The National Association of Broadcasters is firing back at
claims by the American Cable Association that broadcasters collectively
negotiating retrans in a market is consumer unfriendly.
While the FCC's two-year-old retrans proposals are unlikely
to be acted on anytime soon, the commission has raised the issue of joint
station agreements -- which often include joint retrans negotiations -- in
other proceedings, including its media ownership and program access
rulemakings.
ACA has long argued that the joint agreements are a way for
broadcasters to skirt local ownership caps and give them undue market power in
carriage agreements that wind up translating to higher cable bills for their
customers.
In
a filing in the retrans docket at the FCC, NAB said it was countering
"erroneous contentions" by cable TV interests in recent submissions,
then goes on to cite several ACA filings.
NAB asserts that cable operators are misleading the
commission about the impact of retrans and with claims of improper broadcast
bargaining, are abusing their market power and are the ones hurting the public.
NAB points to a Multichannel News study to argue that it is the price of cable
programming channel, not broadcast stations, that drive up cable prices and
that for government to step in to reduce the fees cable ops pay for TV stations
would only inflate their profits. It suggests the only way to ensure that would
be for the government to also impose cable rate regs as well.
