Broadband Plan ‘Unnecessary Government Interference': Smith

LAS VEGAS -- The FCC’s broadband plan would “yank away” more than one-third of the spectrum used by TV and radio stations and would represent a “great spectrum grab,” NAB President Gordon Smith said in his first speech at an NAB convention. “This plan appears to be an example of unnecessary government intervention when technology in the marketplace is already working through the issue,” he said. With the many advances coming soon to wireless communications, “you have to ask what makes this spectrum grab -- and the destruction and loss of innovation it would cause -- really necessary."

If there is really a broadband spectrum problem, the broadcast industry is ready to help solve it, Smith said. But first, he said, a comprehensive inventory of unused spectrum is needed to ensure that no stations are forced to go dark. He said digital compression and other innovations might be able to solve any spectrum shortage.

Smith said, “How voluntary is it when the plan says ‘The government’s ability to reclaim, clear and re-auction spectrum … is an appropriate tool when a voluntary process stalls entirely'?” Broadcasting gave back more than a quarter of its spectrum after the DTV transition and is regulated and required to meet community standards, while the Internet “is rampant with lewd and degrading material,” he said. Smith called maintaining broadcasting a matter of “homeland security."

Retransmission fees are important to broadcasters, Smith said. Broadcast TV programming provides the “real value” to satellite and cable operators, and TV stations “deserve fair compensation,” he said. On the record industry’s crusade to impose a performance fee on radio stations, Smith called the charge a “tax” that would be “basically a bailout of the major recording companies.”

NAB Show Notebook …

In reallocating spectrum under the broadband plan, the FCC must consider broadcasting’s contributions, “historical and current,” to consumers’ well-being, FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn said at a breakfast held by Garvey Schubert Barer, a Washington law firm. The increasing demand for spectrum by new technology “is forcing the commission to look in all directions,” she said, not just at broadcast spectrum. Clyburn said that also on her radar are the “paltry numbers” of TV and radio stations owned by minorities. Innovative ways must be found to encourage women and “historically underrepresented groups to become a part of this important industry."

Allbritton Communications’ Jerry Fritz said he’s “very dubious” that TV stations will get fair value in return for any spectrum they surrender under the broadband plan. At an American Bar Association legal forum Sunday, he said forced sharing of spectrum would take away TV stations’ “flexibility” in their use of spectrum. Fritz added that there’s already much spectrum sharing with wireless. Christopher Guttman-McCabe of CTIA said much of the spectrum allocated to TV stations, such as required co-channel and adjacent channel separations, isn’t used, but wireless operators are “hindered” from sharing the space.