Jessell at Large

FCC Misfires on Minority Ownership Regs

Rather than make low-power and full-power stations bear an additional burden of filing biennial reports on ownership in an effort to increase minority participation, the FCC should ask for data from sources that already compile it. And the commission should investigate its owned failed minority ownership policies of the past so it doesn't go astray again.
TVNewsCheck,

The FCC's new reporting requirements on female and minority broadcast ownership is misguided and imposes additional, unnecessary costs on TV and radio stations in a time of financial distress.

Through the new reporting, the FCC is seeking hard data on just how many broadcast stations are owned by minorities and women.

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That understandable. Such data would provide a foundation for new policies and provide a bulwark against inevitable court challenges.

But there is a far simpler way of getting it than by instituting a whole new regime of detailed, biennial reporting starting this fall.

The FCC can just ask for it.

In October 2007, Free Press put together a superb study that details the dismal state of minority and female ownership in TV broadcasting. To no one's surprise, it found that all groups were grossly underrepresented.

Women owned only 80 of the 1,700-plus full-power TV stations (5.87 percent), while minorities owned just 43 (3.15 percent), according to the study.

With little prodding, I'm sure Free Press could update its work without much trouble. Thanks to the economy and the FCC ownership restriction, not many TV stations have changed hands in the past 16 months.

The NAB and other trade associations might be prevailed upon to do similar studies. When looked at side by side, the studies may differ a bit in the numbers and percentages, but not enough to be meaningful.

And, of course, they could all do parallel radio studies.

If the FCC wants an independent count, it could award a contract to an outside research firm. BIAfn, for one, could handle it. It has the best databases of TV and radio stations around.

This is no small matter. The Community Broadcasters Association put out a statement immediately after the FCC action complaining about the new paperwork.

"This burden will require tens of thousands of man-hours and cuts against the concept of LPTV as a lightly regulated service," the statement says, adding that the requisite filing fee on the ownership reports would constitute a "heavy tax."

The NAB may choose not to complain about this, having bigger issues to deal with, but I'm sure that the full-power member stations are feeling the same way as the LPTVers about yet another pointless FCC-mandated chore.

Ironically, the CBA also suggests that ownership policies are unnecessary in the LPTV world. According to its survey, it says, 43 percent of LPTVs have minority ownership and 60 percent have female ownership.

Now I also said the FCC reporting requirements are misguided. Here's why.

As I pointed out here last week, the FCC has a long history of trying to undo the nation's long history of racial and gender discrimination.

The agency has tried repeatedly to boost minority and female ownership with various policies -- preferences for new stations, tax breaks for sellers of stations to minorities and discounts for minorities who buy stations in trouble at the FCC.

But those policies failed miserably. They didn't increase the ranks of minority or female owners over the long term and they wrongly enriched people who figured out how to game the system.

Frankly, given its track record, the FCC should just give up trying to bring more minorities and women into broadcasting. But if it's determined to go ahead, what it need to do is open an inquiry into what went wrong with those past policies so that it could avoid the same mistakes and provide safeguards against abuse.

If the FCC wanted to have some fun, it could identify all those who cynically used the policies to make a fast buck. Many are still around.

I could help out with that.

Harry A. Jessell is editor of TVNewsCheck. You may contact him at 973-701-1067 or at hajessell@newscheckmedia.com.

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Comments (8) -

Rafer Riller posted over 3 years ago
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I don't agree with your position that "the FCC should just give up on trying to bring more minorities and women into broadcasting". I think they should take a deeper look at the root of the industry. The FCC should find out why more minorities are not being recruited and promoted to management positions in broadcasting. Opportunities for ownership would be more prevelant if minorities were allowed beyonfd the glass ceiling that exist at broadcasting companies. Frankly we need to see more "Dick Parsons" in this business!
BennyJets Nickname posted over 3 years ago
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OK...so..."Women owned only 80 of the 1,700-plus full-power TV stations (5.87 percent), while minorities owned just 43 (3.15 percent), according to the study." What does that mean??? It's not some sort of conspiracy. What do we hope to gain by this kind of study? Are we talking now about Affirmative Action Ownership? Are we going to take licenses away just because someone does not fall in to category of a being a minority or a woman? (Sound like racial and gender profiling to me.) I really don’t believe anyone has been “preventing” women or minorities from buying a media outlet, so where are we heading with this? We tried this forced equality approach with the housing market, see how that turned out. Beside, most broadcast facilities are owned by corporations these days…how does that compute into the equation.
Lynn Rowe posted over 3 years ago
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I am curious what the objective is supposed to be; enrich women and minority owners that get involved in TV station purchases and/or to provide broader and higher quality programming for women and/or minorities. The former as a goal is dubious at best as it would have a limited impact on a national economic basis and would most likely not impact the type of programming that the station would utilize. If the second point is the objective that what does ownership have to do with this. Would this not be best addressed by programming limits. But then again, this is not publically financed TV. These station owners take the risk all investers take. Why should they be forced to do anything but to maximize the return to their shareholders. In a free market, it is thought that the market leader services the market the best. Frankly, the US has a bi polar personality regarding the desire to promote socially aware programming verse the willingness to fund it. There is no free lunch.
MediaAnalyst Nickname posted over 3 years ago
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I hate to be cynical, but with the current financial state of the industry maybe we should consider the fact that the groups that don't own stations at the moment are a lot smarter and a lot better positioned then those who do. If the FCC continues to make things more difficult for stations they soon won't have that many that they will need to worry about. They would be much better served trying to figure out how local stations are going to be relevant and profitable in today's media environment.
mediawiseguy Nickname posted over 3 years ago
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Your comments are 100% on target. The FCC has failed in their efforts to force ownership by minorities and women. This is fortunate since neither group should be given ANY special consideration. The tax breaks given to minority certificates led to fraudulent deals and allowed the development of "beard" companies to amass more stations. The real need is to stop the continued rise of mass ownership that destroys localism and forces news operation into a "corporate speak" that has virtually destroyed a once robust local news business/.
Sue Scanlan posted over 3 years ago
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Comment of TOM Scanlan, gratefully acknowledging use of Sue's computer..... OK, so the FCC wants to make sure every avenue is open for minorities and women that exist for non-minorities. Commendable, and could be done easier and more efficiently by hiring the likes of BIA. No disagreement. But, hey, don't we ALREADY have these circuit breakers in place? Aren't there already enough laws at the federal, state and local level dealing with discrimination? Couldn't a minority/woman seeking financing and being turned down rely on those laws to seek redress? I submit the laws are in place and work just fine. Moving on to the second point - making it 'easier' for minorities and women to enter broadcast ownership....well now, is the FCC sure that that many minorities/women really WANT to enter this biz? Hey, we bailed five years ago for many of the same reasons so many people LEAVE broadcasting and SELL their stations..........burdensome, useless paperwork, rising fees for the 'privilege' of having the FCC regulate us, falling revenues year-after-year, rising costs of doing business.......hey, FCC, maybe minorities and women aren't so stupid after all - they don't want in this biz any more than others do!
Frank Zappala posted over 3 years ago
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I think we are working at the wrong end of the problem. Diversity of ownership will come from the ground up not the top down. We need to recruit large numbers of minorities and women into entry level jobs. and then create career paths that lead to managment and evenually ownership. With associates we have begun to do this on a smaller scale, but it needs to be a full scale effort througout the industry. Instead of helping minorites to buy stations and fail. lets train them to compete on the open market for ownership by giving them the knowledge, experience, and connections. If you would like to see the beginning of this type of movement, check out www.themsi.net.
HopeUMakeit Nickname posted over 3 years ago
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Of course the current ownership MAJORITY will find or just make up all sorts of BS on why this issue is a waste of time. Only white folk consider themselves capable of serving all communities as long as they are the ones getting rich. What the majority cannot grasp is that America must be “inclusive” of all colors and races in broadcasting or the clock will be ticking on democracy as we know it. I will let you choose which voice I will use, the airwaves or pipe bombs. All voices must be heard for democracy to work. I also think Radio One is 2 big. Drive across America and it all sounds like the same tape reel regardless of the format of the color of the ownership group. As a native of Lake Charles Louisiana, I always looked forward to hearing the Zydeco of my early childhood. Try to find it now... The Bush led great consolidation will be the 2nd contributing factor of the downfall of our country if it is not addressed asap.

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