Broadcasting&Cable

The budget bill that passed in the wee hours of the morning of Feb 9 included $20 billion for infrastructure initiatives, at least some of which will go to broadband buildouts.

The US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has denied a petition from Prometheus Radio Project that it effectively stay the Federal Communications Commission's November vote to deregulate local broadcast ownership.  The court suggested the jury was still out on the FCC's response to the court's direction on ownership diversity and that Prometheus did not make a case for direct action from the court.

House Communications Subcommittee Vice Chair Leonard Lance (R-NJ) is joining subcommittee Ranking Member Mike Doyle (D-PA) in introducing bipartisan legislation that will help bring 5G wireless service closer to reality and help close the digital divide.  The "Advancing Innovation and Reinvigorating Widespread Access to Viable Electromagnetic Spectrum", or AIRWAVES Act, will encourage the federal government to free up more spectrum for commercial licensed and unlicensed use.  More spectrum will improve data service from all providers and help close geographic gaps in coverage.

The New England Cable & Telecommunications Association is putting in a plug for federal network neutrality legislation. That came in planned testimony at a Massachusetts Senate Special Committee on Network Neutrality and Consumer Protection Hearing Feb 6. 

Prometheus Radio Project and Media Mobilizing Project have asked the Third Circuit Court of Appeals to deny broadcasters' requests that the court allow them to argue against Prometheus et al.'s challenge to the Federal Communications Commission's broadcast deregulation.

The Federal Communications Commission told the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit that it did consider the impact of its broadcast local ownership deregulation on minority and female ownership and that that consideration and its adoption of a definition of eligible entity meets that court's mandate. "[T]he Commission carefully analyzed whether each of its rule changes would have a “material impact on minority and female ownership," said the FCC's legal team. The FCC told the court it could consider the arguments for or against the rule change in the regular order of challenges to tho

The National Association of Broadcasters and Sinclair have asked a federal court to allow them to weigh in on the request from critics of the Federal Communications Commission's broadcast deregulatory decision that the court block that deregulation.