Free Press Hails FCC Plans to Expose Covert Consolidation, Promote Broadcast Diversity

WASHINGTON — On Thursday, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler announced that the agency will take a closer look at television station "sharing arrangements." These agreements allow a single conglomerate to control multiple stations in the same market, skirting FCC rules that are supposed to preserve independence and diversity on the airwaves.

The FCC will vote on an order and ask more questions on these topics at its monthly meeting at the end of March. It will issue rules requiring attribution of "joint sales agreements" where one TV station sells 15 percent or more of the advertising time for another broadcast outlet.

The agency will also seek further comments on management arrangements. These agreements often result in consolidated newsrooms with carbon-copy newscasts airing on multiple stations. The FCC's proposal would also prohibit allegedly independent stations from conducting joint negotiations for cable carriage of their signals.

The FCC is proposing no changes to the agency's longstanding newspaper-TV cross-ownership rules, which preserve diversity of viewpoints among broadcast stations and newspapers serving the same media markets.

Free Press President and CEO Craig Aaron made the following statement:

"For too long, the FCC sat on its hands and watched television broadcast conglomerates like Sinclair use so-called sharing agreements to gobble up more television stations. These shady deals spurred the biggest wave of media consolidation in history — knocking independent local voices off the air, slashing newsroom jobs and killing media diversity.

"Today's announcement begins the process of righting FCC mistakes on media ownership. The agency must close the loopholes in its rules and ensure corporations can’t use shell companies to hide the real owners of local stations and sneak through even more media consolidation. Viewers need competing sources of local news. 

"The FCC should also be praised for abandoning the failed approach of previous administrations and preserving the important ban on newspaper-TV cross-ownership. Keeping these rules in place is a major victory for the broad coalition of public interest, labor and civil rights organizations, as well as millions and millions of Americans, who opposed FCC efforts to allow more media consolidation over the past decade.

"We welcome Chairman Wheeler's leadership on this vital set of issues, and his willingness to steer clear of the mistakes of FCC predecessors who turned a blind eye to these practices."