MMTC: FCC Can't Keep Punting On Eligible Entity

The Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (MMTC, formerly the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council) has told a federal court that the Federal Communications Commission has failed yet again to define eligible entity, and thus failed to advance minority ownership. That came in MMTC's brief to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, which is hearing various challenges to the FCC's latest Media Ownership decision, this one under FCC chairman Tom Wheeler in 2014.

"The FCC also failed -- as it did in 2003 -- to consider a host of specific proposals to advance minority ownership, including proposals to which the FCC could have applied and tested a meaningful definition of 'eligible entity' and others that could have reduced the need for eligible entities at all," said MMTC, which itself offered up a number of proposals. MMTC said that the Third Circuit, when it remanded the FCC's rules over a decade ago, made it clear it expected the FCC to develop a workable eligible entity standard, which is a "race neutral" standard that would boost minority and female media ownership while still squaring with Supreme Court precedent on affirmative action.