FCC announces Seattle hearing to be held Friday

Giving just one week's notice, the Federal Communications Commission announced Friday it will hold a hearing in Seattle next Friday on proposals to ease long-standing limits on how many local media outlets a single company can own.

The announcement drew immediate fire from opponents of the proposals, who charged the short notice is part of a plan by the commission's Republican majority to short-circuit public involvement and push major changes through before Christmas.

"It shows there is a preordained outcome," FCC Commissioners Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein, the two Democrats on the five-member board, said in a statement.

Jonathan Lawson of Reclaim the Media, a Seattle advocacy group that opposes more media consolidation, agreed. "They are definitely trying to rush things to a close," he said.

The hearing is scheduled to run from 4-11 p.m. at Town Hall, 1119 8th Ave., Seattle. More information is available at www.fcc.gov.

An FCC spokeswoman would not discuss the timing of the announcement. "We've been working on media ownership [rules] for 18 months," Mary Diamond said.

While the date was not official until Friday, rumors of a November hearing in Seattle had been circulating for weeks.

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin has been pushing to wrap up the commission's study of media-ownership rules by the end of the year. While he has not proposed changes, he is expected to support allowing more consolidation.

The FCC said the Seattle hearing will be its last on the topic.

Word of the hearing came just hours after U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., and U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee, D-Bainbridge Island, wrote Martin, asking for at least four weeks' notice of any hearing here.

After the FCC's announcement, Cantwell said the short notice "is counter-productive and does not permit real public input on this critically important issue."

A 1975 FCC rule prohibits "cross-ownership" of a daily newspaper and a television station in the same city, unless the commission grants a waiver. In 2003 the FCC, by a 3-2 vote, repealed that regulation and loosened others that limited the number of TV and radio stations a company can own in the same market.

Most major media companies supported the moves.

The changes provoked a major backlash. In 2004, a federal appeals-court panel put the alterations on hold, ruling the FCC hadn't justified them adequately. But the commission announced last year that it would take up the question again.

Seattle has been a hotbed of opposition to loosening the rules. Copps and Adelstein held two unofficial hearings here, in 2003 and 2006; each drew hundreds who overwhelmingly opposed the changes.

Opponents fear looser rules will stifle competition and result in news coverage that is less responsive to local needs. Supporters say the cross-ownership limits are outdated in light of changes in the media marketplace, and that consolidation will lead to synergies that will benefit the public interest.

Seattle Times Publisher Frank Blethen has been an outspoken opponent of looser rules. Times spokeswoman Jill Mackie said Friday that, while the short advance notice will limit participation, the FCC's previous chairman didn't even hold hearings on media ownership before approving new rules in 2003.

"Chairman Martin recognizes the public has a strong interest in this," she said.

The large multimedia corporations that own most of Seattle's other major news outlets all have supported repealing the newspaper-TV cross-ownership ban. They include The Hearst Corp. (Seattle Post-Intelligencer); Belo Corp. (KING- and KONG-TV); Cox Enterprises (KIRO-TV); and Tribune (KCPQ-TV).

In 2003, published reports indicated that, if the cross-ownership ban were repealed, Hearst might be interested in buying Fisher Communications' KOMO-TV, putting The Times at a potential competitive disadvantage.

But Mackie said that has never been the motive for Blethen's involvement in the issue.

And there hasn't been any talk of a Hearst KOMO purchase in several years.

Reclaim the Media's Lawson said Martin may be trying to push new rules through now because it would be easier than in an election year, and because looser rules could benefit several pending media-company mergers or sales.

Eric Pryne: 206-464-2231 or epryne@seattletimes.com