Key Points
- The FCC approved five broadcast TV license transfers to Sinclair, creating duopolies in markets where it already operated stations.
- Sinclair sought FCC waivers of duopoly rules in all five applications to complete the acquisitions.
- DIRECTV’s petition opposing the transfers was dismissed, partly due to an Eighth Circuit ruling on ownership restrictions.
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has approved the transfer of five broadcast television licenses to Sinclair involving local TV stations that are already operated by the company through shared services agreements.
The stations give Sinclair an actual duopoly in each affected market — Eugene, Eureka, Chico-Redding, Portland-Auburn and the Tri-Cities area of Virginia and Tennessee — where the broadcaster owns at least one major network affiliate and previously operated another on behalf of another company.
In Eugene, Sinclair will acquire KMTR (Channel 16, NBC and CW Network) from Roberts Media. The other four stations — WEMT (Channel 39) in Tennessee, KCVU (Channel 20) in Chico-Redding, KBVU (Channel 28) in Eureka and WPFO (Channel 23) in Portland-Auburn — were licensed to Cunningham Broadcasting, which allows Sinclair to operate nearly all of its stations through local marketing agreements.
In all five of its applications, Sinclair asked the FCC for a waiver of its market duopoly rules, which generally prohibit one company from owning two of the top-four stations or two stations affiliated with one of the four major broadcast networks.
In four markets, Sinclair recently moved the main network affiliate off the station operated through shared service agreements onto a digital sub-channel of its own signal while affiliating the other station with Roar, its comedy multicast network.
Sinclair also requested the FCC make a finding that, on a market-specific basis, acquiring stations from Roberts Media and Cunningham Broadcasting would serve the public interest.
The acquisition of the five broadcast licenses faced opposition from DIRECTV, which filed a formal petition with the FCC seeking a denial of the transfers in September.
The FCC evaluated DIRECTV’s petition and found the company had standing to bring it while the agency evaluated Sinclair’s license transfer requests. But in documents obtained by The Desk on Tuesday, the FCC said the applications complied with the agency’s rules on broadcast duopolies and said DIRECTV couldn’t prove that Sinclair operated too much control over the station owned by Roberts Media or any impropriety connected to the four other stations operated on behalf of Cunningham Broadcasting.
DIRECTV’s petition was also “dismissed as moot” based on an Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals decision last year that invalidated some of the agency’s restrictions on in-market ownership of local TV stations.
Sinclair has a number of other pending transactions before the FCC, including the sale of certain stations to a former Bally Sports executive and a request to acquire the broadcast license of Rochester’s ABC affiliate.
