The House Appropriations Committee last week passed a funding bill that would ban the FCC from implementing its newspaper cross-ownership rule ordered in December.

The bill includes $338.8 million for the FCC for fiscal 2009, which begins Oct. 1.

NAB opposed the measure, included in the bill, that would prohibit the commission from using the funds to implement the new rule.

The bill also includes $20 million for DTV education.

The legislation still needs Senate passage, and many appropriations bills pass through joint House-Senate conference committees to hammer out the differences in the two chambers’ bills.

Meanwhile, Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Wash., has introduced a House version of the Senate resolution of disapproval on the ownership rules. The Senate version passed in May.

— TV Technology