WASHINGTON — Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.) said today he would introduce
legislation to bring the digital television (DTV) transition to an
expeditious end in order to clear broadcasters’ beachfront analog spectrum
to usher in advanced wireless services.
Under current law, broadcasters are required to vacate their analog spectrum
by Dec. 31, 2006, or when 85 percent of the homes in their market are
capable of receiving DTV signals from all broadcasters in that market.
The 85 percent rule has caused many in Congress to question whether the DTV
transition can be met even this decade and the vacated spectrum auctioned
off for wireless broadband and other services. Broadcast spectrum is
considered especially prime because it allows for the penetration of walls
and other obstacles over large distances.
“We could address this problem by eliminating the 85 percent penetration
requirement and setting a Dec. 31, 2006, hard deadline for television
broadcasters to cease analog broadcasts,” Barton said.
A hard deadline, however, creates enormous problems for Washington: if the
2006 deadline is met, the 21 million Americans (approximately 20 percent)
who receive only over-the-air-broadcasts will have their sets go dark on
Jan. 1, 2007, unless they purchase sets with DTV tuners or subscribe to
cable or satellite television services.
“These households represent some of the most economically challenged
residents in our nation. Many are in less financially fortunate rural
areas,” Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Vir.) said. “I dont think any of us would
expect these individuals to bear the burden of the transition that would
turn their television sets into scrap metal.”
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which is overseeing the DTV
transition, voted last year to require all television sets 13 inches and
larger to have DTV tuners installed by July 2007. The ruling also requires
all television interface devices, such as DVD players, also ship with
onboard DTV tuners by mid-2007.
“We are contemplating, in our hard-date legislation, the creation of some
type of digital-to-analog converter program to assist exclusively
over-the-air television households in getting those converter boxes,” said
Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), the chairman of the House Subcommittee on
Telecommunications and the Internet.
Both Barton and Upton said the cost of the converter box subsidy program
could be covered by the proceeds of auctioning off broadcasters’ analog
spectrum.
“Clearing the spectrum on an accelerated and nationwide basis with hard-date
legislation will raise the money necessary to fund the converter-box
program,” Barton said. “Without such legislation, the spectrum would remain
encumbered for many years and yield far less at auction.”
Boucher urged his colleagues not to “rush to judgment” over the converter
box subsidy plan.
“The math that underlies this suggestion is questionable at best,” Boucher
said. “A $100 converter box supplied for 73 million television sets would
cost $7.3 billion. The low end estimate of the revenue the government would
receive upon the auction [of the returned spectrum] is approximately $4
billion.”
A report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) submitted to the
House panel Thursday estimates the cost of a possible converter box subsidy
program from as little as $460 million to as much as $10.6 billion.
The GAO report uses two scenarios for its estimates. In the first, the GAO
assumes converter boxes will be needed for only over-the-air households and
estimates the subsidy cost between $460 million and $2 billion.
In the second GAO scenario, the agency assumed that cable and satellite
operators would be required to provide broadcasters’ digital signals in
“substantially the same format as broadcasters transmitted those signals.”
In that case, cable and satellite subscribers would also need some sort of
converter box in place to receive high-definition signals. The GAO estimated
the cost of that subsidy program to be $1.8 billion to $10.6 billion.
Last year, the Bush administration said it opposed subsidizing converter
boxes for Americans who can’t afford the DTV sets. Instead, Bush supports an
annual analog spectrum tax on broadcasters who fail to vacate their current
spectrum.
