The FCC has moved its March meeting from the 19th to the 31st.
While that is the meeting widely believed to include the media ownership quadrennial review item, an FCC source on background said the move was related to work on two spectrum items—the 5GHz item and rules for the upcoming AWS-3 spectrum auction and the need to coordinate those with other federal agencies.
That is one of three auctions the FCC is holding under congressional directive and timetable.
The FCC could have moved those spectrum items to the April meeting, but the source cited the statutory deadline for the AWS auction—February 2015—as a reason not to delay it any more than necessary.
The FCC will need to auction the AWS-3 spectrum by fall of this year, and the source said the commission generally likes to have six months between issuing rules and holding an auction.
The move could also delay the circulation of the media ownership item, which by custom was expected to be circulated to the commissioners Wednesday (Feb. 27), 21 days days before the March 19 meeting.
