Chairman Pai Remarks Before Michigan Association of Broadcasters

For its part, the Federal Communications Commission will not take the value of broadcasting for granted so long as I am Chairman. I’m committed to modernizing our rules in order to allow broadcasting to flourish. Our record over the past year-and-a-half is proof of this. And with your indulgence, I’d like to walk through some of that record.

One of the biggest things we’re doing for broadcasters at the FCC is something that the typical American would probably expect to be typical for any agency: making sure that our rules match today’s marketplace and technology. That’s often a heavy lift. Broadcasting’s virtues may be timeless, but many broadcast regulations most certainly are not.

The last policy matter I’d like to discuss also featured at the FCC’s August meeting, and that deals with the incentive auction repack. As you know, when Congress authorized the FCC to conduct the incentive auction in 2012, it required the Commission to reimburse certain costs incurred only by full power and Class A stations that were reassigned to new channels as a result of the auction, as well as certain costs incurred by multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs) to continue to carry such stations. Recently, however, Congress passed legislation that, among other things, expanded the list of entities eligible to be reimbursed for auctionrelated expenses. It now includes LPTV stations, TV translators, and FM stations. Last week, we started to implement Congress’ directive. We want to disburse funds fairly and efficiently while at the same time ensuring that there are robust safeguards against waste, fraud, and abuse. If you’re interested, tell us—we need and want to hear from you.


Chairman Pai Remarks Before Michigan Association of Broadcasters