Our local media outlets are being stripped for parts. Aided by decades of bad policymaking, the large companies that control most of the broadcast outlets across the country are laying off local DJs, shuttering local newsrooms and inching ever closer toward creating monopolies in local marketplaces. The more media outlets consolidate, the more our diverse local media is being replaced by faceless, automated infotainment. If it’s true that the media influences and shapes our culture, then we’re headed down a path to uniformity, where cheap centralized content replaces diverse local voices and quality programming.

Proposals under consideration in Washington, D.C. this year could help communities reclaim local airwaves, but they could just as easily play into the hands of the content mills. The proposals, and the processes for adopting them, are complicated and hard to navigate. So we decided to break down exactly what’s at stake, and why it’s essential for all of us to speak up for media that serves our communities, not corporations.

Q: What is triggering these proposed changes to private use of the public airwaves?

Because the public airwaves used by TV and radio broadcasters belong to the public, the Federal Communications Commission sets rules on how those airwaves are used and how many stations one company can own in a community. They do this because Congress tasked the FCC with promoting competition, diversity and localism in broadcasting.

Yes, once upon a time Congress recognized that local media monopolies are bad for communities. However, in the late 1990s the corporate media lobby got Congress to change the law so the FCC has to review its ownership rules every four years in a proceeding where the odds are stacked in broadcasters’ favor. This process, the Quadrennial Ownership Review, is underway right now at the FCC. (Technically, this is the 2010 Quadrennial Ownership Review, and the FCC is running two years behind schedule — but who’s counting?)

The outcomes of these FCC deliberations will affect who owns the media, whether they compete with each other and whether they are accountable to the FCC and the public.

Q: What changes have been proposed?

Most of the changes on the table come down to two questions: who is allowed to own what, and what station owners owe the public in exchange for free use of the public airwaves.

Big media want to own as many stations as possible, including creating local media monopolies where the owner of the local newspaper is also allowed to own the community’s biggest TV and radio outlets. Big media also wants massive loopholes to any ownership restrictions left in place. If the FCC bars them from outright owning additional stations, they at least want the right to control these outlets, from newsrooms to ad departments, via under-the-table “sharing” arrangements.

The corporate media lobby has pushed this monopoly wish list during every single FCC ownership rules review. Former FCC Chairman Michael Powell gave broadcasters everything they wanted during the 2002 review, but public outrage, congressional intervention and ultimately the courts reversed that decision.

In 2007 Powell’s successor, Kevin Martin, decided a total opening of the floodgates of consolidation wasn’t politically possible, so he gave big media its most coveted wish, a “partial” lifting of the rule that prohibits one company from owning a newspaper and broadcast station in the same community. Former FCC Commissioner Michael Copps described this “partial” lifting of the newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership ban as “so ridden with loopholes that an 18-wheeler could be driven through them.” The courts once again stepped in and threw this decision out.

But the current FCC, run by President Obama-appointee Julius Genachowski, has proposed the same loophole-ridden rule, even though then-Sen. Obama strongly condemned it when the Bush-era FCC adopted it. These loopholes could result in media consolidation in even the smallest market, where there are already fewer media outlets competing for audiences and serving local residents.

Even more incredibly, the FCC is still doing nothing to address the lack of participation of women and people of color in the broadcast industry. Ignoring years of public outcry and a federal court mandate, the agency plans to let these egregious disparities continue.

Then there’s the non-proposal to stop “covert consolidation.” Covert consolidation is the increasingly pervasive practice of one company controlling as many as four stations in one community without being subject to ownership restrictions. Despite a recent acknowledgment that covert consolidation “is clearly at odds with the purpose and intent of the duopoly rule,” the FCC proposes no concrete remedy, but simply asks whether it needs to clamp down on the practice. (We think the answer is pretty obvious.)

There is one bright spot. In addition to changes to the who-owns-what rules, the FCC in a parallel inquiry is considering rules that would make it easier for the public to access information about what’s aired on TV stations: stuff like who paid for political ads, what local issues our stations are covering and whether the same company operates multiple stations in a given community. Not surprisingly, broadcasters are staunchly opposed to any measures that would require them to make public information accessible to the actual public.

Q: Aren’t broadcasters just running a business? Why does the FCC have oversight of the broadcast industry?

Broadcasters do not pay to use the airwaves, which count as a publicly owned resource under the law. Instead, they are supposed to fulfill their half of a bargain they made with the American people. For-profit companies receive free licenses to use the airwaves for television and radio stations (unlike, say, cellphone companies that often pay billions for their airwaves at FCC-run auctions). In return, broadcasters have agreed to serve the public’s news and information needs. This is a good deal for broadcasters. They get to use the public airwaves for free, and make billions of dollars in profits each year. In theory this should be good for everybody else too.

It’s the FCC’s job to enforce this “public interest bargain,” and that means ensuring that communities are served by a diverse number of locally owned broadcast outlets that compete with each other to provide quality programming to their listeners and viewers.
 

Q: Do the FCC media ownership rule proposals strengthen or weaken public interest protections?

Many of the proposals on the table reflect heavy media lobby influence, and, if adopted, would actively degrade public interest protections, resulting in more media consolidation.

Ultimately, it’s the FCC’s responsibility to make policies that protect the public interest. To understand what the public’s interest is, the FCC must actually hear from the public. Despite ultimately proposing terrible rules, both Chairman Powell and Chairman Martin held numerous public hearings across the country, hearings that gave community members the chance to have their own voices heard by all FCC commissioners. So far, the current FCC has no plans to hold public hearings.

Q: What can I do?

Join our efforts to save local airwaves. We have until April 3rd to speak out for media that represents our communities.