On Thursday, the much anticipated Online Public Inspection File for television stations launched more or less successfully. To complete the task in the short time given them, the FCC staff put forth an Olympic effect, and while they were subject to some point deductions for a few stumbles in the…
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FCC Enforcement Monitor
July 2012 Pillsbury’s communications lawyers have published FCC Enforcement Monitor monthly since 1999 to inform our clients of notable FCC enforcement actions against FCC license holders and others. This month’s issue includes: FCC Assesses $68,000 in Fines for Unauthorized STL Operations EAS Failures Lead to $8,000 Fine Licensee in Wyoming…
Online Public File Stay Denied – Online Public Inspection File Interface Demonstrations Scheduled for Monday and Tuesday
Late this afternoon, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit denied the Stay requested by the National Association of Broadcasters that would have prevented the FCC’s new online Public Inspection File posting requirement from becoming effective. As a result, television broadcast stations must be prepared…
FCC Announces FY2012 Regulatory Fee Amounts
The FCC has released a Report and Order which includes its final determinations as to how much each FCC licensee will have to pay in Annual Regulatory Fees for fiscal year 2012 (FY 2012). The FCC collects Annual Regulatory Fees to offset the cost of its non-application processing functions, such…
FCC Conducts Demo of Its New Online Public Inspection File Interface
By Lauren Lynch Flick and Paul A. Cicelski As promised, yesterday morning the FCC conducted a public demonstration and webcast of the interface it has developed to host the online public inspection files for television broadcast stations. As we noted last week, the database is being developed in connection with…
FCC Denies NAB Online Public File Stay Request as Focus Moves to Court
As I reported last week, the FCC’s new rules requiring television stations to replace the public files they maintain at their studios with electronic files to be hosted online by the FCC are currently set to become effective on August 2, 2012. Since that report, a lot of events have…
FCC Online Public/Political File Rules Are Effective August 2
Earlier today, the FCC announced in the Federal Register that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has approved the FCC’s new rules requiring television stations to replace the public files that they maintain at their studios with electronic files that will be hosted online by the FCC. As a…
FCC Enforcement Monitor
June 2012 Pillsbury’s communications lawyers have published FCC Enforcement Monitor monthly since 1999 to inform our clients of notable FCC enforcement actions against FCC license holders and others. This month’s issue includes: Long-Term Violation of an FCC Order Leads to $25,000 Forfeiture FCC Issues $10,000 Fines for Obstruction Lighting Violations…
FCC Piles $65,000 in Fines on Small AM Station in Less Than a Year
The FCC recently issued two separate Notices of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture (NALs), found here and here, for a combined sum of $40,000 against the licensee of a Class D AM radio station for failing to make available a complete public inspection file, and submitting what the FCC concluded was…
Office of Management and Budget, Keeping in Character, Approves FCC Online Public File Rules
The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has once again rubber-stamped and approved an FCC information collection request in apparent defiance of its statutory obligation to take a hard look at the burdens imposed under the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA). As I reported previously, the FCC adopted burdensome rules requiring…