At least two broadcasters, CBS and National Public Radio, want th...

merger, the commission should guarantee a fast rulemaking, the broadcasters said. Apparently both have given up hope of the commission writing an HD Radio mandate into a merger approval order. The NAB also wants the commission “to condition any approval of the merger so that consumers would have access to radio equipment that would allow them to switch between digital satellite offerings and terrestrial digital offerings,” its ex parte said. The CBS proposal, both more sweeping and more specific, urges that the commission begin a rulemaking within 30 days after approving the merger and finish it within 180 days. CBS wants the FCC to require HD Radio in terrestrial as well as in satellite receivers “at some future date,” it said. NPR wants HD Radio required only in satellite receivers, it said. NPR sees “this proposal as an essential means of assuring the broad availability of local HD services to the public,” its filing said. The FCC considered but didn’t impose a digital radio hard cutoff date in a May 2007 order. “Several reasons support this decision,” the commission said then. They included the fact that, unlike TV licensees, radio stations “are under no statutory mandate to convert to a digital format” and because the “spectrum reclamation needs that exist for DTV do not exist here.” It was not clear at our deadline Friday whether the commission would agree to propose a rulemaking or a less binding notice of inquiry on an HD Radio requirement.