FCC Proposes Cable, Satellite, Radio Database Extension

In response to a petition filed by campaign finance reform groups seeking to extended online filing requirements to cable, satellite and radio, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler circulated a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to that effect for a vote by the other commissioners.

TV broadcasters already have to file records of political ad buys to a searchable, FCC-hosted database (the FCC says it has had millions of hits on that database), but the FCC held off extending that requirement, and other public file requirements -- like equal employment opportunity, children's TV and more -- to cable and satellite operators, which are all still required to keep those files available for public inspection locally. A timetable has not been proposed for that phase-in, but the idea would be to have the larger entities go first, followed by smaller ones, and perhaps have some cut-off below which the requirement was waived.