Gray Television signed a rights deal with the Phoenix Suns and Phoenix Mercury basketball teams to deliver locally broadcast games to 2.8 million viewers for free using a combination of broadcast TV and streaming, said a news release Friday. That would triple the teams’ reach compared with their previous distribution over a regional sports network, the release said. All Suns and Mercury non-national exclusive games will be broadcast between Gray stations KTVK Phoenix, Arizona, and low-power station KPHE-LD Phoenix, the release said. KTVK will air 13 Mercury regular season games and all available post-season games, with the remaining regular season games airing on KPHE. Viewers will also be able to watch games through a streaming option via a Suns or Mercury branded app for smartphones and Smart TVs, the release said. The 2023 Phoenix Mercury season will stream direct to consumer for free, the release said. “The agreement is subject to the approval of the NBA and WNBA and any required resolution with the incumbent regional sports partner,” the release said. The first Phoenix Mercury game will air live on KTVK and be simulcast on KPHE May 25.

The FCC’s “unprecedented” actions on Standard/Tegna “raise serious concerns about the future of ALL broadcast transactions which may have a profound impact on broadcast viewers,” wrote NAB CEO Curtis LeGeyt in a blog post Thursday. “Every industry under the regulatory microscope of the FCC should be asking themselves if they are next” said LeGeyt. FCC staffers “who are not accountable to the public” as commissioners are “should not be allowed to make a final determination sending a multi-billion-dollar transaction to the gallows,” said LeGeyt. The Standard/Tegna deal showed the FCC’s 180-day shot clock is an “illusion,” and long delays in merger reviews keep companies from making needed operational changes, he said. The agency’s public interest review standard is too “amorphous” and allows the FCC to justify actions using “ad hoc concerns unrelated to its mandate,” the blog post said. “Ensuring that a given transaction complies with the FCC’s rules should be the primary focus of merger review, rather than allowing for arbitrary demands that fall outside the FCC’s oversight,” LeGeyt said. The agency’s handling of the review “has exposed the flaws in the current system of transaction review, and it is our hope that FCC will reverse course and correct this miscarriage of justice.” The FCC released an order Thursday memorializing Administrative Law Judge Jane Halprin's ruling Wednesday (see 2304260066) putting the transaction's hearing proceeding on hold until June 1.

The FCC’s proposals to update the foreign-sponsored content rules (see 2301250067) exceed the agency’s authority, said representatives of NAB, Fox, NBCU, Gray Television and the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council this week in meetings with aides to Commissioners Nathan Simington and Brendan Carr, according to an ex parte filing posted Thursday in docket 20-299. Requiring broadcasters to obtain certifications from programming lessees is a burden on broadcasters and will clutter the FCC’s online public inspection files with useless documents, the broadcasters said. “We cannot conceive of a single public benefit from littering stations’ online public files with thousands of certifications stating that innumerable local entities -- churches, family-owned businesses, and high school football programs -- are not agents of Russia or China,” the broadcasters said. If the FCC goes forward with the proposals, it should clarify the rule doesn’t apply to ads for commercial products and services, and limit the public file requirement to instances where a lessee is a foreign governmental entity, the broadcasters said. The agency should also exclude religious and local programming from the rules, they said.

The FCC shouldn’t extend broadcasters’ waiver of the 2013 audible crawl rule without gathering more information on NAB’s efforts to implement audible crawls or setting specific benchmarks for implementation, said the American Council for the Blind and the American Foundation for the Blind in comments posted in docket 12-107 Tuesday. “We are concerned that outreach related to this waiver petition is being performed to check-the-box and will continue to prove insufficient for finding or developing a solution to this problem,” said a joint filing from the consumer groups. Compliance with the 2013 rule requiring broadcasters to provide audio description on a second audio stream of emergency information conveyed through graphics was originally required by 2015, but the agency granted an 18-month waiver and has repeatedly extended it (see 2304100058). NAB requested a two-year extension for the current waiver, which expires May 26. In comments posted Tuesday, the Society of Broadcast Engineers backed NAB’s request. “The technology for automated audio description of a dynamic image simply does not yet exist to permit broadcasters to effectively and efficiently abide by the non-textual component of the Audible Crawl Rule,” said SBE. The FCC should determine whether NAB has reached outside the broadcast industry to technical experts in AI and emergency alerting, the consumer groups said. “Without proactive outreach and engagement by broadcasters to the technology sector” a solution ”will not materialize and consumers with disabilities will never receive full and equal access to emergency alert information.”

FCC Administrative Law Judge Jane Halprin continued the FCC’s hearing proceeding on Standard/Tegna until June 1 -- effectively pausing it -- and denied broadcaster requests to limit additional discovery, said attorneys representing both sides in the case. Halprin made the ruling at a status conference at the FCC Wednesday that had been set to determine the deal’s schedule, attorneys said. The Standard/Tegna broadcasters requested an accelerated hearing schedule with no additional discovery (see 2304200060), but Halprin denied that request Wednesday. Standard General didn’t comment on the ruling, but the Standard/Tegna broadcast parties have steadfastly said the deal can’t be extended past May 22 due to the expiration of financing that can’t be replaced (see 2304180074). With a quick hearing out of reach, the FCC's reversing itself and voting the deal is likely the only road left to the broadcasters, attorneys said. The broadcasters are expected to try to put pressure on the agency through Congress, multiple attorneys said. “Until more recently, this summer, we never had a lobbyist in D.C.,” Managing Partner Soohyung Kim said last week at the NAB Show. “Now we are employing like half of D.C.” In a news release Wednesday, Standard General highlighted remarks from Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., Tuesday saying he won’t support FCC nominees “if they are unwilling to support diversity -- including by acting in a way that denies a vote to a diverse applicant.” FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks -- the only commissioner yet to take a public stance on the deal -- is likely soon to be up for renomination. In a joint statement Wednesday, Asian Americans Advancing Justice, National Action Network, the National Urban League and UnidosUS urged the FCC to hold a commission vote on the deal. “As FCC Commissioner Geoffrey Starks said in a recent speech on diversity in media: ‘We need to do better,’" the release said. “We will not call on the Commissioners to cast their votes one way or the other. But what we do demand is fair and equal treatment,” the civil rights groups said. “And, so far, ‘fair and equal treatment’ has not been the order of the day.” Starks didn’t comment.

The FCC Enforcement Bureau issued 16 notices of illegal pirate radio broadcasting to landowners in the New York City metro area for apparently allowing illegal broadcasting from their property, the agency said Tuesday. It said fines of more than $2 million could follow if it determines the property owners continued to allow pirate broadcasts. It said the notices were to properties identified by field agents as pirate broadcast sources during the bureau's 2022-2023 sweeps of the New York areas. Applauding the notices, NAB said pirate operations "interfere with both licensed broadcast stations and air traffic control systems. In recent years, reductions of FCC field enforcement led directly to increased pirate activity and required Congressional action to provide the additional tools necessary to effectively combat these illegal operators by placing liability on the landowners who facilitate them. With full funding of the 2020 PIRATE Act now in place, NAB looks forward to regular enforcement sweeps that will help maintain order on the public airwaves.”

The NAB Show 2023 drew 65,013 registered attendees and 1,208 exhibiting companies, according to preliminary numbers announced by the trade group Tuesday. The 2022 show, the first after the two preceding events were canceled due to COVID-19, had 53,458 registered attendees and 940 exhibitors, while the pre-pandemic 2019 had 91,460 people and over 1,600 exhibitors. This year was the trade show’s centennial anniversary. Next year’s show will be April 13-17 in Las Vegas, the release said.

The FCC should vote in the near future on reinstating equal employment opportunity data collection, said public interest and civil rights groups in a meeting with Media Bureau staff Friday, according to an ex parte filing posted in docket 19-177 Wednesday. The groups were the United Church of Christ Media Justice Ministry, the Leadership Council on Civil and Human Rights, the National Hispanic Media Coalition and the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council. “It is a best practice and consistent with current business and regulatory norms to collect and publish employment data,” the filing said. “Essentially the same data” is used on EEO and FCC forms “so companies are most likely already in possession of the data needed for both forms,” the filing said. The groups also said the data should be made public: “Public data will best serve the public interest.”

India public broadcaster Prasar Bharati will allow GeoBroadcast Solutions to test its geotargeted radio systems on All India Radio starting in mid-April, said GBS in a news release Monday. The test will begin with the broadcaster's radio stations in Delhi and Bengaluru and reach a combined listenership of 23 million, the release said. “The technology will not only reach underserved communities through an improved broadcast signal but will also provide zoned customized content to various dialect and ethnic groups,” GBS said. The installation should be completed and ready for trial by the end of the summer, it said.

The FCC unanimously approved an order on updating low-power TV and TV translator rules, said Tuesday’s Daily Digest. The item had been set for commissioners' open meeting Thursday but has been deleted from the agenda, according to the FCC’s website. The order updates rules for LPTV and translators to reflect the digital transition, and requires LPTV stations to comply with station identification requirements. The order also rejects calls from the LPTV Broadcasters Association to replace the term low-power television in FCC rules with “local power television.” The "purpose of this proceeding is to eliminate confusion within our rules,” the order said. “Because several of our rules stem from statutory requirements, and because Congress has used the term ‘low power television,’ we believe that changing this term would result in inconsistencies between the statute and the rules and would create, not eliminate, confusion within our rules,” the order said. The order also requires a minor modification permit for all LPTV station relocations, where previously LPTV stations were allowed to relocate less than 500 feet without a permit. The order updates the coordinates used to determine land mobile radio protection, and updates FCC rules for assigning LPTV call signs. “These updates reflect the Commission’s continued effort to ensure our rules clearly reflect the Commission’s requirements, and are understandable to all stakeholders,” the order said.