FCC Creates New Captioning Exemption?

FCC CREATES NEW CAPTIONING EXEMPTION?
[SOURCE: Benton Foundation]
On Tuesday, the FCC released a decision by Monica Desai, Chief of the FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau, granting two separate petitions for exemption from the closed captioning requirements for video programming, filed by two video programming owners -- Anglers for Christ Ministries, Inc. (Anglers) and New Beginning Ministries (New Beginning) -- because A) both of the organizations here are non-profit and B) the mandated closed captioning would cause "significant difficulties for these entities." Chief Desai writes, "For these reasons, we note that, in the future, when considering an exemption petition filed by a non-profit organization that does not receive compensation from video programming distributors from the airing of its programming, and that, in the absence of an exemption, may terminate or substantially curtail its programming, or curtail other activities important to its mission, we will be inclined favorably to grant such a petition because, as the petitions of Anglers and New Beginning demonstrate, this confluence of factors strongly suggests that mandated closed captioning would pose an undue burden on such a petitioner." An additional exemption criteria seems to have been added by the FCC in this order -- that not only is an exemption allowed if it poses an undue burden or if it would mean that a program might not be able to be produced, but added a new provision that has never been argued or addressed in any public forum - that if the caption mandate may force an organization to "curtail other activities important to its mission," it will be granted a PERMANENT AND PRE-EMPTIVE exemption from the captioning rules. This could as easily be interpreted to apply to public television stations as religious broadcasters. Also a major issue is the fact that more than 500 letters of exemption from the captioning rules have been sent out to religious broadcasters this week - and those letters will not be available for review on the web, but instead will have to be reviewed at the FCC's document room in person. This is all somewhat ironic given that Chairman Martin, during his renomination hearing on Tuesday, told the Senate: "Accessing communication services is vital to the ability of the individuals with disabilities to participate fully in society. With the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, the Commission was directed to ensure that hearing or speech disabilities not pose a barrier to participating in today's communication revolution."
* See Petitions for Exemption from Closed Captioning Requirements (CGB-CC-0005 & 0007)
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DA-06-1802A1.doc