I have written to the Federal Communications Commission to urge Chairman Michael Powell and all other FCC commissioners to stop plans to end the critical safeguards that are designed to help ensure diversity of media ownership. Under the new FCC plans, one company in a community will be able to own the newspaper, several TV and radio stations, the cable system, and the principal Internet access company. There will be fewer owners of networks, stations, and newspapers nationwide. I urged the Commission to ensure there are further public hearings to discuss how such proposals will affect our community and the nation.

This excessive deregulation is ending up as bad for competition, the First Amendment, and democracy.

This issue is of primary public importance. Why have we not heard about it on commercial television and other commercial media? We are not hearing about it even now when the decision is to come next month (June 2003). Where is the commercial media's commitment to serve the public?

Why were there no FCC hearings on this topic scheduled for the Midwest? Why are there not notices in newspapers and public service announcements on television concerning the issues and intended FCC actions?

Could it be that the vast majority of the public is not informed of this issue because it is not in the interest of the handful of giant commercial media owners to so inform? Where is the democracy in this?

I know our local media is public spirited. Please cover this issue soon.

Gerald Wala
Bettendorf

FCC Should - and Will - Move Quickly


The following excerpts come from a letter by FCC Chairperson Michael K. Powell released April 16 in response to eight letters from members of Congress. Earlier this week, Powell began circulating a 250-page draft of new media-ownership regulations that would, according to media reports, significantly loosen limits on how many media outlets - and of what type - a company can own. A vote is scheduled for June 3. This letter asserts Powell's claim that further comment periods and review are unnecessary. For more information on the issue, visit (http://www.fcc.gov/ownership).

... Respectfully, I would like to explain the reasoning behind our present course toward completing this proceeding by early June 2003, without an additional, and unprecedented, notice and comment period. First, the Commission is legally obligated to complete this proceeding in the timeframe established by Congress. Congress mandated in the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that the Commission "shall review ... all of its ownership rules biennially." ... This directive expressly demands timely review and its perpetual character requires closure in order to ready for the subsequent review that shortly follows. I regretfully note that the Commission already is tardy in satisfying its responsibilities, given that the current review should have been finished by the close of 2002 (two full years since the completion of the first biennial review). If the Commission were to issue a further notice, as some propose, the Commission would be hard pressed to finish this 2002 biennial review before late this calendar year and would be forced to start the 2004 review almost immediately.

In fact, Congress chastised the Commission for failing to finish the first biennial review in a timely fashion. Congress took the extraordinary step of demanding, in legislation, that the Commission complete within six months its delayed review, because the Commission failed to act promptly on a complete record. ... Thus, given this prior Congressional rebuke, I feel especially obligated to complete this proceeding promptly.

Moreover, there must be a fair opportunity between the completion of the present proceeding and the initiation of the next to resolve the inevitable challenges to our decision that will ensue. Parties will undoubtedly seek Commission reconsideration and mount substantial court challenges to our decisions, no matter what the outcome. The 2004 biennial review will be impossible to conduct responsibly, if court cases remain pending thereby denying the Commission and the parties an understanding of the permissible parameters of the choices we may make. This is not trivial, given that the courts have spoken aggressively about the burdens placed on the government for defending its regulations in this area, and that judicial sustainability is a key objective of this proceeding.

I fully concede, however, that getting it right is more important than just getting it done. If I were convinced the record was deficient, or that any proposed course required additional comment, I would not hesitate to seek it, even at the expense of time. But, I do not, at present, see that any of those situations are present.

As several of the letters recognize, the Commission has compiled the most extensive record ever for a biennial review. It is a record of over 18,000 comments (with over 17,000 coming from individual Americans), compiled over an extended comment period. It is a record consisting of 12 empirical studies of various aspects of the media marketplace that were separately made available to the public for comment, as were the underlying data that supported those studies' conclusions. It is a record that has significant input from the American public through individual comments, through public hearings and through the unprecedented Commission action of reaching out and asking the public how they use the media to access news, and public affairs information. This Commission can proudly say that it has conducted the most thorough and comprehensive review of our broadcast ownership rules in their 60 year history. The Commission has spent the past several months studying this record and the time to make judgments based on that record is before us.

The Commission understands the importance of its obligations under the Administrative Procedures Act to solicit input from interested parties and to base our decisions on that input. I assure you, again, that if, in our sound judgment, further comment on any specific rule changes in this proceeding is required, we will seek it. I understand that many would appreciate the opportunity to see each specific proposed rule change prior to adoption, but we do nothing radical by declining the invitation. In my five and a half years at the Commission, I do not recall a single instance in which such a process was pursued - including numerous matters involving media and ownership rules. In fact, the Commission's last biennial review did not follow such a course, yet it made significant changes in the rules. Indeed, not until this late point in a proceeding that has been pending over eight months have I heard any concerns expressed about the form of the current notice of proposed rulemaking. It is late in this process to suddenly adopt an alternative, even if worthy, procedural course.

I have personally spent hours with the record and probably have the fullest understanding of the possible actions that might be taken in this proceeding.

I firmly believe, based on where the Commission is today, that further and more specific notice is unwarranted in light of the full record before us, and weighed against the pitfalls of further delay. I would highlight that the public interest is presently being ill-served by a body of rules that have been severely wounded and rendered substantially ineffective by withering judicial fire. Survival demands action. ...

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