Senators Back Dual Carriage Exemption

SENATORS BACK DUAL CARRIAGE EXEMPTION
[SOURCE: Multichannel News, AUTHOR: Ted Hearn]
Sens. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), Byron Dorgan (D-ND), Trent Lott (R-Miss), Olympia Snowe (R-Maine), Gordon Smith (R-OR), Jim DeMint (R-SC), and John Thune (R-SD) have written Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin asking the FCC to exempt small cable operators from rules that largely require the duplicative carriage of some local TV signals beginning in early 2009. The FCC refused to exempt small-capacity systems or systems with 5,000 subscribers or fewer because FCC chairman Kevin Martin did not believe that their hardship was genuine. Instead, Martin would only agree to a case-by-case waiver system, forcing mom-and-pop cable companies to work the federal bureaucracy. Troubled by such an approach they called “burdensome,” the senators are advocating a blanket exemption for systems with less than 552 MHz of capacity or with 5,000 or few subscribers.
http://www.multichannel.com/article/CA6504133.html?rssid=196

* Sens. Back Small Cable Operators in Dual-Carriage Matter
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6504054.html?rssid=193