The FCC’s recently released draft relocation reimbursement forms...

The FCC’s recently released draft relocation reimbursement forms (CD Sept 29 p14) and the announced timeline for filing them could lead to “hiccups,” said Fletcher Heald broadcast attorney Anne Goodwin Crump in a post on the firm’s blog Monday (http://bit.ly/1rFMyjT). Because only three months are planned between the issuance of the public notice announcing channel reassignments and the date stations and multichannel video programming distributors have to turn in their cost estimates, station objections and challenges to reassignment are liable to stack up, she said. “It’s unlikely in the extreme that such a petition would be resolved before the close of the three-month period for estimates.” Stations that have reconsideration petitions granted won’t have to move, and so wouldn’t incur relocation costs. But if the three-month period is up first, they'll already have had to go to “the trouble and expense” of filing for reimbursement, she said. Crump said it’s not yet clear what happens if there are many reconsideration requests or petitions for review of the repacking: “Will it nonetheless be necessary to march full speed ahead even in the face of substantial uncertainty?"