NAB Lobbies Media Bureau for Ownership Deregulation

NAB lawyers met with Media Bureau front office and other staff to press for FCC ownership deregulation. "Expeditiously reinstate the UHF discount," which was "arbitrary and capricious for the Commission to eliminate," representatives including General Counsel Rick Kaplan told acting bureau Chief Michelle Carey and others, according to the association. That discount may soon be brought back (see 1701110067). The broadcaster group also sought grant of its petition for reconsideration of media ownership rules (see 1702060053). "Remove the eight-voices test from the local TV rule and reform the top four prohibition by allowing a single entity to own up to two of the top four-ranked stations in a local market; reverse the joint sales agreement attribution and shared services agreement disclosure requirements; and eliminate the newspaper/broadcast and radio/television cross-ownership rules," NAB said in a filing posted Thursday in docket 14-50. Others oppose such deregulation (see 1701260018).