A Regional Repack Is Reasonable Way To Go

How much time TV broadcasters should have to move to new channels during the repacking of the TV band that will follow the incentive auction has turned into a schoolyard spat — sort of like the ones we have come to expect from Republican presidential candidates.

The FCC instigated it by declaring, rather arbitrarily, that broadcasters would have just 39 months to move after they get their new channel assignments this fall. If you can’t do it, too bad. The new tenant is moving in.

No way, screamed the NAB. To make its point, the NAB hired Digital Tech Consulting to take a look at look at the availability of resources needed to make the move — RF consulting engineers, tower companies, structural engineers, high tower crews, antennas, transmitters and other RF gear.

Given the limits on those resources, DTC concludes in its study, it would take longer — much, much longer, eight to 11 years — to complete the repack, depending on the number of stations sold in the auction and how many would have to be moved.

Nonsense, cried T-Mobile, among the carriers that intend to bid for TV spectrum and that want to take possession of it as soon as possible. It cited a study of its own and, to the surprise of no one, it says the FCC is dead right, there are plenty of resources to do the job in 39 months.

Liar, liar, pants on fire, hollered the NAB. DTC dissected the T-Mobile study and found it seriously lacking. DTC stands by its original findings, it said. The repack will take years, not months. What’s a wireless carrier know about broadcasting anyway?

The NAB is so upset by the bullying of the FCC and the wireless carriers that it has run to Capitol Hill in search of help.

Stop.

Like the Republican presidential campaigning, the squabbling is amusing, but not productive and not particularly dignified.

We can solve this like adults.

First of all, we have to set aside the simple 39-month transition. It is based on a national repacking free-for-all in which every broadcaster would compete for those limited resources. Of course, the biggest broadcasters would use their financial muscle to push their ways to the head of the lines.

So, after 39 months, we could easily end up with scores of markets where one or two stations have built new facilities for their new channels and one or two have not. Such markets could not be cleared for wireless use.

The FCC could, nonetheless, force stations that miss the deadline off the air. But broadcasters still have enough friends on Capitol Hill and among their viewing public to insure that doesn’t happen. In fact, all five commissioners pledged last fall at a congressional hearing that that they wouldn’t cause any station to go dark.

The solution is clear. What’s needed is not one deadline, but a series of deadlines as part of a plan in which stations migrate to their new RF digs region by region and, perhaps, market by market within each region.

As I reported here last November, the phase-in idea has been kicking around for awhile. I believe it originated with the NAB. In any case, it found its way into an FCC repack ruling last spring as one option. “This tailored approach will ensure that stations have the time they need to complete construction while making spectrum available for new uses as rapidly as possible,” the agency said.

I am happy to report today that the idea is gaining some momentum.

In a March 14 letter to the FCC, AT&T, one of the wireless Big Two, urged the agency to develop, adopt and manage a “regionalized, phased approach … to expedite the clearing of spectrum in a rational and strategic fashion.”

Making it happen will require “strong, centralized FCC leadership,” it observed.

This week, the NAB seconded the AT&T recommendation in its own letter to the FCC. The regional approach would minimize disruption of service to broadcasters and viewers and get the spectrum in the hands of the wireless buyers “as quickly as possible,” it said.

Like AT&T, the NAB said it is up to the FCC not only to fashion the regional approach by balancing the interests of all parties, but also to settle the inevitable disputes that will arise during the transition.

At a House hearing Tuesday, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler told Illinois Democrat Dave Loebsack the agency is putting together a team to address repacking in a serious way. “One of the proposals on the table right now is some kind of regional repacking plan.”

No decision has been made, but it does have its merits, he said. “Clearly, it doesn’t make sense to have the limited assets of folks who erect antennas racing hither and yon to be able to do things. We have to be able to manage that appropriately.”

Let’s hope Wheeler understands the urgency. The reverse auction should begin in early May and the forward auction immediately after that. If all goes well, the FCC might be ready to hand out the new channel assignments in the fall. And that would start the clock on the current 39-month deadline.

If the FCC is going to avoid the hither-and-yon scenario it should have at least a solid framework on a regionalization plan in place by the time of the channels assignments and a final plan shortly thereafter.

We don’t yet have a consensus on the regional approach. I’m sure some spectrum buyers will object, demanding that broadcasters vacate the property within 39 months regardless of whether their new facilities are ready.

But they will come around, I think, when they realize the true nature of the task, the limits of the resources and depth of goodwill broadcasters have in Congress and among the public.

Meanwhile, broadcasters will have accept that they will still have to meet deadlines. Nobody likes them, but as everybody knows they are necessary. And they are tolerable, too, if they are created without prejudice and based on sound facts.

Facts are surprisingly hard to come by, of course. But between the T-Mobile and NAB/DTC studies, I think we are closing in on them.

And once they are established, the FCC and the stakeholders should be able to develop a solid regionalized transition plan with workable deadlines, some that may be shorter than 39 months and others that may be considerably longer.

On the whole, it will represent the most efficient means of making the spectrum available to the wireless buyers as quickly as possible with a minimum of disruption to broadcasters and their viewers.

I still believe reasonable men and women can sit down and come up with a plan that works for all. Even in Washington.

Harry A. Jessell is editor of TVNewsCheck. He can be contacted at 973-701-1067 or [email protected]. You can read earlier columns here.