They will be renewed, transferred or assigned along with the clusion of the 39-month post-auction repacking transition. main license. Otherwise, DTDRT stations will be generally DTDRT applications and DRT displacement applications subject to the same technical and operating rules that govern other TV translators. 2 Unauthorized Transfer of Control Results from TBA The FCC’s Media Bureau has adopted a Consent TBAs are not prohibited by any FCC rule or policy Decree in which the parties to a Time Brokerage provided that the parties comply with the ownership Agreement (a “TBA”) covering KRDO-FM, Security, rules and the licensee maintains ultimate control over the Colorado, acknowledged that they had committed an station.

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