Political Ad Buyers Push Back Against Broadcasters’ Political File Cost Claims
Broadcasters’ high cost estimates for putting TV stations’ political file information online (CD Dec 27 p7) are unfounded and probably overblown, said LUC Media Group, an ad agency that specializes in getting political advertisers federally mandated rates during periods leading up to an election. “Stations and cable television systems have learned over the years that if they can limit the information that candidates have about availabilities and rates, they can get candidates to overpay for airtime that they buy,” LUC said in reply comments filed in the commission’s enhanced disclosure of TV stations’ public interest obligations proceeding. “Internet access to those files will enable more candidates to become better informed about the availabilities and pricing, and thus demand that they receive the lowest unit charge for the time they buy. That is the real reason that stations are voicing objections to having to upload their political files to the Internet."
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The FCC needs to make clear what TV stations’ obligations are when it comes to what information is included in the file and placed online, LUC said. It pointed to examples where TV stations stopped reporting information about the Republican Governors Association’s ad buys in a Georgia gubernatorial contest, claiming they were issue ads rather than candidate ads. “Broadcasters frequently tout their role in keeping the public informed,” LUC said. “It is thus incongruous to see them oppose sensible efforts by the commission designed to do just that.”
But the costs of uploading political file information are real, said Fox, ABC, CBS, NBC and Univision in jointly-filed reply comments. “It would be decidedly non-trivial to the station account executives on whom the task would fall, and who are already more than fully occupied during frenetic campaign periods,” they said. “Moreover, making political file information -- including price information -- easily accessible online to advertising agencies, other television stations and cable competitors would put broadcasters at a distinct negotiating disadvantage. … The fact that having a searchable database of a station’s public file materials may be convenient to academic researchers -- or to advocacy groups eager to litigate claims that broadcasters are not serving the public interest as they perceive it -- is not sufficient to justify saddling broadcasters with the additional costs of converting documents from the form in which they exist to formats that would ideally serve the interests of such parties."
Broadcasters also opposed cable operator and public interest group arguments for requiring stations to disclose shared services agreements and other arrangements between stations. The American Cable Association and Time Warner Cable separately pointed to evidence in the record that such rules are needed. “Unless and until the Commission makes a threshold determination that such agreements are relevant to its analysis of broadcaster compliance with some rule or standard, imposing a requirement to publicly disclose these agreements would be imposing costs and burdens on broadcasters without first identifying any public interest benefit,” the NAB said. “Mandatory filing of any information for its own sake would be unlawful from an APA [Administrative Procedure Act], PRA [Paperwork Reduction Act] and RFA [Regulatory Flexibility Act] standpoint."
But without public access to those agreements, “it is exceedingly difficult for members of the public, or the Commission, to learn whether particular programming is generated by the station itself or is a product of an agreement with another entity, including a competing broadcast station,” said a coalition of public interest groups including the Benton Foundation, Free Press, the New America Foundation and Media Access Project. The coalition also urged the FCC to reject broadcasters’ calls to form a working group or pilot program ahead of implementing its enhanced disclosure rules. “There is no cause to delay these proceedings further,” it said.