Is the FCC Serving the Public Interest?

On Tuesday, December 18th, The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will vote to abrogate the measure known as the 'crossover-ownership rule'. This FCC directive, essentially prohibits publishing media companies from acquiring radio or television stations within their regional newspaper markets.

The revocation of this rule will in essence ease media-ownership restrictions and conceivably allow big conglomerate media giants to begin amassing and sequestering additional local media radio and television outlets.

Why is the public not informed about this? Ostensibly, the FCC is in a rush to serve the private interest over the welfare of the public.

The current FCC directorate is comprised of 5 commissioners, 3 Republicans and 2 Democrats, appointed by the President. The current Chair, Kevin Martin, a Republican, has made it clear over the past 2 months to the public, as well as to the U.S. Congress and Senate members, that his intent is to invalidate this directive.

In an attempt to raise this issue to a public forum, this past Friday, December 14th, a Senate Commerce Committee convened in Capitol Hill to have Martin render a public explanation. Lawmakers warned Martin about the consequences of rushing this resolve and requested he delay the FCC vote until adequate research is done with respect to the consequences of such ruling. Martin was recalcitrant to this request.

According to the U.S. Census bureau, approximately 1/3 (33%) of the United States population (100.7 million Americans) is comprised of ethnic and racial minorities. Yet the percent of minority or female owners of television stations, does not even account for one-tenth of this percentage. Why such discrepancy?