A Thursday status conference on the license of a broadcaster convicted of attempting to have a woman raped (see 2112100056) was canceled after Roger Wahl, licensee of WQZS(FM) Meyersdale, Pennsylvania, said he couldn’t attend due to a medical procedure. Wahl said in a Monday filing that he was to have major surgery Wednesday and then would be in medical facilities recovering and undergoing physical therapy. He didn't comment. “Dates and deadlines established throughout this proceeding are not suggestions,” wrote FCC Administrative Law Judge Jane Halprin in an order posted Wednesday. Wahl received notice over a month before and didn’t submit anything saying he couldn’t attend before this week, and didn’t initially respond to attempts to contact him, Halprin said. “He has wasted the time of the Presiding Judge and her staff, the Enforcement Bureau, and the court reporting service that was engaged to prepare a transcript of the conference.” Parties that ignore court deadlines are “in significant danger of being held in default,” Halprin said: “A decision regarding the ongoing consideration of this hearing proceeding will be issued" later.

The FCC Media Bureau granted a request from One Ministries to be allotted Channel *4 for Fort Bragg, California, as the community’s first local noncommercial educational TV station, said a Tuesday order in docket 21-123. Channels designated with an asterisk are reserved for NCE stations. The bureau also granted a request by Gray Television to swap KNOE-TV Monroe, Louisiana, from Channel 8 to 24, an order said in docket 21-126. MB seeks comment 30 days after Federal Register publication, replies in another 15 days in docket 22-13 on a request from WNYT-TV for WNYT Albany, New York, which would go to 21 from 12.

The FCC Media Bureau will stop accepting filings in the consolidated database system (CDBS) after 5 p.m. EST Wednesday, said a public notice. “This action is necessary due to pressing technical issues that prevent the effective use of CDBS going forward.” Tuesday's PN said the move “is intended to facilitate the ongoing transition of all filings to the Licensing and Management System (LMS) database.” Technical issues make filing in CDBS no longer feasible, said an FCC spokesperson. "We are focused on making this change as easy as possible on users. We are proactively reaching out to stakeholders, and encourage anyone in need of assistance to contact Media Bureau staff.” The Media Bureau “anticipates this will be a permanent sunset of the use of CDBS for Media Bureau filings,” and most MB applications and submissions have already transitioned from CDBS to LMS, the PN said. The shift, which has been progressing gradually for several years, was first announced in 2014. Then, it was planned to be completed by 2016. “The public will continue to have access to CDBS for public searches and CDBS data files,” the PN said. After the CDBS sunsets Wednesday, “all Media Bureau filings that cannot be submitted using LMS must be submitted by email to audiofilings@fcc.gov,” the PN said. Several of the filings that will now require email submissions will transition to LMS in “the near future,” it said. “A future public notice will provide additional information about that continued transition of Media Bureau filings to LMS.”

The FCC Media Bureau wants to refresh the record on requiring electronics manufacturers and MVPDs to make closed caption display settings “readily accessible,” said a public notice Monday on docket 12-108. A 2015 further NPRM sought comment but didn’t lead to action. The call for a refreshed record is a response to comments in other accessibility dockets suggesting “issues persist” and on “the discoverability and ease of use challenges” at a recent FCC forum (see 2112020075), the PN said. It's seeking comment on requiring the settings controlling how captions are displayed to be easy to access, and the extent of authority to do so under the 1990 Television Decoder Circuitry Act. The PN asks which entities should be responsible for compliance and whether “both manufacturers and MVPDs should be obligated to facilitate the ability of consumers to locate and control closed captioning display settings?” Comments are due 30 days after Federal Register publication, replies in 15 more days.

New NAB President Curtis LeGeyt took aim at tech companies in his first blog post from the top seat. “With their dominance of the online advertising marketplace and opaque use of algorithms, Big Tech giants are threatening Americans’ access to quality local journalism,” he wrote Thursday. LeGeyt said broadcasters need “a level playing field” to compete for ad dollars with tech companies and to be compensated when broadcast content is accessed through online platforms. Congress and the FCC should enact policies to preserve broadcasting as a source of more reliable journalism than “the misinformation running rampant on social media,” LeGeyt said.

The full FCC denied Schwab Multimedia's appeal of a Media Bureau decision to deny Schwab a construction permit extension for KWIF(AM) Culver City, California, said an order in Thursday’s Daily Digest. Schwab argued construction was impeded by COVID-19 and more extensions should have been granted, but the FCC said in the order that Schwab didn’t build out the station because it lost permission to build on the site. “Accordingly, we reject Schwab’s allegation that the Bureau erred in not granting tolling based on other causes, such as COVID,” the order said. Schwab’s construction permit deadline was originally November 2019, but the company was granted several extensions, including one in March 2020 based on Schwab’s contention that COVID-19 shelter-in-place orders made it impossible to continue work. In September, the bureau denied an additional extension and found “no evidence of a causal connection between Schwab’s claimed continued COVID-related impediments and its failure to construct.” In October, Schwab told the bureau it had lost the landlord’s permission to construct on the site. Schwab also didn’t provide sufficient evidence that COVID restrictions prevented construction, and late-filed evidence that construction was occurring, the order said. “Permittees that seek additional construction time following a disaster must establish a material nexus between the disaster and failure to construct,” the order said.

The Radio Music License Committee (RMLC) and Global Music Rights (GMR) reached an agreement that could end long-running RMLC-GMR lawsuits over rights compensation, the entities said in a joint letter Wednesday: “The parties have reached this conditional settlement after more than five years of dueling litigations and great cost to both sides, in terms of both time and money.” The settlement requires GMR to offer commercial radio stations a “negotiated, long term license agreement” that begins April 1. The settlement will be finalized only if a sufficient number of radio stations agree by Jan. 31 to opt in, the letter said. If the settlement is successful, “it will ... give radio stations the opportunity to perform GMR works for several years with rate certainty,” the letter said. If not enough radio stations agree, “litigation will continue.” GMR “has not made any commitment to offer any other license to radio stations after the current interim license expires on March 31, 2022,” the letter said. Wilkinson Barker broadcast attorney David Oxenford told us he couldn’t comment on the specifics of the settlement or say whether broadcasters should opt in, but that rate certainty would be a positive development for most broadcasters. One potential hiccup for broadcasters is that there’s no indication the settlement would provide future oversight for GMR similar to the covenants for other music rights organizations, he said.

There were 33,467 broadcast stations in the U.S. Dec. 31, the FCC said in a quarterly count released Tuesday. That’s down nearly 100 from the 33,564 listed in the December 2020 count, apparently mostly from the ranks of radio stations. The 2021 listing shows 1,758 full-power TV stations -- unchanged from December 2020 -- and 15,389 full-power radio stations, 56 fewer than the previous year. Low-power FMs also decreased from 2,136 in 2020 to 2,069 in 2021. Low-power TV stations and Class A's went down as well, from 2,399 to 2,310. The number of translator stations increased year over year, from 11,826 to 11,941.

There's “no basis” for suspending the FCC’s “targeted, straightforward” foreign sponsorship disclosure rules, the agency told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Monday in docket 21-1171 in response to a stay request from the National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters and the Multimedia, Telecom and Internet Council (see 2112220048). The rule is “narrowly tailored,” doesn’t cause harm to broadcasters and imposes only “a limited duty to name check two government websites” to determine if a lessor is a foreign-sponsored entity, the agency said. The FCC countered broadcaster arguments that the rule solves a nonexistent problem. “An agency need not suffer the flood before building the levee,” the FCC said. Since the rule is intended to address undisclosed governmental sponsorship, the few previous incidents may be “the tip of the iceberg,” the agency said. The FCC also dismissed broadcaster claims that the rule violates the First Amendment. The rule is within the agency’s authority because it's content neutral and “is a reasonable condition on the privilege of broadcasting over the nation’s limited airwaves,” the agency said.

New NAB President Curtis LeGeyt took the group's reins Monday, said a news release that day (see 2111100073). Former President Gordon Smith has “transitioned to an advisory and advocacy role,” it said. Under LeGeyt, current Executive Vice President-Public Affairs Michelle Lehman will also be his chief of staff while retaining her current role, and Lesley Pena, formerly executive assistant to LeGeyt, will be deputy chief of staff. Both are newly created positions. "Chief legal officer" has also been added to the title of Rick Kaplan, who remains executive vice president-legal and regulatory affairs.