Pai Wants Bipartisan Support for AM-Only Window, JSAs, Incubator Program

FM translators and joint sales agreements help minority broadcasters “thrive,” said FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai in a statement released Wednesday after his visit to minority-owned radio stations and a TV station operated by historically African-American school Tougaloo College. The school’s WLOO Vicksburg, Mississippi, might not have survived this long without its JSA, Pai said. He also visited an AM station that had found its FM translator “critical” to its operations. The FCC should support minority broadcasters with rules that will allow AM stations an exclusive FM translator [application] window and allow JSAs, and should establish “an incubator program to make it easier for minority entrepreneurs to enter the broadcast business,” Pai said. “I hope that these and other policies find bipartisan support in the months and years ahead.”