No Special Waivers for New Tribune Owner
Members of the StopBigMedia.com Coalition say that the recent the sale of the Tribune Co. to real estate mogul Sam Zell should not be not be approved without an agreement to follow existing media ownership rules.
Current FCC rules prohibit cross-ownership of a radio or television station and newspaper in the same market — the new Tribune owner would have to sell off the cross-owned stations or newspapers. The present Tribune owners were able to bypass the media ownership rules through special backroom deals with the FCC.
When the cross-ownership ban was passed in 1975, the FCC “grandfathered” the Tribune’s ownership of the Chicago Tribune and WGN-TV and WGN radio in Chicago. In 2000, the FCC granted a special temporary waiver that allowed the Tribune to own both a major daily newspaper and a TV station in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Hartford, Conn., Los Angeles and New York.
But the temporary waiver is set to expire soon — and the grandfather protections don’t apply to any new Tribune Co. owners.
“Tribune is betting that it can get the FCC to bend its rules,” said Andrew Jay Schwartzman, president of Media Access Project. “It was wrong the first time, and now there is an even higher obstacle to obtaining regulatory relief. The fact that there are willing buyers like Eli Broad and Ron Burkle who would break up the newspaper/TV combinations makes it especially hard to justify a special FCC waiver.”
In June 2006, FCC Chairman Kevin Martin initiated a review of the ownership rules — with the clear intention of allowing Big Media to swallow up more local outlets.
At all three official media ownership hearings, the overwhelming majority of people have testified in opposition to lifting the cross-ownership ban or relaxing any of the existing media ownership rules. And the fourth hearing in Tampa on April 30 promises to be more of the same.
Allowing Tribune to continue its cross-ownership under Zell would not only violate federal rules, it would fly in the face of the millions who have demanded less consolidation and more independent, local and diverse media.
Josh Silver, executive director of Free Press says:
“The new Tribune Co. needs to follow the rules. Bigger isn’t always better, and cross-owning conglomerates like Tribune have been a disaster for the localism, diversity and competition the FCC is supposed to protect. The media giants have been manipulating the system for too long. It’s time to end the backroom deals and stop special waivers.”
Update: In a recent Chicago Tribune article, Zell is quoted as saying that he “does not expect FCC regulations prohibiting cross-ownership of newspapers and broadcasting stations in the same communities to pose an obstacle because he expects those rules to disappear.”
Strict limits on media ownership made sense in an era when a major media market would have three broadcast television stations, maybe two major newspapers, and a handful of broadcast radio stations. Now nearly every media market has all of these, plus cable and satellite television, satellite radio, numerous weekly and daily newspapers, and the countless online options offered by the Internet. Without a relaxation of the current ownership rules, many of the smaller, independent broadcasters will find themselves unable to compete with the ever-expanding media outlets for the advertising dollars on which they rely. And in the spirit of full disclosure, I do some consulting work with the NAB.
April 4th, 2007 at 5:31 pm