FCC Probes Fox on WWOR License Renewal in Rare Move That Some Call Significant

The FCC is probing the representations of News Corp.’s Fox Television Stations in discussions it had with the agency over the pending and contested license renewal of WWOR-TV Secaucus, N.J. Media Bureau Chief Bill Lake on Thursday sent the a lawyer for the broadcast network a letter of inquiry saying it’s investigating whether Fox broke several rules by allegedly misrepresenting the extent of its news and operations. WWOR is the only full-power commercial station in New Jersey and is required to carry news serving the specific audience of the northern part of the state, rather than just its community of license, as is the case with all other U.S. TV stations.

Lake’s letter asks Fox about claims by Voice for New Jersey, among the opponents of a license renewal request that’s been pending for several years, that the company misrepresented the quantity of New Jersey news and public affairs content on WWOR after July 2009 and the number of employees in Secaucus from that time on (CD Dec 9 p12). Voice for New Jersey cited ex parte filings from Fox in which it discussed those matters as if they were current facts, after it had allegedly cut back on both programming aimed at the state and employees there. Fox has described the issue as a misunderstanding, said a past filing in docket 07-260. Lake noted that the company said it revised documents from an August 2009 ex parte meeting with commission staff to reflect the changes in programming, and used them in later meetings, but didn’t provide copies of the new handout to those at the August meeting.

The bureau now is investigating whether Fox intentionally gave “material factual information that was incorrect” on content and staff, Lake wrote. It’s also probing whether the broadcaster intentionally omitted “material information that is necessary to prevent any material factual statement that is made from being incorrect or misleading,” he said, or failed “to notify the Commission as promptly as possible and in any event within thirty days of any change in circumstances that rendered its application no longer substantially accurate and complete in all significant respects or of any substantial change."

Fox said the allegations from the group were wrong. The company looks forward to “responding to the FCC’s inquiry,” a spokeswoman said. “We are confident that upon review of all facts and applicable law, the FCC will recognize that these unwarranted claims hold no merit.” Supporters of yanking WWOR’s license -- who also oppose News Corp. owning a New York City TV station and The New York Post in violation of cross-ownership rules -- said the letter of inquiry is significant and shows the regulator is taking the allegations seriously. Such letters are rare, the supporters said. Replies to Lake’s letter, which asked nine questions, are due in 30 days.

Fox hasn’t “explicitly confirmed or denied the accuracy” of the allegations, “nor has it provided complete information regarding the timing or extent of any programming or staff reductions,” Lake wrote (http://xrl.us/bii4yq). He asked when WWOR last aired an hour-long newscast at night that was regularly scheduled, when the station last showed one on a weekend and when it last aired public affairs shows on a weekly basis. “For any program referenced in the preceding request that was canceled or reduced in program length effective on or after June 1, 2007, state the name of the program, the date of cancellation or reduction, and the name of any replacement program that the Station produced and aired,” the letter said.

A December letter to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski about Voice of New Jersey’s allegations from Free Press, Media Access Project, Rainbow/Push Coalition and United Church of Christ appeared to set the ball in motion for the inquiry, representatives of some of those groups said. “Although Fox has been effective at deferring commission action thus far, I wonder if their actions in this case are going to make the commission sit up and take notice,” said lawyer Cheryl Leanza, consulting for the church on WWOR. The FCC “should be doing a better job here, and the fact that we have to go to these lengths to point out the problem here just points to commission inattention to the issue,” she said. “But hopefully this will change."

Such a probe is “extremely uncommon,” said Senior Vice President Andrew Schwartzman of the Media Access Project. While “the odds of Fox losing its license [are] extremely remote,” putting the license at all in jeopardy “in this regard is significant, and it’s not out of the realm of possibility” that the license could be withdrawn, he said. “It would require years of litigation.”