Local stations angle for DBS carriage
DBS operators 'ignore' public TV channels

Originally published in Current, Sept. 4, 2000

By Karen Everhart Bedford

Finding that big commercial TV stations are being lofted on direct broadcast satellites but not their own signals, public TV stations are negotiating with the DBS companies, operating a low-profile public information web site, and petitioning the FCC to secure "local to local" carriage.

A coalition of public TV stations is negotiating with DirecTV, the country's largest satellite company, to add public TV stations to its line-up. Local-to-local packages of both DirecTV and EchoStar's Dish Network, with a few exceptions, now include the top network affiliate stations in the 30 largest markets, but only a national PBS feed. Last fall's Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act lets satellite companies deliver the PBS feed until January 2002 instead of requiring them to carry local public stations.

In the meantime, the campaign is trying to enlist viewers in its cause with a web site headlined: "I Want My PBS Station: A Campaign to Support Local Public Television." The site at www.iwantmypbsstation.org lists 28 public TV stations including most of the big ones.

PBS, APTS and CPB have filed two rounds of comments with the FCC on a proceeding that it opened earlier this summer to determine how widely, and under what rules, DBS providers will be required to carry signals from local public TV stations. Filing another joint response were KCET in Los Angeles, KQED in San Francisco and KERA in Dallas.

In negotiations, publicity and FCC filings, the stations are trying to directly influence the DBS companies — shifting the focus of their frustrations away from PBS, which has been their target for complaints for several years.

DBS carriage issues have consumed a great deal of time and energy among station execs and PBS policymakers since 1996, as PBS sought to establish a presence for public TV on the emerging delivery system. Station leaders repeatedly criticized PBS efforts as they became nervous about direct-to-home satellite delivery of the same national programs that they broadcast.

Passage of the Satellite Home Viewers Improvement Act (SHVIA) last fall pitched the direct broadcast ball into a much bigger court. The law gave DBS operators rights to deliver local broadcast signals into local markets — the so-called "local to local" services now being marketed in the nation's top 30 markets. Public TV lobbied Congress for clauses requiring DBS providers to include hometown PBS stations in local program packages by January 2002. And now that the FCC is considering rules to implement SHVIA, public TV is asking the commission for regulatory protections.

A notice posted on WNET's web site conveys the urgency that stations attach to being left out of satellite operators' local line-ups. The site, which links to www.iwantmypbsstation.org, targets DirecTV with a campaign "to support local public television." "DirecTV's rapid growth poses a direct threat to local PBS stations, which depend on viewer support for a wide range of local and national PBS programming," according to the campaign's web site. Visitors are urged to contact DirecTV and declare, "I want my PBS station!"

The only local station now carried on a DBS satellite is WGBH in Boston, hometown station of Rep. Ed Markey, ranking Democrat on the House telecommunications subcommittee. The Boston station is available in the DBS local-to-local package on EchoStar's Dish Network.

Legal loophole seen

The FCC asked for comments on its SHVIA rules early in June, and two rounds of comments have been filed over the summer. The commission asked whether satellite carriers should be allowed to escape local-to-local must-carry rules by negotiating individual deals with stations in the market.

The commission indicated its rules will address carriage requirements of multiple public TV stations within a market, and standards for delivery of signals to the DBS companies, among other issues.

APTS, PBS and CPB jointly urge the commission to model its must-carry requirements for DBS providers on those imposed on cable companies. The proceeding "must generally end in the carriage of the same local [noncommercial] stations by DBS and cable, at roughly the same cost to the stations, in generally the same manner, and resulting in the same ease of access for viewers," the national organizations concluded.

The FCC should give special protection to public stations because, unlike commercial stations, they don't have the option of extracting carriage fees from DBS companies or withholding permission for carriage, they said. The law also affirms the importance of public access to public TV, the groups noted.

In joint comments filed for KCET, KQED and KERA, they argue against DBS providers' current practice of "ignoring" public TV stations in local program packages — the very issue that stations are attempting to resolve with DirecTV through negotiations.

By omitting local public TV stations in their local-to-local program packages, DBS companies abuse the "compulsory license" that allows them to pick up the national PBS feed, the stations told the FCC. The compulsory license was "not the carte blanche to ignore local public television stations that the DBS industry has made it."

Continued carriage of the national PBS feed on DBS ignores public television's "bedrock" founding principle of localism, "deprives DBS subscribers of the many local programs broadcast" by stations, and "impairs the ability of those stations to retain existing members and obtain new members."

The stations ask the FCC to affirm "in the most vigorous manner" the importance of DBS carriage of local public TV stations, and to adopt rules requiring direct satellite companies as of January 2002 to carry local public TV stations in all markets receiving another local station.

Both EchoStar and DirecTV ask the FCC not to grant the same must-carry rights to public TV stations on DBS systems as they have secured on cable. The FCC's cable must-carry rules operate on sliding scale that ties the number of noncommercial stations to be carried on a cable system to that system's channel capacity. The DBS companies instead seek to tie must-carry rules for their industry to the existing "set-aside" rules, which require satellite companies to allocate 4 percent of their channel capacity to noncommercial educational or informational programming.

Echostar proposes that the FCC require satellite carriers to devote 2 percent of their channel capacity to carriage of local public TV stations, and count it towards their required set-aside of 4 percent. "In essence, local carriage of [noncommercial stations] must be rationed, because failure to do so means that fewer cities will receive local service, or there will be no capacity in some cities for carriage of [a noncommercial station] — neither of these outcomes is desirable," the company wrote in its comments.

DirecTV asks the commission to set the threshold for public TV must-carry at 4 percent of the local channels that satellite carriers would be required to carry in a market. The company also urges the commission to expand the number of public stations exempted from must-carry on the grounds that they carry duplicative programming.

In its reply comments, pubcasting said the NCE carriage limits proposed by DBS companies would result in regional carriage of a single local public TV station. The proposals conflict with the SHVIA's goal of preserving localism, and "[blink] at the dramatic capacity increases planned by both EchoStar and DirecTV."

 

	.	To Current's home page
	.	Earlier news: Stations want PBS to differentiate its feed for DBS satellites, 1999.
	.	Outside link: Web site for "I Want My PBS Station" campaign.

Web page posted Sept. 10, 2000
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