TV Station Affiliates Turn Up the Heat on FCC over Big Four Bargaining Practices
FCC asked to intervene by station owners to save their industry from 'break glass' pressures noted by FCC Chairman Brendan Carr. Big four networks warn agency not to disrupt the status quo
FCC: Over the next year, the regulatory structure of the broadcast TV market could change dramatically, taken in a whole new direction by FCC Chairman Brendan Carr. At issue are the business terms and conditions governing the commercial relationships between the Big Four networks (ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox) on one side and their hundreds of local TV station affiliates owned by Nexstar Media Group, Sinclair, TEGNA, and Gray Media on the other. If there were ever an industry omerta requiring silence, the tradition is no longer being honored.
“What was once a symbiotic relationship between the Big Four Networks and their Affiliates has shifted to a destructive arrangement in which the Networks extract a toll on local stations’ ability to serve the interests of their local communities,” said about 700 Big Four affiliates in a Dec. 10 filing with the FCC. Counsel for the CBS and Fox affiliates is former Republican FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell.
The Big Four, at the end of the regulatory process, could see their bargaining leverage over the affiliates taken down more than just a notch or two as a result of aggressive FCC mandates that might include a cap on affiliate fees paid to the Big Four and a requirement of good-faith bargaining on both sides – which could rule out a current network practice of providing their national programming to streamers shorn of local station content. (Rest of the story available to Breakfast Club Plus and Premium Members. More items below paywall.)
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