Religious Broadcasters Praise FCC Commissioners' Opposition to Pay-Per-Channel Campaign; FCC's 'A La Carte' Model Would Devastate Religious Broadcasting

Religious Broadcasters Praise FCC Commissioners' Opposition to Pay-Per-Channel Campaign; FCC's 'A La Carte' Model Would Devastate Religious Broadcasting

WASHINGTON, Nov. 28 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Faith and Family Broadcasting Coalition, a coalition of the nation's leading religious television broadcasters, today praised FCC Commissioners McDowell, Tate, and Adelstein for opposing a regulatory campaign designed to force cable companies to radically alter their long-established business model and offer programming on a pay-per-channel, or "a la carte" basis.

Commissioners Robert M. McDowell, Deborah Taylor Tate, and Jonathan S. Adelstein wisely and properly opposed efforts to use the FCC's extraordinary regulatory powers under the "70/70" threshold of a 1984 cable statute meant to prevent cable from gaining too much market power. The rule only kicks in when cable systems with 36 or more channels are available to 70% of U.S. households and achieve a 70% penetration rate of those households. The FCC simply did not have sufficient evidence to support a finding that the 70/70 threshold had been reached. Such a finding would have given the FCC the power to further regulate cable and force the a la carte business model. Such a forced change would have had a devastating effect on religious broadcasters.

Given the nature of today's subscription video marketplace, which includes Direct Broadcast Satellite, Verizon Communications' FiOS TV and AT&T's U-verse TV systems, and the entry of new fiber-optic Internet-based offerings and program streaming, relying on a 20-year-old program-diversity and rate regulation statute was as inappropriate as it was unnecessary.

"A per-channel charge would dramatically limit, if not kill, the availability of religious-based programming on cable" according to Colby M. May, Director and Senior Counsel of the ACLJ's Washington, DC office. ACLJ filed official comments to the Federal Communications Commission opposing a la carte regulations when they were first proposed in 2005. "For 25 years the bundled-channel model of cable distribution has allowed religious programmers to be a dynamic and important part of the cable marketplace, providing the unique Gospel message of hope, joy, and love, which has touched millions of lives over that time. A government mandate to force abandonment of channel-bundling and substituting-in an a la carte regime was misguided and threatened that historic distribution," May said.

To schedule an interview with Colby May, contact Audrey Mullen at
703-548-1160
First Call Analyst:
FCMN Contact:

Source: Faith and Family Broadcasting Coalition

CONTACT: Audrey Mullen, +1-703-548-1160, for Faith and Family
Broadcasting Coalition

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