Effective Date Set for New JSA Limits

[Commentary] The Federal Communications Commission’s 2014 Quadrennial Regulatory Review (2014 Quad Regulation Review) decision has now been published in the Federal Register in two separate parts -- one covering the Report and Order component and the other covering the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) component.

As a result, we now know when the new TV joint sales agreements (JSAs) rules for TV licensees will take effect – that would be June 19, 2014. We also know that comments on the various proposals in the NPRM are due by July 7, 2014 and reply comments by August 4.

While the new JSA rules require that TV JSAs old and new be submitted to the Commission (and placed in stations’ online public inspection files), that requirement will not kick in on June 19. Because that aspect of the rules constitutes an “information collection”, it must first be run past the Office of Management and Budget pursuant to the hilariously-named Paperwork Reduction Act. As a result, we don’t expect the file-with-the-FCC/place-in-the-public-file component to take effect for another four-six months or so.