Your WBA, along with 46 other State Broadcasters Associations, recently filed Joint Reply Comments in the FCC’s proceeding reviewing equipment and operational issues identified following the first nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System.
In complementing the outstanding work of the FCC, FEMA, the NAB, NPR and many others in the area of EAS, we pointed out that the State Broadcasters Associations are the equally committed, boots-on-the-grounds representatives of the broadcast industry. Our EAS-related mission is to best ensure that the tried and true, one-to-many, communications architecture of our nation’s radio and television broadcasters continues to be relied upon as a highly efficient communications tool protecting lives and property and speeding recovery efforts after virtually any kind of natural and man-made disaster. We identified the many ways in which State Broadcasters Associations play a critical role, among other EAS-related matters (i) working with state and local emergency management authorities in drafting, updating and fine-tuning State EAS plans that the FCC requires be filed, approved and followed; (ii) educating/training state and local emergency management authorities; (iii) administering the required regular monthly EAS tests; (iv) checking EAS equipment under the State Associations’ ABIP Programs; and (v) where resources permit, assisting stations to acquire updated EAS equipment.
We cautioned the Commission, in its efforts to further improve the EAS system, not to follow a one-size-fits-all approach. Rather, given the vast number of configurations in station plants and equipment, we urged the Commission to follow a path of flexibility as relates to the presentation of text and audio.
We also stressed need for the Commission to amend its regulations to prohibit cable operators from blocking members of the public, who are their subscribers, from having immediate, continuing and full access to the emergency information provided by local television stations that are carried on their systems. During EAS activations, cable systems frequently, in effect, stand in front of TV screens, blocking their subscribers’ “view” of the “First Informer” information provided by their local television broadcast stations. Television stations not only invest millions of dollars to provide emergency information. In addition, their programming is captioned for the benefit of the hearing impaired. Thus, the cable industry’s practice of overriding television programming prejudices the very class of viewer that Congress and the FCC have specifically sought to protect. We urged the FCC to end the practice immediately.
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