WASHINGTON—Official legislation has been introduced by Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.) that seeks to promote diversity in the broadcast media industry and support local broadcasters across the U.S. through the creation of a broadcast incubator program.

The Broadcast Diversity in Leadership Act would create this incubator program, which would be led by the FCC, to allow existing broadcasters to form partnerships with emerging broadcasters to enable greater access to financial resources as well as allow for information sharing, mentoring and other activities that aim to promote diversity in broadcast ownership.

Walden, who is the Republican leader for the Energy and Commerce Committee, is a former radio station owner.

“I understand the importance of ensuring broadcast owners and their content reflect the communities they serve,” said Walden. “We must ensure our local broadcast media stations can continue to compete in today’s media marketplace and attract future generations to the industry to continue to provide local and diverse information across communities. I am proud to introduce this bill today that will support our hardworking broadcasters and ensure the industry’s continued growth and prosperity.”

PLUS: NABLF Launches Diversity, Inclusion and Equity Resource Center

The bill has already received the support of the NAB, the Multicultural Media, Telecom & Internet Council (MMTC) and the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters.

“NABOB is pleased to support Congressman Walden’s bill directing the FCC to create an incubator program to support the entry of new and diverse voices in the broadcasting industry by providing for an established broadcaster and an emerging broadcaster to enter into a qualifying incubator  relationship,” said James Winston, president of NABOB. “NABOB has supported the creation of an incubator program for many years. We are very grateful to Congressman Walden for taking this next step toward its implementation.”

The full bill can be found online. 

WASHINGTON--There’s both support and scorn for a Federal Communications Commission plan to rekindle an incubation program designed to boost minority ownership.

In November, the commission created a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that proposed to create a broadcast incubator program that would promote ownership diversity. Since the structure of such a program requires further exploration, the FCC is seeking comments on how it should structure such a program so that minority owners, women and small business can become active entrants into the broadcast services industry.

In its comments on the issue, the National Association of Broadcasters supported the program, saying such a plan could help reduce barriers to entry — such as the lack of operational expertise and access to capital. The NAB laid out several recommendations, such as pairing established broadcasters with new entrants into the market.

[Read: FCC Chairman Elaborates On Broadcast Incubator, Steps To Bridge Digital Divide

Others say the FCC is not going far enough. Ravi Kapur, president of Major Market Broadcasting of North Dakota, purchased full-power television station KRDK in 2014 under the auspices of increasing diversity in broadcast ownership, Kapur said in a filing. But a territorial fight ensued as the station fought to secure its branding and cable carriage in the market against a larger broadcaster, Kapur said. This particular technique for diverse ownership incubation did not work, he said. “While our organization has been able to survive through sheer guile and willpower, the average minority broadcaster would not have survived this brutal test of wills,” Kapur wrote.

Yet it is wise for the FCC to try and incubate diverse ownership, Kapur said. “Under our ownership, KRDK now produces more local programming than every other television station in North Dakota combined,” Kapur said.

In his filing, Kapur suggests the FCC set up a viable system that will enable more voices to participate, such as granting low-power television stations must-carry and Class A status, and having full-power television stations set aside up to 2 Mbps of their 19.39 Mbps to independent and women and minority-led organizations who can use that spectrum to provide services others won’t venture into. “There are ways to increase minority participation without harming incumbents,” Kapur said.

For Skip Finley, president WYOB(FM) in Oak Bluffs, Mass., the three most important factors driving broadcast ownership for minorities are experience, availability of station inventory for sale and access to capital. To address these issues, Finley a suggested a plan that would, as an example, encourage existing licensees to provide capital to new entrants in exchange for additional station ownership in a market. A program like this would not only provide financial assistance to new entrants, but provide mitigated risk to an established broadcaster, he said.

Other groups, however, oppose the commission’s proposal to adopt an incubator program.

A program like this one “will not fulfill the commission’s obligation to promote gender and racial diversity of media ownership,” said a group led by the United Church of Christ. The group’s concern is that such a program would end up creating a substantial loophole in the FCC’s ownership rules without having any significant impact on minority and female ownership.

The group opposes the adoption of any incubator program because, the group said, the FCC is not actually attempting to promote minority and female ownership.

“No incubator program, no matter how well intended and designed, will lead to diverse media ownership,” the group said. The group also includes the Media Alliance, the National Organization for Women Foundation, the Communications Workers for America, Common Cause, the Benton Foundation, the Media Council Hawaii, Prometheus Radio Project and the Media Mobilizing Project.

Plus, due to what the group calls the FCC’s “earlier failures” to collect sufficient ownership data, it makes it impossible to tailor a program that will improve ownership diversity or properly assess the impact of such a program, the group said.

The FCC has set a deadline of April 9 for reply comments. Comments can be submitted via the FCC’s ECFS database using Media Bureau Docket 17-289.

This article originally appeared in our sister publication, Radio World. 

WASHINGTON—FCC Chairman Ajit Pai relied on an out-of-this-world quote to describe how his agency is addressing the real-world lack of diversity in the communications industry during remarks presented today at the MMTC 9th Annual Broadband and Social Justice Summit in Washington, D.C.

“To borrow from Yoda in ‘The Empire Strikes Back,’ ‘Try not. Do, or do not. There is no try.’ Much wisdom in that statement there is,” said Pai. 

Pai was referring to action the FCC took in November 2017 to advance a broadcast incubator program, something he described as “a personal priority” since 2014, he told his audience at the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council gathering. Last fall, the agency adopted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking seeking advice on how to put the program together and implement it.

“Our goal is to develop an incubator program that will help address barriers to station ownership, such as lack of access to capital and the need for technical experience—and for these solutions to increase broadcast ownership diversity,” he said.

 The NPRM asks for information on topics, such as the criteria to be eligible to benefit from the program, appropriate activities of the incubator, what benefits should be available and how the program should be reviewed, monitored and enforced, said Pai.

The FCC chairman also discussed “a repugnant practice” of certain advertisers that “exclude minority focused media outlets from their ad campaigns through a so-called ‘No Urban/No Hispanic’ dictate,” he said.

While former FCC Commissioners Jonathan Adelstein and Robert McDowell and the American Association of Advertising Agencies (4As) “led the charge” against the practice, which resulted in the 4As adopting a “non-discrimination policy frame” and a review process for media complaints in 2011, the practice appears to have “arisen again,” said Pai. The 4As again have worked to end discriminatory practices and will today announce its Fair Play policy, which asks charter media agencies “to recommit to fair and equitable treatment of minority media owners,” he said.

Pai began his address by acknowledging the role MMTC has played as “one of the most respected and thoughtful voices in our community.” He described MMTC as “a key advocate” for many FCC policies enacted over the past year. For example, MMTC supported the agency discontinuing its local broadcast main studio rule. While some opponents “called this an attack on localism,” MMTC pointed out that the rule’s staffing requirements acted as an impediment to minority broadcasters from entering markets “by putting significant financial burdens” on them, he said.

He also recognized MMTC as a long-time proponent of Class C4 FM stations, a new class of stations that could increase power of hundreds of Class A stations. On Feb. 5, the Media Bureau released an NPRM on Class C4 FM stations. Pai noted that MMTC has backed authorization because it could help small and minority-owned stations to obtain the capital they need and strengthen their market position.

Pai also told MMTC that he has reconstituted the FCC’s Diversity Committee, which has the primary mission of developing recommendations on ways to empower disadvantaged communities and accelerate the entry of small businesses, including minority- and women-owned entities, into media and digital industries.

However, the place where the missions of the agency and MMTC most closely align is in closing the digital divide, he said. “Every American who wants high-speed Internet access should be able to get it,” said Pai.

The FCC’s Broadband Deployment Advisory Committee (BDAC) weeks ago submitted findings and recommendations to the commission aimed at bridging the divide. Pai called the BDAC’s report “a valuable contribution to our efforts to promote expanded availability of wired and wireless broadband.”

Pai closed his comments by recalling the words of abolitionist and social reformer Frederick Douglass, which he said “still resonate today.” Douglass’s words “[s]ome know the value of education by having it. I know its value by not having it” are echoed in an “opportunity gap in the digital age,” said Pai.

Pai seeks to change the circumstance where those “on the wrong side of the digital divide” do not have the “full ability to educate their kids,” find high-quality health care, become entrepreneurs, engage civically in their local communities “and otherwise better their lives,” he said.