Mike Gravino, managing director of the Next Gen TV Coalition and executive director of the LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition, has died, according to the Advanced Television Broadcast Alliance and various reports. Gravino had retired last week to enter a D.C. hospice to deal with pancreatic cancer, former D.C. lobbyist and broadcast executive Preston Padden had tweeted May 29.
A coalition of LPTV broadcasters says that buyers of LPTV stations who turn over the spectrum to the FCC for unlicensed use be granted tax credits in the same amount or twice the amount as the stations’ purchase prices. The credits could be used to reduce ordinary taxes or those of businesses that use unlicensed spectrum.
The LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition says the commission needs to generate more data on how the upcoming spectrum auction and band repacking will affect low-power TV stations before moving forward.
