DTV Cliff Effect Assistance Act Introduced In Senate

Sens Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) have introduced the DTV Cliff Effect Assistance Act, a bill that would allocate $125 million to help pay for digital repeaters or translator towers to fill in areas where a weak signal means no signal at all (the cliff effect). The money would be available through 2012 from a newly created Digital Television Transition and Public Safety Fund. The bill would also require that those translators serve double duty to help out with the rollout of broadband service, saying that the equipment "shall reasonably facilitate the collocation of any wireless communications or broadband equipment," with the stipulation that the requirement would not apply if there is "clear evidence" that co-location would create interference issues.