Markey: Feb. 17 DTV Date May Have To Move
Obama FCC transition team also floating idea, sources say
By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 1/7/2009 2:59:00 PM
Update: Obama Asks Congress to Delay DTV Transition
Related: The DTV Countdown: Complete Coverage of the DTV Transition
The DTV hard date appears to be softening.
Consumers Union (CU) late Wednesday asked the heads of the congressional committees with telecommunications oversight, as well as the current and future administrations, to consider delaying the Feb. 17, 2009 transition date.
And at least one of those key Congressional players, Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), chairman of the House Telecommunications & Internet Subcommittee, says the date may have to move.
In a letter to Rep. Markey, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), the incoming chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committe, and others, the CU requested that Congress consider a delay "until a plan is in place to minimize the number of consumers who will lose TV signals, particularly by fixing the flaws in the federal coupon program created to offset the cost of this transition."
The National Telecommunications & Information Administration this week announced that it had hit the funding ceiling for its program to distribute government subsidies for DTV-to-analog converter boxes and that new applications would have to be put on a waiting list unless the cap were raised or the Antideficiency Act (ADA) rule preventing it from spending money it expected to be freed up by expired coupons was waived.
“Congressman Markey is working on an exemption to the ADA to deal with the immediate waiting list issue," said Daniel Reilly, a spokesman for Markey. "But with the date looming, moving the date back certainly warrants further discussion and may be a wise choice.”
According to several sources, the Obama FCC transition team has been "very busy" on the issue and has been floating the possibility of moving the date. The transition press office had not returned an e-mail request for comment at press time.
Joel Kelsey, a policy analyst for Consumers Union and one of the two signatories on the letter, said CU had met with the transition team about the issue, and that they are "rightly concerned that this is a mess that they are now going to have to clean up in a very short time frame."
He would not comment on whether they favored moving the date beyond only saying that the transition team has been "extremely active on the DTV transition issue." He said the Obama transition team had not asked Consumers Union to send the letter.
Consumers Union has suggested the move could be in the neighborhood four months or so, though it has not offered a timetable. That is according to a CNBC interview with CU senior counsel Chris Murray, the other signature on the CU letter. Murray told CNBC that he thought there was a "reasonably good chance" that Congress would push the date back four months or so. "We're not ready to say there will be a delay yet," he said. "We believe that Congress should consider a delay [but] I don't think I can talk about this as something that is readily going to happen," he said.
Perhaps, but the Washington lobbying community was buzzing Wednesday with talk that it was a real possibility.
In an e-mail alert from communications law firm Wilkinson Barker Knauer obtained by B&C, the Murray CNBC intervew was cited prominently, with lawyers there saying they were hearing that "serious consideration" was being given to moving the date to June 1 (Memorial Day weekend) and suggesting more trial balloons would be floated in the coming days.
According to the lobbyist, the new administration is not looking forward to inheriting a transition with major issues about viewers not receiving their subsidies in time. That would include target populations like senior citizens, minorities and the disabled.
It would be tough to make the move at this late date. The broadcasting and cable industries and the government have spent hundreds of millions of dollars in cash and donated airtime on hammering home that Feb. 17 date, putting it on Web sites, billboards, and even a race car. Some broadcasters have already made the switch early (Wilmington, N.C.), or are about to (Hawaii on Jan. 15), and some of the spectrum has already been auctioned for advanced services.
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After seeing those number's from Neilson, the transition will get it's delay. I believe one or two years, like 2011. United State Senate will adopt a bill to delay the transition. I do admit one thing, broadcasters have good hi definition stations, Dish Network is not ready yet.
Thomas Ingram - 1/15/2009 9:41:00 PM EST -
Would you like to know what is the real problem with this whole Digital Transition?
It's the BLOGOSPHERE!
The ability of people (many of them post on these boards), to post the same old nonsense over and over, giving the public NO useful information at all, just telling them their own experiences as if they were EVERYONE's experiences.
True, many people don't know how to get a DTV signal. That does not mean that DTV is unworkable. True, not enough information has been given to the avaerage person. That doesn't mean they can't get help.
If anything, there is far too much "information" out there. All it does is confuse people.
God help us all, when the internet and the bloggers (most of whom have no idea what they are talking about)get involved!
Ken English - 1/10/2009 4:47:00 PM EST -
Just eliminate the lengthy one month wait to get a coupon and keep the transition on schedule.
We all have waited long enough.
Make coupons available online or as soon as applied for.
George Kowal CBNT - 1/8/2009 8:05:00 PM EST -
To delay the DTV transition mandate is very believable considering the mess that congress and the administration has generated; and yet a simultaneous example of an unbelievable lapse in wisdom. Most of the “Great Unwashed†will simply put off--for a period equal to the proposed delay--those necessary personal steps required to make an in-house DTV transition. Perhaps funds should be transferred from the forthcoming Obama stimulus package to buy free converters from an American firm…that is if one existed. Think of it! A domestic job creation program, a new “Buy American†emphasis, and all while rejuvenating a domestic electronics industry we let slip through our hands decades ago. And to heck with those dumb little red coupons… just send everyone another government check. Then the responsible people could join hands and hope that recipients spend it on DTV Converters...rather than Coors. That free federal money worked so well last time. Now that is government at its finest!
DJ Paul - 1/8/2009 7:42:00 PM EST -
Suck it! B!tches!!!! All you fu@king losers, GET OVER
IT DTV is here! Just re-institute the coupons now...
People who don't have coupons by now will sure and sh!t
apply when the "clicker" doesn't work anymore. We have
put this off for too long, just like we put off HD
(which isn't the same thing), the metric system, the
whole 4ucking future! All of that s#it is still coming,
guys, and there's nothing you 4ucking losers can do to
stop it... you are only prolonging our wait for better
wireless services. DO IT NOW.
Doit Now - 1/8/2009 6:35:00 PM EST
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