FCC’s Pai: JSA Overhaul Plan Still In Play

The controversial FCC proposal to break up joint sales agreements is alive and well at the agency despite the recent FCC announcement that it was putting the media ownership review on hold to permit study of the impact of the review on minority ownership.

“It [the JSA proposal] is very much on the table” said Commissioner Ajit Pai in a hallway interview with TVNewsCheck during a break in the action at the NAB State Leadership conference in Washington today.

Pai said his hope is that the JSA proposal is axed. “That would work tremendous hardship on broadcasters, especially smaller areas. We are talking about stations in the 100 or 200 biggest markets, which have a miniscule portion of the revenue of, say. a New York City station. A JSA or SSA can mean the difference between consolidating operations and saving costs” and going out of business.

In an announcement last week, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said the decision to put the ownership review on temporary hold was to give the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council time to complete a study on the proposed rule changes’ effects on minority ownership and newsgathering.

At the time Genachowski did not specifically mention the JSA proposal that would require JSAs to be unwound within two years or the stations counted as jointly owned.The JSAs allow broadcasters to operate two stations in markets where outright ownership of the two stations would be prohibited under current FCC rules.

FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel, a Democrat, declined comment on the JSA proposal.

Also during the public session, Pai said he agreed with the NAB that it would be preferable to postpone the incentive auction, at least temporarily, if necessarily to make sure it was conducted properly:. “Whether it’s your car … or an incentive auction, you’d rather get it done right than right now.”

As it stands, the FCC is hoping to hold the auction in 2014. In followup comments, Pai said he was hopeful the commission could still do that, but “if the option is between getting it done sooner and getting it done right, I’ll choose getting it done right.”