Minority Broadcasters Ask FCC to Tweak Definition

The Council for Diversity and Competition Supporters (DCS), a group of minority broadcasters represented by the Minority Media & Telecommunications Council, officially asked the Federal Communications Commission to reconsider some of the steps it proposed in what it billed as an effort to help them gain access to capital and stations. Specifically DCS asked the FCC to reconsider its definition of "designated entities" that qualified for the FCC's help. The DCS said three of the diversity initiatives the FCC adopted, and three more it proposed, are dependent on that definition. Since the Commission has said that it was open to rethinking that definition, the MMTC asked it to modify the order to make clear that the definition is an interim measure and "would not be likely to advance minority and women ownership." It also asked that no station applications based on the "small business" definition be precedential. The MMTC also asked the FCC to reconsider its decision not to grant minority owners public-interest waivers of its 25% limit on foreign ownership of broadcast properties. The DCS proposed the waivers as a way to give those owners greater access to capital.
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