FCC Chief Says Media Ownership Rules Need To Be Addressed By Siobhan Hughes Dow Jones Newswires
Friday March 17, 5:26 PM EST http://finance.myway.com/jsp/nw/nwdt_rt.jsp?section=news&cat=INDUSTRY&feed=dji&news_id=dji-00104320060317&date=20060317 WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin Martin suggested that media-ownership rules are among the areas in which the agency may be able to take action once it has a full complement of commissioners. The FCC currently is evenly split between Republicans and Democrats. The Senate must confirm telecommunications lobbyist Robert McDowell, President Bush's pick for the FCC, before Martin will be operating with a Republican majority for the first time since he took over the agency in March 2005. A divided FCC last July pulled from consideration a vote on whether to seek public comment on new media-ownership rules. The FCC had voted to ease media- ownership restrictions in 2003, when Martin was a commissioner, but an appeals court overturned some of the FCC rules one year later. "When we get a fifth commissioner, obviously he could end up being a tiebreaker vote and we would be able to move forward on it," Martin told reporters in Washington as he completed his first year as head of the FCC. "I do think we need to end up addressing it." As for reviewing the planned purchase of Adelphia Communications Corp.'s assets by Time Warner Inc. (TWX) (TWX) and Comcast Corp. (CMCSA) (CMCSA), Martin said the agency was still working with the companies. The FCC has been reviewing the transaction for 286 days, compared with the 199 days it took to review SBC Communications Inc.'s purchase of AT&T Corp. (T) and the 199 days it took to review Verizon Communications Inc.'s (VZ) (VZ) purchase of MCI Inc. "In each case, we work closely with the parties that are in front of us on the timing of when...of how important it is to try to get it through to the parties themselves," Martin said. Martin said that among the most immediate decisions was a petition due from Verizon (VZ) in "the next couple days" regarding exempting high-speed, fiber-optic broadband service to commercial entities from some current regulations. "I think the commission should act on that," he said, saying he was "hopeful" the FCC would provide "regulatory relief for the incumbents' deployment of fiber to not just to consumers but to commercial entities as well." Martin defended a series of rulings the FCC issued this week aimed at giving broadcasters guidance about what types of language or content could be considered indecent. Asked about decisions in which one barnyard epithet was deemed unacceptable but one pejorative descriptive phrase was called "not sufficiently vulgar" to warrant fines, Martin said that "whenever the commission is trying to end up determining what is appropriate or inappropriate, there are inherently lines that end up being drawn." He said that "the debate is not new." Martin also said that "one area where the commission could do something" was setting time limits on determinations by local franchise authorities for permitting the rights to provide video service in their communities. In general, Martin said one of his top priorities was to speed up deployment of high-speed, high-capacity Internet service around the country. He said he wanted to create a regulatory environment for "the private sector to go out and invest in the next generation of networks so that they're able to bring broadband services throughout the country." ================================ George Antunes, Political Science Dept University of Houston; Houston, TX 77204 Voice: 713-743-3923 Fax: 713-743-3927 antunes at uh dot edu Reply with a "Thank you" if you liked this post. _____________________________ MEDIANEWS mailing list [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
