FCC Chairman Michael Powell 'Not Averse' to Considering New Guidelines to Help Broadcasters Better Serve the Public Interest

LAS VEGAS, April 21, 2004 -- Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell yesterday said that he was "not averse to the Commission's considering new public interest obligations" for broadcasters as they make the transition to digital television.

Other commissioners appear divided on the issue as they let their views be known during a series of industry events at the National Association of Broadcasters' (NAB) annual gathering in Las Vegas.

Powell made his statement while being interviewed by ABC journalist Sam Donaldson at the FCC "Chairman's Breakfast" at the Las Vegas Hilton. The FCC Chairman did not state specifically how he thought broadcasters ought to serve the public. "My personal view is that government should be reluctant to regulate content for anybody," Powell said. The Founding Fathers, he noted, were most concerned about using the power of government to promote certain viewpoints.

On the same day, two other FCC Commissioners joined an alliance of public interests groups to launch the Public Interest, Public Airwaves Coalition, urging the FCC to hold the nation's commercial broadcasters to a more responsible standard of public service, especially as it pertains to covering national and local elections.

During a press conference inside the Convention, FCC Commissioners Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein helped launch the campaign by speaking out in support of a proposal Coalition members submitted to the FCC on April 7. (Full disclosure: MediaChannel.org is a member of the Coalition). The proposal asks the regulatory agency to help ensure among other items that each licensed broadcasters air a minimum three hours per week of civic or electoral affairs programming on their most-watched primary channel.

Speaking to reporters during the press conference, Commissioner Copps expressed concern, "about all the bad things that have been visited upon what was once, not so long ago a viable and valuable public interest standard."

Copps discussed the falloff of public affairs programming by broadcasters, citing an Alliance for Better Campaigns and Benton Foundation survey that found broadcasters devoted less than one half of one percent of their programming to local public affairs. "What we get from our media, Big Media in particular, is less of America," Copps told reporters.

Commissioner Copps didn't withhold criticism of his own agency's record on clarifying public interest guidelines for broadcasters -- as the industry stands poised to receive access to more broadcasting spectrum to accommodate the industry's ongoing transition to digital television. "We actually started having a discussion about digital television and the public interest years ago," Copps said. "But before [guidelines] were completed, leadership at the commission changed hands and now it's three and a half years later."

FCC Commissioners Kathleen Abernathy and Kevin Martin were considerably more lukewarm about obligating brodcasters to serve the public interest. Abernathy said that “any specific [public interest] mandates,” faced constitutional hurdles. “We’re talking about intrusions on [broadcaster] free speech rights,” Abernathy said.

Commissioner Martin said that broadcasters are "as involved in their local communities as any industry I've seen." He is "very hesitant to quantify the public interest obligations because "a floor often becomes a ceiling," that curtails community service.

Commissioner Adelstein said, "[b]roadcast television continues to be the main source of election coverage for the American public, yet study after study shows that the level of political coverage is pitiful."

In Adelstein's view: "The FCC is supposed to protect the public against the natural tendencies of corporations to seek out efficiencies above all else. We have two principal ways of doing that. First, we have protections against media ownership, but most of these were gutted last summer. Second, we have public interest obligations."

Adelstein called for "immediate attention" to the Public Interest, Public Airwaves proposal and challenged broadcasters to support the initiative as well with increased coverage of local and national elections. "If some broadcasters can't even do that, we will all know that at long last, they have no sense of responsibility left."

"If the industry blinks and will agree to our proposal, we will have the votes needed [from FCC Commissioners], said Jeffrey Chester, Executive Director of the Center for Digital Democracy, a member of the Coalition. Chester and other members are continuing their outreach to the agency's five commissioners with the aim to win at least three in support of the proposal. Adelstein and Copps already demonstrated their support by speaking during the Las Vegas launch of the Coalition

Coalition efforts in Washington are getting further support by a nationwide petition drive launched by members including the Alliance for Better Campaigns, Common Cause, Free Press, Media for Democracy, MediaChannel.org. MoveOn.org and TrueMajority.org. The petition, which is being sent to congressinal members, FCC Commissioner Powell and local broadcasters, calls upon the FCC "to define minimum standards for broadcasters to fulfill their public interest obligation through coverage of elections and civic affairs." Since its launch late last week, citizens have sent more than 100,000 electronically signed petitions to decision makers in Washington.

In the months ahead the Coalition will reach out to television stations in all 50 states to brief them on the FCC proposal and engage local station managers in a discussion of best standards for serving their local audiences.

Broadcasters, in this new era, must continue to find "whatever is relevant to [local] communities," Chairman Powell told Sam Donaldson. And the role of broadcasters is to continue to be a "locally focused industry" with their fingers on the pulse of the people who are their audiences.

Whether broadcast licensees remain entitled to "free and exclusive" access to the airwaves, Powell said, will depend on whether they can demonstrate that their service to the community is unique and not matched by other competitors.

-- Timothy Karr is the executive director of MediaChannel.org. Additional reporting provided by Celia Wexler, vice president for advocacy at Common Cause.

© MediaChannel.org, 2004. All rights reserved.

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