UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

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FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION

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FIELD HEARING

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BROADCAST LOCALISM HEARING

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CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA

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CHAIRMAN POWELL PRESIDING

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WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2003

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**[I N D E X]{.underline}**

Statements:

Mayor Patrick McCrory\...\...\...\...\...\...\...4

Representative Mel Watt\...\...\...\...\...\....23

Representative Michael Price\...\...\...\.....

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Opening Statements:

Michael K. Powell, Chairman \...\...\...\...\...9

Michael J. Copps, Commissioner \...\...\...\...13

Jonathan S. Adelstein, Commissioner \...\....17

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Panel One Discussion: Localism Issues

Jim Keelor, President & COO, Liberty

Corporation \...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\....32

Debbie Kwei, General Manager,

WCHH-FM \...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\.....34

Tift Merritt, Singer/Songwriter \...\...\.....37

Joan Siefert Rose, General Manager,

WUNC-FM \...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\.....42

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Commissioner and Audience Questions: \...\...\.....64

Break: \...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\.....126

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**[I N D E X]{.underline}** (Cont.d)

Panel Two Discussion: Localism Issues

Terri Avery, Operations Manager,

Program Director, WBAV-FM \...\...\...\...\.....127

Jim Goodmon, President and CEO,

Capitol Broadcasting Company \...\...\...\.....129

Mary Klenz, Co-president,

League of Women Voters \...\...\...\...\...\.....133

John Rustin, Director, Government Relations,

North Carolina Family Policy Council \...\...135

Michael Ward, General Manager,

WNCN-TV \...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\...\.....138

Commissioner and Audience Questions: \...\...\.....141

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[P R O C E E D I N G S]{.underline}

5:35 P. M.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen, and welcome to the
first public hearing of the Federal Communications Commission on
localism in broadcasting.

This event also serves as a fact-gathering inquiry to coincide with your
local broadcasters' licenses coming up for FCC renewal, as they do every
eight years.

My name is Michael Powell; I serve as chairman of the Federal
Communications Commission. I am joined by my two distinguished
colleagues, to my right, Commissioner Mike Copps, and to my left,
Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein.

I also want to express my regrets that our other two colleagues cannot
be here, Commissioner Abernathy, who has an illness in the family, and
Commissioner Martin, who has another commitment.

Before we get started in earnest, I have the distinct pleasure of
introducing the Mayor of Charlotte who has been terrific in bringing us
to his town, the Honorable Patrick McCrory. Mayor?

MAYOR McCRORY: Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, welcome to Charlotte, North
Carolina. And I also, Mr. Chairman, need to also give my best to the
Secretary of State and just let him know that we really appreciate not
only the work he\'s doing for our country and for our world, but we also
want to let him know we haven\'t forgotten about America\'s Promise.
He\'s been very active in our local America\'s Promise efforts, and we
really do appreciate that very much.

On behalf of the City of Charlotte we\'d like to welcome you to the 19th
largest city in the United States of America, the second largest
financial center, and the home of the almost undefeated Carolina
Panthers, and home in the near future to the Charlotte Bobcats, and also
I must also say the Charlotte 49er basketball team.

But it\'s a city we\'re very, very proud of. We have a population of
610,000 people in an area of about 280 square miles. And your job is
very important for Charlotte and our future because communications and
the media and the interaction with the public is a very, very important
priority for us all, as it is in most cities.

As the hearings unfold today you are going to hear from many voices
because Charlotte is not afraid to speak out, but we will do it in a
very, very professional and respectable way.

I would like to make you aware I also represent mayors from throughout
the country as a member of the Board of Directors of the U.S. Conference
of Mayors. And I just want to briefly take advantage of this welcome, if
you don\'t mind, Mr. Chairman, to mention two issues that are important
to this mayor and also mayors throughout the nation, and that is
especially with the issue of homeland security.

At this point in time we need to solve the interference issue so
channels for our emergency responders are no longer intermingled among
and adjacent to commercial channels. This is extremely important to our
first responders in this region and throughout the regions throughout
the United States.

Your support of the consensus plan which is supported by all of the top
organizations of the first responders\' profession will help enhance
public safety by realigning the 800 megahertz system into two distinct
blocks, with one for public safety and the other one for wireless
carriers.

This will virtually eliminate any chance of interference, and once again
provide reliability in the first responder communication system without
costing local governments millions of dollars.

As a member of \-- as a new member of Secretary Ridge\'s Homeland
Security Commission, communications is one of the most vital parts of
homeland security, and your role in that effort is very, very important
to us all. So I ask for your support of the consensus plan and the
subsequent funding to address this homeland security issue.

In addition to the public radio spectrum issue, your rule-making
decisions in the area of cable modems and internet service will have a
direct impact on the financial well being of cities throughout the
United States.

Local governments are presently unable to collect franchise fees because
of a recent ruling in 2002 classifying cable modem services as
information rather than cable or telecommunications services. This is
talking about our right-of-ways which has been our property which we get
a fair return of dollars for. And that basically renews that while at
the same time we\'re getting many unfunded mandates from the Federal
Government. We\'re having our revenue stream taken away from cities
throughout the United States.

This has caught us quite off-guard, and in Charlotte alone reduces
revenues from the \$5 million we currently collect from cable
franchises.

I\'m worried about the slippery slope of unfunded mandates that will
continue to happen, in addition to the slippery slope of what\'s next
regarding taking funding away from getting money from our right-of-ways.
I did want to make you aware of that, although I know you\'re here to
talk about primarily some other issues of important legislation, and I
do want to recognize that.

I do want to say something about our media outlets here in Charlotte.
Overall I want to compliment them because they\'ve been extremely
responsive in most cases to our public needs, especially during
emergencies.

Even on 9-11 we had incredible evacuation from our high rise towers
because we are the second financial center in the United States, and
most people don\'t realize that. But on 9-11 we had people evacuating
our high rise buildings and our media and other people involved helped
communicate exactly what we needed them to do during 9-11.

And also we needed their help during hurricanes and ice storms and other
types of activities, and they\'ve all been extremely cooperative when
we, the City, have asked for their assistance, whether it be the TV
stations or the radio programs, and we\'ve been very complimentary of
them. And they\'ve also continued to provide us good public service.

I will say this in Charlotte. There\'s a very strong community norm of
responsibility that is not only put on public servants like myself, but
also on the media. And if you cross that norm and you don\'t get
involved in this community, the market and the community will respond
and they will respond in many different ways, both with their pocket
books, with people speaking out against them if they don\'t take full
responsibility and care for our city.

Because we have a firm belief in Charlotte that when you come here, you
can make a living, but you also must care for the current and future of
Charlotte, and you must make it a better place in which to live, work,
and raise a family, and that includes the media organizations.

We do listen to the marketplace. I say this rather lightly, but an
example of that is The Howard Stern Show did not make it here in
Charlotte. And that to me says something because we do have community
values and community norms that are very, very important to us. And we
expect the people in the media markets respond to those norms, care for
our community, and help educate the community in many areas, including
government service.

So on behalf of everyone in the City of Charlotte, welcome, enjoy your
stay here. I hope you get to visit our city more. Chairman Powell, I
know you got to walk in our city a little bit this morning, but next
time stay longer and we\'ll give you a great tour and we\'ll take you to
a Carolina Panther football game too.

Thank you and may God bless each one of you. Thank you very much.

(Applause.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And as a Redskin fan, we\'re
happy to be in greener pastures here in Charlotte.

(Laughter.)

MAYOR McCRORY: You\'re coming soon.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Yes, sadly. I also want to just thank you and all the
wonderful people of Charlotte who have just extended the classic
southern hospitality to the Commission. It\'s been one of the best
organized events we\'ve ever had, and I really want to extend my
compliments to you and to the citizens of the city.

With that let me begin with some opening remarks. Back in August I
announced an initiative on localism in broadcasting. A critical part of
that effort is for the FCC to get out of Washington and start talking to
Americans about the system of broadcasting and how it serves local
communities.

We are here in Charlotte tonight to kick off a series of public hearings
on localism in broadcasting, and to use those hearings as a part of the
record we will use to make decisions on whether or not to renew the
licenses of your local broadcasters.

So what is localism and why does the FCC care about it? Generally
speaking, localism is the responsiveness of a broadcast station to the
needs and interests of its community. Promoting localism is one of the
principle reasons the FCC regulates broadcast television and radio.

Before a radio or television station can go on the air, it must receive
a broadcast license from the FCC. If the FCC determines the applicant is
qualified to hold a license, one is issued.

In return, however, the licensee promises to serve the public interest
through its property. A key part of the public interest is that the
broadcaster air programming that is responsive to the community of
license. This public interest obligation applies uniquely to
broadcasters and is what singularly distinguishes them from cable or
satellite channels.

The FCC has promoted localism in two major ways. One is by limiting the
number of stations an entity can own. But regardless of who owns the
station, that owner is legally obligated to serve the local community.
This inquiry here seeks to examine if that is happening, and if not, to
consider the actions the Commission might take, including potentially
not renewing an owner\'s broadcast license for failing to serve the
public interest.

In the past the Commission tried to promote localism by requiring
broadcasters to air certain kinds of programming that it believed was in
the public interest. Over time, however, the media environment became
more competitive and past FCC\'s have relied more on free markets to
ensure that citizens received the programming they wanted.

But a station\'s duty to serve its local community has never changed.
Today\'s hearing begins an on-the-ground inspection of how our broadcast
system is working for local communities. Specifically we have three main
objectives of these hearings.

First, we want to hear directly from members of the public on how they
think their local broadcasters are doing; what you do like, what do you
dislike; what do you think should be done differently?

Secondly we want to hear from broadcasters about their localism efforts.
I know many broadcasters are justifiably proud of their work to serve
their local communities and we need to hear from them.

And third, we want to educate the members of the public on how they can
participate at the FCC when a local station\'s license is up for
renewal.

I see these hearings as an opportunity to bring these license renewals
to life. It is one thing for us as commissioners to sit at our desks in
Washington and read a dry rule application; quite another to talk
directly with the people who listen to those stations every day.

We chose Charlotte as our first hearing site in part because the radio
and TV licenses for North Carolina and South Carolina are up for renewal
shortly, and we wanted to begin spreading the word that renewals are not
just an inside the Washington Beltway phenomenon. They\'re open to
anyone who has something to say about their local stations.

Along these lines I have asked the FCC staff to prepare a short primer
on how to participate in the license renewal process. Those will be
available to you on the tables in the back of the room. This primer is
also located on our website at www.fcc.gov/localism.

Finally I want to thank the panelists for preparing testimony and
joining us tonight. The participation of local broadcasters is critical
if these hearings are to be meaningful, and I extend my sincere thanks
for your presence here tonight. And I want to wish to thank the local
groups and individuals who have agreed to speak tonight as well.

And finally I want to extend a welcome to the citizens of Charlotte who
are here in attendance, as well as those watching on TV or listening via
the FCC\'s audio webcast. We very much look forward to tonight\'s
discussion.

With those opening remarks, let me give my colleagues an opportunity to
speak, and I first introduce you to Commissioner Mike Copps.
Commissioner?

COMMISSIONER COPPS: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good evening and welcome to
all. It\'s always a happy occasion for me to return to the Carolinas,
having lived for a number of years just down the road in Spartenburg and
having many pleasant memories of being a student at Chapel Hill. I am
most grateful for the hospitality that we have received while we are
here today, grateful for everybody taking the time to turn out this
evening.

I\'m particularly pleased to see Congressman Mel Watt from Charlotte,
the 12th Congressional District, and my friend David Price from the 4th
District here tonight. Both of these gentlemen have shown strong and
visionary leadership in a host of media issues.

Tonight we continue a truly remarkable grassroots dialogue about the
future of our media. Over the course of the past year we have witnessed
a growing national concern over what many people believe are disturbing
trends in the media. Citizens from all over the country, conservative
and liberal, republican and democrat, young and old, rural and urban,
north and south have come together to express their concern and even
alarm.

For many months the discussion focused on ownership rules implemented by
the Federal Communications Commission with people asking how many or
perhaps, more accurately, how a few broadcast stations, media
conglomerates should be allowed to own, or for what purposes are
stations granted licenses, and how does the public interest fare in the
more heavily consolidated environment. This ownership dialogue continues
in Congress and in the courts around the nation.

Tonight we address core media values, particularly localism, from a
little different perspective. But we must realize, of course, that it is
all part of a larger discussion about protecting the people\'s interest
and the people\'s airwaves. No part of this grassroots dialogue can be
divorced from any other part.

As we begin this first of several Commission hearings, we should return
to basic principles reminding ourselves that all of us own the airwaves,
and the corporations that are given the privilege of using this precious
public asset, and to profit from that use in exchange for their
commitment to serve the public interest.

Broadcasters have been given very special privileges and they have very
special responsibilities to serve their local communities.

Since the 1980\'s, in my opinion, fundamental protections of the public
interest have been weakened and have withered. Requirements like meeting
with members of the community to determine the needs and wishes of their
local audience, teeing up controversial issues for viewers and
listeners, encouraging antagonistic points of view, and providing
viewpoint and program diversity, to name just a few of the obligations
that once we had.

In addition we have pared back the license renewal process from one
wherein every three years examined very rigorously whether the
broadcaster was actually serving the public interest, to one wherein now
companies need only send us a short form every eight years and generally
nothing more. These days getting a license renewed is pretty much a slam
dunk. It\'s not called postcard renewal for nothing.

So step by step, rule by rule, public interest protections strike me as
being weaker, much weaker than they used to be. I believe this has
happened at a high and dangerous cost to the American people. Some call
my concern excessive, but I believe in my bones that the survival of
fundamental value hinges on the outcome of this national dialogue.

We come to Charlotte to talk directly with members of this community and
region and to tap its local expertise as to what is happening here. How
can we possibly know if licensees are serving their communities without
hearing from the community? Are stations adding to the civic dialogue?
Are they adhering to community standards, or are they airing excessive
amounts of indecent and excessively violent programming?

Are they encouraging local talents and local genius? Are they reaching
out to minority groups within the community?

I know we will leave here tonight knowing facts and having perspectives
that just wouldn\'t have floated into us had we remained in Washington.
We start with our panels tonight and I would like to thank each panelist
for taking the time and trouble to be with us this evening.

What I\'m especially looking forward to is hearing from members of the
public that have given up their evening to be here to discuss the
importance of local broadcasting in their communities. I have seen this
around the country, the interest and the high value that the American
people place on localism in broadcasting.

And I think it shows how important this issue is here when so many of
you turn out in this room this evening and I understand in the overflow
rooms also. North Carolina is making its voice heard, and I am
enormously pleased to be here to listen and to learn.

So I thank each of you, and I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for bringing us
together tonight.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you, Commissioner, for your remarks. Commissioner
Adelstein.

COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It\'s great to be here
in Charlotte to begin this dialogue on how well broadcasters are serving
their local communities.

I\'d like to commend Chairman Powell and my fellow Commissioners for
bringing us together and getting these historic hearings underway.

I think the key is, as the Chairman said, for us to get outside of
Washington and to hear directly from people in communities like
Charlotte. And we\'re doing a series of these across the country in a
very select group of cities, and I just think that it\'s so important
that we do so. I also recommend that we continue to keep our eye on
what\'s happening in local communities as we go through each of these
license renewals.

I\'d like to recognize Congressman Watt and Congressman Price for their
leadership on these issues, and thank them for being here.

I think that it\'s also critical that these hearings are taking place
just in time for us to tell the public how they can participate in this
upcoming round of license renewals. This is really, I think, historic
that we are looking at this issue at all, because these have been, as
Commissioner Copps outlined, a postcard process.

Now we\'re getting out here, we\'re taking it seriously, we want to hear
from people, we want to see what\'s happening.

I think that the broadcasters, they\'re in many cases doing a great job,
but we need to keep people\'s feet to the fire to ensure that they\'re
continuing to serve their local communities. I don\'t think most people
in the public are even aware that these license renewals are happening,
and we\'re here to let you know how you can get involved.

Tonight\'s hearing falls around the hearings that were held around the
country last spring to hear public input about the media ownership rules
that we have. I think those hearings were tremendously valuable.

We heard firsthand from thousands of people, and I sense that there is a
real frustration out among the public about the media. And one of the
issues of concern was localism, and I think it\'s appropriate that we
now focus on that issue head-on. And I think that we\'ll learn a lot
about that issue, even more deftly than we did last time.

So we\'re here to talk about localism and I\'d like to talk a little bit
about what that means. Every community has its local needs, its local
talents, local elections, local news, and local culture. And localism
reflects the commitment to local news and public affairs programming,
but it also means a lot more.

It means providing opportunities for local self-expression, it means
reaching out, developing and promoting local performing artists and
other local talent. It means making programming decisions that serve
local needs. It means making sure that the coverage reflects the makeup
of the community.

I was fascinated to learn, for example, that the Hispanic population in
North Carolina has increased by nearly 400 percent since 1990, with
Raleigh, Greensboro and Charlotte three of the four fastest growing
Hispanic cities in America. We need to know the concerns of the growing
Hispanic community as well as the African-American community and other
minority groups, that they are getting the attention that they deserve
through the licensed broadcast outlets in this community.

Localism also means the station being responsive to the community in
other ways, such as dedicating the resources to discover and address the
needs of the community. It means being accessible, sending reporters and
cameras out to all parts of the community, to all the different stories,
to really cover what\'s happening in the community, documenting those
efforts that they undertake for the public to review in files that are
accessible to residents in the communities so they can know what the
station\'s doing.

I think there are many local broadcasters in this country who have shown
a long-term and a real commitment to community service and to localism,
and some stations do very well with this, including some real standouts
here in North Carolina, and I think we\'ll hear from representatives of
some of those today.

So we\'re here tonight to learn how we can encourage other stations to
put the needs of the local community first. That\'s the cornerstone of
the public\'s social contract with broadcasters.

As outlined by my colleagues, they get a valuable license from the FCC
to use the public airwaves, and then they agree to act as a trustee for
the public interest in return. We don\'t give out those licenses simply
to broadcasters on a national basis like in other countries. In many
cases, like the BBC in England, they provide nationwide licenses. Here
historically we provide local licenses to local communities and insisted
that they serve local needs.

So each \-- you as licensees should take that obligation very seriously
and make sure to inform the community about local elections, about
political controversies, about good things that are happening in the
community, and other matters that are related to the self-governance of
a democracy.

Thinking of my own family and my own father, for example, was an elected
republican state representative in my home state of South Dakota, and he
sees the need for the media to cover these local concerns, what\'s
happening in the state government and local government.

And I think he\'s really onto something because if you look at a study
that was done of all the combined TV coverage of the 2000 campaign,
including local, state and federal, all \-- from the sheriff to the
President of the United States, 74 seconds per night is all we saw.
People heard a lot more from paid political ads in 74 seconds.

Maybe that\'s why half our population doesn\'t even bother to vote. I
don\'t think that\'s a very healthy thing for our democracy. And half
our people not voting isn\'t a healthy democracy.

And the licensees of our broadcast stations have an obligation to do
something about it, they have an obligation to cover what\'s happening
in the community, to get people aware of what\'s happening, to not just
have them get all their information from these overwhelming negative
ads. They need to cover local political issues.

So we\'re about to begin an in-depth examination. This is the beginning
of it, of how we, the FCC, can improve how broadcasters serve their
local communities, and we need your input as we launch this
investigation.

For example, how to hold stations accountable when shock-jock
programming offends community standards or harms the residents. We\'ve
heard some stories about that right here in North Carolina.

So I look forward to hearing from all the excellent panelists and I want
to thank them for coming from all across the State of North Carolina to
share their views about how the local communities are being served, or
how in the case of the broadcasters they are serving their local
communities.

So thank you all for coming out and sharing your views, and I thank the
public for coming here, and I look forward to hearing from you.

I\'ve got a two-week baby home, so I\'ve got to rush out right
afterwards to get back and make sure I\'m serving my own immediate local
community. Thank you for your time and I look forward to hearing from
the witnesses.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you very much, Commissioner Adelstein. As you\'ve
heard, we are really honored to have with us two very distinguished
members of the United States Congress who have taken some time to come
and lend their support to the hearing.

We\'re going to hear from Congressman David Price, Democratic
representative from Chapel Hill, first elected to Congress in 1986, and
also Congressman Mel Watt, the Democratic representative from here in
Charlotte who has served since 1992.

And I\'d like to invite them first, if Congressman Watt would like, to
make a few remarks, and we welcome you to do that, sir.

CONGRESSMAN WATT: I want to personally thank Chairman Powell and the
other Commissioners for providing this opportunity for our residents to
express their feelings about the importance of localism in broadcasting.

I\'m mindful that the purpose of this hearing is to get the input of the
people, not their representatives in Congress. Consequently, my comments
will be brief and I\'ve submitted a longer version of what I have to say
to the secretary.

Before proceeding to my substantive comments, I want to make two brief
points that may be unnecessary because they are so obvious. I do so only
because I think they should not be taken for granted.

First, isn\'t it great to live in a country that places a value on
having a discussion such as this which first and foremost assumes an
unequivocal commitment to the importance of the First Amendment and to
the importance of the rights the First Amendment protects, free speech
and free and open press?

What would many people around the world give to have an opportunity such
as this to express themselves?

Second, while tonight\'s discussion is about localism in broadcasting,
and you\'re likely to hear over and over that localism is important, I
think it is also important to emphasize that every element of our system
of broadcasting plays a valuable role whether the local, regional,
national, print, television, radio or tech. In short, the best citizen
is an informed citizen.

Substantively, my bottom line is that localism in broadcasting is
extremely important. That probably became obvious from a high profile
source recently, the President of the United States.

President Bush complained about how he perceived that the national media
was filtering good information about the way things are going in Iraq,
and indicated that he was turning to local broadcasters to get the,
quote, real story out. If all of our media had been national media, that
option clearly would not have been available to the President. This
example clearly illustrates the value of differing perspectives in the
media.

I suspect you\'re going to hear a parade of people today who agree with
the President that localism is important. I\'ll also be surprised if you
don\'t also hear that the current local and national breakdown seems to
be working real well in this community, which leads me to the first
point I want to make.

If the system wasn\'t broke, why did the FCC try to fix it? Already
today ten companies control the huge majority of media, radio,
television, books, magazines, cable, internet, movies and music. One can
make a good case that localism was about the only thing that was keeping
some semblance of balance in the system.

So why would the FCC want to make a bad situation worse by running the
risk of reducing that important local ingredient?

In short, there seems to me to be no justification for the FCC\'s June 2
decision to allow one company in our largest cities to own up to three
TV stations, the daily newspaper, eight radio stations, the cable system
and the internet sites affiliated with all of these.

If the decision stands, I believe fewer and fewer large corporations
will control more and more of our media. And I believe we could expect
lower standards, less attention to local interest and talent, and a
dramatic decline in the diversity of public voices we hear, see and
read. I think this would be bad for our democracy. That is why I have
been a part of ongoing efforts in Congress to reverse the 3-2 decision
of the FCC.

I want to make a second point quickly, but with no less passion. There
are important elements to diversity in media other than just the issue
of whether local groups or national corporations own the bulk of our
media outlets.

One element that is extremely important to my constituents and to me is
the lack of racial minorities in the media ownership. This issue was
addressed eloquently by Commissioner Adelstein on July 22nd in his
speech delivered to the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council. I
agree with the Commissioner that the FCC\'s new ownership rules would
likely make, quote, \"the situation for minorities and new entrants go
from bad to worse\", close quote.

Despite representing more than 29 percent of the U.S. population,
minority broadcasters own only four percent of the nation\'s commercial
stations, a decline of 14 percent since enactment of the
Telecommunications Act of 1996; and 1.9 percent of the nation\'s
commercial television stations.

In a report and order released by the FCC on July 2, 2003 and published
in the Federal Register on August 5, 2003, the FCC stated, quote, \"that
encouraging minority and female ownership historically has been an
important Commission objective and we affirm that goal here\", close
quote.

Both because I think minority ownership is important and because I
believe minority ownership best promotes a diversity of viewpoints, I
simply want to encourage the FCC to make \-- to take this objective
seriously and make a real commitment to it.

Enough said on this issue. I thank you again, Mr. Chairman, for being
here. I hope you enjoy this great city, and I\'m delighted to have you
in the 12th Congressional District of North Carolina.

(Applause.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you, Congressman Watt. Congressman Price, please.

CONGRESSMAN PRICE: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me add my welcome to you
and other members of the Commission for holding this, the first of your
nationwide hearings on localism and license renewal here in North
Carolina. We welcome you and we appreciate the effort you have made to
take this show on the road, and to start out in this community.

In a way this discussion tonight we\'ll continue the discussion we had
at Duke University in March with Commissioners Copps and Adelstein when
the issue was localism as it pertained to media ownership.

I\'m happy to see many familiar faces here tonight from the Triangle
area of North Carolina. We\'ve known for a long time how important local
media are to our communities, but I must say we hardly anticipated how
loudly this issue would resonate across the political spectrum.

I remember from my short-lived career in radio in one of those one
thousand watt stations that sprang up in the 1950s, how stations were
required to document their local programming and public service at
license renewal time. Most of these rules are no more. But the need to
ensure the local media meet the needs of their communities remain.

The license renewal process is an important part of that, I believe, but
it can\'t do the job alone. Network executives can\'t do that from their
corporate offices in New York either. Rather, local broadcasters have a
day-to-day responsibility. These broadcasters are responsible for
programming that covers and engages their local communities. Indeed,
they\'re often at their best when they compete with each other in
providing such coverage.

Viewers and listeners have told us in overwhelming numbers how much they
value this local orientation and want it encouraged, not smothered.

Localism is partly about who owns television and radio stations, but
it\'s also about how broadcasters determine their programming,
programming that adheres to their community standards, not the standards
of some reality TV producer in Los Angeles or some Dixie Chicks bashing
political operative in Washington.

Just look at radio. We\'re living in a world where one or a very few
companies can control most of the stations we listen to. Many local
stations these days are essentially run by remote control. Post-1996
deregulation has not been kind to localism and radio. Why on earth would
we want to see television go down that same path?

Diversity in media isn\'t about 200 flavors on cable or on satellite TV
or radio. It\'s about the diversity and the independence of our media,
media that reflect the standards and needs of our communities.

Americans have made their voice heard in this debate and I expect we\'ll
hear a good deal more of that tonight. My thanks to the Commission for
making this exchange possible.

And, Mr. Chairman, if I might, in a demonstration that concern for
localism does in fact cross party lines, I\'d like to ask that a fine
article recently from **The Charlotte Observer** be included in the
record by former Senator Jesse Helms and Representative Richard Burr
entitled [Keep Control of TV Local]{.underline}.

(Applause.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you very much, Congressman. I\'ll be happy to
submit that for the record. At this point I\'d like to ask the secretary
of the FCC to please announce officially tonight\'s meeting.

SECRETARY DORTCH: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good evening to you,
Commissioners, panelists and special guests. The following are the
procedures for today\'s Localism Task Force public hearing. We will
utilize a time machine to maintain time limits on each presentation.
Each panelist will have a total of three minutes to make their
individual presentation.

The green light will signal for the first two minutes of your remarks.
When the yellow light signals, you\'ll have one minute remaining. At
that time you should sum up your presentation and closing remarks. The
red light signals the end of your allotted time. Please conclude your
remarks at that time. Thank you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you, Madam Secretary. Let me take a second to
explain to the audience exactly how the program will proceed before we
get started.

The first panel will offer their testimony, and as they are speaking,
all members of the public are invited to write down any questions you
may have for the panelist on notecards. You\'ll find those notecards in
the packets you picked up when you came in.

Those cards will be collected and delivered up here and we\'ll pose as
many of the questions to the panelists as time permits. In addition, my
colleagues and I may take the opportunity to ask questions of the
panelists as well.

Following the first panel we will have an open mic period, and all
members of the audience are welcome to offer comments or ask questions
of the panelists directly. We\'ll then take a short break, and the
second panel will make their presentations, again followed by questions
from the bench and written questions from the audience.

So without further ado we should get started with our first panel, and
let me please ask Mr. Keelor to provide your opening statement. Welcome
and thank you for being with us.

MR. KEELOR: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Commissioners. My name is Jim
Keelor; I\'m president and COO of Liberty Corporation based in
Greenville, South Carolina.

Liberty owns fifteen television stations, including WIS, the NBC
affiliate in Columbia, and WWAY, the ABC affiliate in Wilmington. Our
other markets run from 50 to 180.

I started out in broadcasting 36 years ago as a local reporter, so I
think I\'ve seen the industry from the ground up and I\'m grateful for
the opportunity to share some of the experiences of how a television
station serve their local markets.

Shortly after beginning work at one of our stations, every new Liberty
employee received from me a personal letter and that letter begins,
quote, \"we here at Liberty are very serious about our commitments to
the communities we serve\", end quote. And while there are too many
examples of this commitment to describe here, I would like to mention
just a few of those station efforts.

First, as most of you know, the Carolinas have an unfortunate history of
hurricanes and other severe weather, and over the years both WWAY and
WIS have dedicated thousands of hours to covering these storms, most
recently Hurricane Isabel.

Liberty has invested millions of dollars in state-of-the-art weather
tracking equipment and other technology which help us to broadcast
localized emergency warnings and report on the community recovery
efforts. We have also organized fundraisers to help those families who
were victims of the storms.

Liberty\'s stations also devote a substantial amount of free air time to
covering local politics. WWAY and the North Carolina Broadcasters
Association have a 25-year history of producing debates among statewide
political candidates. WIS produced and aired live debates before both
the primary and general elections for governor in South Carolina in
2002.

Prior to that general election WIS aired live interviews during its
top-rated evening newscast with 18 candidates for federal and statewide
offices, and profiles of eight different key issues in the races for the
U.S. Senate and governor, all at no cost to the candidates.

Our stations also recognize their special place in the community as a
source of education and culture. For example, WWAY provided special
programming on the debut and opening of the new Cameron Art Museum in
Wilmington, and a thirty-minute special just before that museum opened.

WIS, for its part, recently launched a terrific new program called \"A
Class Act\" which helps teachers in South Carolina equip their
classrooms with needed supplies in the face of government cuts in
educational funds.

Commissioners, we think it\'s important for you to understand that
Liberty is not unique in its commitment to localism. It\'s what
broadcasters must strive to do. Local stations understand that given
their unique place in the community, it is important and a necessity for
them to be good corporate citizens.

But we also know that in this era of six nationwide TV networks, 80
cable channels, high-speed internet, and all the other sources of
information out there, we must differentiate ourselves if we\'re going
to attract and hold the attention of our viewers. The best way for us to
do that is to be involved in our communities, be responsible and
responsive to the concerns of our local audience. That is something
Liberty Corporation learned a long time ago, and it is the main reason
we\'ve been able to survive and flourish as a group of stations located
in small markets for so many years.

Again, thank you for this opportunity. I\'ll be happy to answer any
questions from the Commissioners or the audience might have.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you very much, sir. Ms. Debbie Kwei, General
Manager of WCHH.

MS. KWEI: Thank you and good evening. My name is Debbie Kwei and I\'m
the General Manager of WCHH, 92.7 here in Charlotte. We are a member of
the Radio One family which serves local markets with a large
African-American presence.

Having lived in Charlotte since 1988, I was thrilled when WCHH hired me
three years ago as it set out to bring a unique urban format to my local
community. I\'m delighted to speak to you today on the subject of
localism because I\'m proud of the achievements WCHH has made in
reaching out to the African-American community in Charlotte.

First I\'d like you to know that Radio One came to the Charlotte area
because of its large and growing African-American population of over
300,000 residents. Before WCHH\'s arrival, 92.7 FM had been an
exclusively oldies station with a significantly smaller minority
following than it enjoys today.

Welcoming the addition of our station to the market, the local arts and
entertainment tabloid, [Creative Loafing]{.underline}, gave us its best
format change award for 2001. Rather than having to turn to national
cable outlets like MTV or BET, Charlotte\'s many urban music fans can
tune into one of three very local radio venues in fulfilling their
musical interests.

The urban radio heard in Charlotte is not the same as that of Los
Angeles or Detroit. We regularly invite listeners to our offices and ask
for feedback about our programming. We combine their input with other
research to help us know which artists, whether national or local,
Charlotte\'s urban music fans want to hear. Through this process WCHH
creates a format that reflects the particular musical tastes of southern
urban listeners.

For example, in addition to popular national artists, we are always
excited to air local urban talent, as we have done with a young North
Carolina artist named Sherica. Because of her local appeal, I doubt
people in other cities can hear Sherica as often as they have done on
WCHH.

WCHH also airs a weekly program called [Heat From the
Street]{.underline} which exclusively features local artists. To find
other new acts that appeal to our listeners, station program directors
in Charlotte will meet with representatives of independent labels
weekly.

By attracting a larger music following, WCHH is a perfect outlet for
speakers wishing to reach the local African-American community, whether
on issues of personal well-being or during local emergencies like recent
Hurricane Isabel.

Seizing upon these opportunities is our Life Improvements for Everyone
Campaign which tackles six issues per year that are a particular concern
to the African-American community.

For example, in the upcoming campaign WCHH will run public service
announcements with the local American Red Cross Chapters to inform
listeners about the low supply of minority bone marrow donors and
opportunities for free bone marrow testing for minorities.

To be sure the local Red Cross has the attention of our listeners, we
will air stories about the sister of popular urban artist Nelly who is
suffering from leukemia. This month for breast cancer awareness, we
asked representatives from the local clinics to speak on the air about
the need for regular detection measures.

In airing these and other public service messages we could not reach
Charlotte\'s African-American community if we hadn\'t first met our
locality\'s particular interest in urban music. Thus, localism for us is
learning and catering to the listening interest of our local target
audience working with the community on important issues of public
concern, and providing an outlet for local artists.

Thank you very much for your time. I look forward to hearing your
questions.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you very much, Ms. Kwei. Our next panelist is
Tift Merritt.

MS. MERRITT: Hi, my name is Tift Merritt. I\'m a major label recording
artist. And if you haven\'t ever heard of me, it\'s because I\'m not on
your radio. I\'ve brought my record if you want to pass them out; I\'d
appreciate it.

[Time Magazine]{.underline} named my debut the number six record of
2002; Billboard called me a major new artist; CMT regularly played my
music video. Here\'s my spread in [Vanity Fair]{.underline} and I was on
David Letter- \-- I\'m legit, and I\'m not here to complain that I\'m
not the queen of the radio.

I\'m here because I\'m a North Carolina musician; I\'m a North Carolina
businesswoman. Everyone in my band is from North Carolina. The support
of my North Carolina fans has really allowed me to accomplish what I
have, so you\'re looking at local.

And when I was invited to speak today, I was told that today\'s debates
are about localism, not about ownership. As a local, I want to make it
clear that any conversation about localism without regard to media
ownership is absolutely avoiding the heart of this issue and certainly
cannot render a sincere solution.

(Applause.)

I only have three minutes, so I\'m going to cut you off. In
[Fortune]{.underline} magazine the president of Clear Channel, Lowery
Mays, I am not attacking him; I\'m saying what he said. He said that his
company is not interested in music, in songs, in DJs; they sell
advertising.

I\'m here today because I\'m very distressed that the FCC feels
comfortable allowing the public airwaves to rest in the hands of people
who admittedly do not care about content. The airwaves are public; the
airwaves serve the public, not a corporate bottom line, and this is
where localism begins.

In North Carolina I\'ve sold as many records as people like Toby Keith
and Alan Jackson. My local country affiliate knew about this. People
called in and requested me. And because I\'m local, and a lot of them
told me about it. And you would think that because I was making such
major inroads nationally that the station would have been thrilled to
support me. Not once.

And, in fact, the people who called in were told by the DJs that the DJs
wanted to play me, but management was going to have to change the
programming.

And on top of that, when this issue came to light earlier this spring
and received some publicity, the station said well, it\'s because
Tift\'s record company didn\'t contact us, which was absolutely,
probably the truth because my record company, who I have a wonderful
relationship with, did make the decision that they were not going to
spend a lot of money on an expensive radio campaign.

Do you understand what that means? It costs money to get on the radio.
And, you know, these executives are really smart, but they\'re not smart
enough they want me to pay it back, so they put it on my royalty
statement of what I\'m financially responsible to them for. So it\'s,
you know, it\'s there.

I think in my instance I don\'t understand how the airwaves can be a
place of healthy competition. For example, radio conglomerates claim
that programming is localized, and I don\'t see how this can be true in
this case. And deregulation proponents claim that the airwaves are
public. But how, when a station disregarded listeners in the signal
range, how can that be true?

I want to make it very clear that I\'m a realistic, small businesswoman
and that I was locked out of competition and isolated from my main line
to my audience. The fewer the radio station owners, the fewer and the
\-- the less the concern about content. The more monotony on every play
list, the more I will be locked out and thousands, thousands, thousands
of people like me will be in that situation.

And these are people that bring 500 to 2,000 people to your main street
on any given night. They fill your restaurants, they use FedEx, they use
hotels. These are legitimate people who contribute to the economy. But
most importantly, they bring their music and they\'re going to be
silenced.

Commissioner, the new media rules incorporating clear standards for
local programming are important, but local initiative that refuses to
recognize the role that concentrated media plays in stifling local
voices simply elevates window-dressing over true substance.

And in North Carolina if you want to talk about local musicians, you\'re
talking about John Coltrane, you\'re talking about Roberta Flack, Doc
Watson, Max Roach, Earl Scruggs, people who not only made this state
unique, but have shaped the heritage of our country and are reknown
around the world.

If you give young musicians no possibility of making a living, if you
give the radio waves to people with no regard for music or localism or
content, if you stifle the musical outlets with an unfettered interest
in the bottom line, you will scatter not only the next generation of
North Carolina talent, but 49 other states worth because they will have
to find something more feasible than an instrument to voice their sorrow
and their joy.

Thank you for your time.

(Applause.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you, Ms. Merritt, for that passionate recitation.

MS. MERRITT: I was hoping to be charming, but I didn\'t know I\'d only
have three minutes. I was told five.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: It was a righteous five, though. Our fourth panelist is
Ms. Joan Siefert Rose, General Manager of WUNC-FM. We\'re very happy to
have you here, and please proceed.

MS. ROSE: I\'m glad to be here, and I\'m also very pleased to tell you
that Tift Merritt can be heard on WUNC, as well as on many other public
stations across the state. It is an honor for those of us down on the
left-hand side of the FM band to address the Commission\'s Task Force on
Localism on behalf of noncommercial broadcasters in the state.

The topic of the hearing today which is local public service really
touches upon my core responsibility as a public broadcaster. I\'m sure
that most of you here have tuned in to public radio at some point. North
Carolina has 15 different public radio licensees offering news, public
affairs, classical music, jazz, bluegrass, hip-hop, reggae, community
service announcements, and reading services to the blind.

And we have a combined weekly audience of 1.3 million listeners across
the state, so it\'s a significant audience that is reached in North
Carolina.

One of the licensees is WUNC public radio. We\'re a news and public
affairs service, with bluegrass music on the weekends, licensed to the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. We serve 300,000 weekly
listeners in 36 counties in North Carolina.

We don\'t receive any direct funds from either the university or the
State of North Carolina. And in a typical year we receive less than ten
percent of our operating dollars from the Federal Corporation for Public
Broadcasting. We must rely on the generous support of the local
community of listeners to keep us on the air.

Therefore, we really do depend on the extent of the service we provide
responsive to the needs and interests of our local listeners that we
serve.

As a public broadcaster, WUNC is an editorial voice that speaks with a
North Carolina accent. That is, we live and we breathe the stories we
report. Local programming is personally very important to me.

I was moved by Congressman Price\'s discussion of his brief career at a
1,000 watt station, because when I became a broadcast journalist 25
years ago, the industry required each radio station to provide a minimum
amount of local news and public affairs. I learned my craft at small
stations just like that and practiced it in increasingly larger markets
of commercial stations.

Although commercial stations no longer face specific local programming
requirements, local news and public affairs programming remain the very
foundation of public broadcasting.

While commercial broadcasters still do perform many valuable services,
and is ably documented by the panel here this evening, we are unique in
our ability as a non-commercial station to dedicate enormous amounts of
our time and resources to creating purely local programming.

The FCC can help support the strong local programming on non-commercial
stations like WUNC. You can help by protecting the technical integrity
of our broadcast signals by enforcing non-interference technical
standards in a fair, reasonable and timely manner.

I\'d like to point out that WUNC recently incurred an expensive and
lengthy technical challenge at the FCC against an interfering translator
station. I also want to point out that most public stations do not have
the financial or legal resources to do so.

We very much encourage diverse voices and viewpoints and welcome new
broadcasters to the spectrum, but we also want to point out that it
should not be done \-- the signal should not be at the expense of
existing public stations that provide excellent service to listeners.

I also wish in closing to pay tribute to UNC television, public
television stations serving more than two million viewers every week
across the state, and also to the public TV station and the public radio
station here in Charlotte. Their stewardship to the community sets a
standard that is the envy of public television and radio broadcasters
across the country.

My fuller statement is being submitted for the record along with a
voluminous set of letters from listeners and viewers to the local public
\-- to their local radio and television stations talking about the
service that has been provided, and I thank you very much for this
opportunity.

(Applause.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you for your presentation and we\'ll now allow
questions of the panelists. And if you haven\'t filled out your card,
please do so and send them forward. I invite my colleagues to ask any
questions they might have.

I\'d like to start with a question at least for the two commercial
broadcasters and I think even public broadcasting would have something
to say about it.

On the way down in the plane I was reading a number of E-mails that
we\'ve already begun to receive at our localism site about this area,
and I want to read one criticism and ask a question about it.

This local resident writes: "I\'d like to state my support for any
initiative which allows more local controlled media outlet. The trend
has been away from anything local in the way of radio broadcast. Every
day we hear about radio stations being bought up by conglomerates, in
many cases, American corporations.

Who\'s to say that they\'re \-- what their agendas really are? They
certainly don\'t have local community interest at heart, and the end
result is driving out local culture. The corporation\'s, by necessities,
desire is to increase its bottom line, and that\'s inherently
incompatible with local interests."

A lot of times that is the sentiment that underlies the tension between
commercial or corporate broadcasting and the public interest, that they
are in some sense incompatible, that somehow serving the bottom line or
being profitable is not consistent with that.

And I\'d ask all of you to comment on that or offer some dimension to
that if you\'d like. I\'d even be willing to bet that there are
broadcasters on the other side who wish to speak to it to answer.

MR. KEELOR: Well, I\'ll attempt to answer that. I think first of all one
of the distressful things we see in television in a lot of the small
markets is given the cost of competition and operation and particularly
with the digital conversion, a lot of small market owners are in
financial trouble.

That is, they make a profit, but they do not have the kind of resources
to invest in the kind of services they might like to have. Those are
individual cases. I will speak only to my own company.

I am proud to say that if you went into any of our markets, I don\'t
think anyone in the market would know who Liberty Corporation is, and we
designed it that way. We try very hard not to be a corporate entity. We
are local television stations. Our local managers head the United Way,
we do Red Cross blood drives, we do all those things that identifies us
in the community.

So in Liberty Corporation\'s \-- at least in our situation, I don\'t
think that really applies because in our markets other than the little
disclaimer we put up at the end of the newscasts that, you know, owned
by Liberty Corporation, which is required by law as identification, no
one knows who we are, and we like it that way.

We want them to know who the local management, the local talent, the
local programming and the local station are.

MS. KWEI: Just to kind of follow up on that, I would agree and I think
most of the FM broadcast radio stations in the market pretty much do the
same thing, and that is we all stamp, if you will, our local stations
versus our company headquarters. When we\'re on the air we speak of our
individual stations, not the corporate owners.

Just to kind of follow up on what you said, I totally \-- I agree with
you somewhat and I agree with that person somewhat because I think that
there is always, always a striving on our part to do better. I don\'t
think any broadcaster in this room or elsewhere can honestly sit and say
that they\'re doing everything right.

On a day-to-day basis we sit and we meet locally, I think our COO and
our director of sales nationally meet daily, weekly, trying to figure
out ways and find ways in which we can do a better job.

Revenue is a big part of what we do. We are commercial radio stations,
but at the same time we have a responsibility. In our case we have a
responsibility to the community at large, we have a responsibility to
the African-American community to uphold certain standards, to follow
policies and guidelines set by the FCC, which we all do, and again, we
try our best to do it better on a day-to-day basis.

So I hear that person loud and clear, and I think it would be very easy
for us to sit here and say that that\'s not true, where what I think
we\'re trying to say is to a certain degree it is true, but we have to
do a better job daily in trying to overcome that.

MS. ROSE: Even as a public broadcaster certainly we can do more to
reflect our local community. However, I think we are naturally aligned
in the fact that our contributions and our operating dollars largely
come from individual listeners. So to the extent that our programming is
responsive to their needs, they will contribute. And if they don\'t
contribute, then we know we are not meeting their needs.

We get a report card very quickly on that, so I would say I would agree
with the other speakers that we could do more certainly and we intend to
as our resources grow and as we meet the needs of listeners we
anticipate the contributions will increase.

COMMISSIONER COPPS: Let me just ask one question while we wait for the
cards, and I\'ll ask it of Jim Keelor. The right of a local station or
an affiliated station to reject a program strikes a lot of people,
including me, as integral to preserving localism and this raises its
head particularly in the matter of indecent programming that might be
contrary to the values of a community.

How important is the right to reject and is it a problem for you or for
other independent stations that you know of to reject a network feed
that you deem unacceptable to the values of the local community?

MR. KEELOR: Well, Commissioner Copps, I think you\'re correct in that
the right to reject rule for 50 years the Commission has recognized that
as a core of localism and we\'d like to see that continued.

The dynamics of the network affiliate relationship changed so much that
it is more difficult to preempt network programming. But I think you
also have to realize that the right to reject rule insists that the
licensee is really the sole determiner of the quality and content of a
program for the local market.

And there are also times when a local program, be it a high school
championship, a student debate, a town hall meeting, might take
precedent over a network program. And that \-- I\'m not talking about a
news event now, I\'m talking about a community event. And I think a
station should have the right to reject to do that.

In the dynamics that exist today, it is difficult to make that happen
and getting more difficult. And I think that\'s why the affiliated
stations group filed a petition to the Commission more than two years
ago asking them to simply reaffirm, not create new law, but reaffirmed
what has been a fifty year tradition of the right to reject.

And the petition is still there and has not been acted on, and I think
that if you really want to see something that can drive localism and
ensure it for the future, we would like to see the Commission clarify
and reaffirm its fifty year support of the right to reject rule.

COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Ms. Merritt, you said something that caught my
attention. You said essentially that you have to pay for play on radio,
that the label or you are forced to pay. That\'s commonly known as
payola.

I\'m wondering if you understand that\'s a violation of the law, that
\--

MS. MERRITT: Do you mean do I understand?

COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Well, you \--

MS. MERRITT: I have not violated the law. I understand it.

COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: Let me explain to you the situation, that the
law requires that if a station requires payment for play of something on
the radio, that that be disclosed. Now, that\'s pretty much acceptable
for that to happen, but the station has to say brought to you by EMI
Records is such and such an artist.

Now, you mentioned this was a line item on your statement as if they
were charging you directly, and I\'m just wondering if you\'re
suggesting that payola is keeping local artists like yourself off of the
radio.

MS. MERRITT: Well, there\'s a system in place and it\'s absolutely naive
to think that pay for play doesn\'t go on. There are elaborate ways of
independent promotion, that this completely happens. I\'d like to cite
an **[Observer]{.underline}** article from Saturday, October 18th, about
country radio.

And it says: "but Logan, the first subject in this, acknowledged that
many veteran acts, veteran musical acts, now record for small
independent labels that don\'t have a lot of promotional muscle."

I\'ll ask you, what do you think promotional muscle is? I think it\'s
money; right? I mean, maybe you should call these guys and ask them too,
but there is certainly a system in place. You know, I\'ve heard of
people getting a bill from a radio station when they were played.

COMMISSIONER ADELSTEIN: That\'s something that deserves further
investigation. Certainly I\'ll follow up this question to you, Joan
Siefert Rose.

You said that Tift Merritt could be heard on WUNC. Do you think that has
anything to do with the fact that you\'re a non-commercial station so
obviously payola doesn\'t enter the picture? I mean, does that possibly
have to do with any evidence of this kind of activity in the radio
business?

MS. ROSE: You know, I really can\'t speak on behalf of commercial
broadcasters here. I only know that our policies are to give exposure to
local artists. This is part of our mandate as a non-commercial station.

And one of the programs that we have on the weekend really focuses on
traditional music and bluegrass music and country music for the area. So
Tift is a very logical artist for us to play, very popular with our
listeners. So in our case we really are motivated to provide talent and
recordings that we think would be something that our listeners would
like to hear, and that\'s about as simple as it gets.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I\'d like to read a couple questions here. I\'d like to
read two of them and then maybe we\'ll go into the open mike session and
continue the discussion.

The first is for Mr. Keelor. It\'s in reference to free time for
candidates during debates and candidate interviews.

"Isn\'t it a legal requirement for licensing in exchange for use of the
public airwaves? What measures do you take to ensure fair and equal
airtime for all candidates, and does that include third-party
candidates?"

MR. KEELOR: It does, sir. All of the Liberty stations during the last
mayoral elections offered candidates free time in various formats other
than newscasts. A five, three-minute, two-minute segment where they
could come in and tape any statement they wanted to make and it would be
carried in various day parts; some in prime, some late night, some early
and so forth. So we made that effort.

We\'ve also opened up, and we were disappointed by the candidates'
response to our offer of a free internet platform. We asked them to put
their campaign positions, their bios and so forth on our websites. And
because our stations are, for the most part, I think 13 of 15 are number
one stations, we drive a lot of viewers to our websites. And we were
disappointed that only one or two took advantage of that.

I think my point here is we have multiple platforms now to make
candidates available. If we can get digital up and running and can
multicast, I see a huge opportunity for us to provide more airtime to
candidates using the digital spectrum, and I think that\'s in our
company\'s game plan.

So free time is something we do routinely. We certainly provide a lot of
coverage during our newscasts. We have done live debates which have been
picked up by national networks and we have offered our website. So
we\'re trying to give them multiple platforms. We do not always get the
cooperation of the candidates that we would like to get.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you. A second question which I think is
interesting: :"Will calls for more public service from broadcast
stations be used as an excuse to punish smaller stations not affiliated
with large corporations?

For example, a small and independent station has a much harder time
maintaining profits than a corporate affiliated station that can afford
to run at a loss by borrowing profits from other partner stations. For
that reason corporate stations must be held to a higher standard."

What I think is interesting in the question is the suggestion that if
there were government mandates for public interest obligations, should
they be in some ways graduated, given the nature of the station; that a
smaller station under perhaps greater financial difficulty would have
fewer public interest obligations.

MR. KEELOR: What I was alluding to before in the smaller markets is that
to provide good service, you must have the resources to do so. And the
fifth station, the WB station in Sioux City, Iowa may not have those
resources.

I think public interest standards in some degree are acceptable. I
don\'t object to them philosophically. What I have always objected to
them is the basis that they are terrible administrative burdens, and
that we spend so much time administering what the government wants done
that we could be devoting to serving the public. That\'s been my concern
with going back to the Fairness Doctrine and various other things.

But to answer specifically, I think they need to be applied uniformly if
you\'re going to have them. I question to what degree you need them. The
Commission obviously in the past several years has believed we do not.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: The next question, \-- and we\'ll take a few minutes to
get through more of these before we go to open mic since they are also
from the audience.

The question here, to discuss the personal attack regulations: "If a
radio station broadcasts a personal attack on a non-public figure, is
the station required to provide a copy of the attack to the individual?
What are the penalties for not following the personal attack
regulation?"

I believe I can answer this question. The Commission had personal attack
rules which were ultimately struck down in court and don\'t currently
exist in the Commission rules as a consequence of a case called RTNDA
(phonetic), if I recall correctly, so regrettably we don\'t have rules
that we\'re capable of enforcing in that area at the moment.

In order to criticize the Chair, I should ask this question. "Why are
the questions from the audience being filtered by the staff members
before they get to the Commissioners?"

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I don\'t know. I hope they\'re not. We\'ll do the best
we can to get to all the questions fairly, and you\'ll be provided with
open mic time and nobody will be filtering through the microphone. So if
we are, I apologize for that.

A question for our broadcast owners: "What efforts do you take to try to
inform your employees about a station\'s \-- from the station\'s
perspective about guidelines for airing local artists? Do you have some
outlines or training for employees to help with this?"

MS. KWEI: Yes, we do. And I have to tell you, over the last several
months or the last, really, last year it\'s gotten a lot better where we
have a \-- we have some standards set in place where weekly our program
directors and our music directors are instructed by myself, the general
manager, and it comes from the headquarters, that we have to allow
access for local artists and independent labels to pitch their product,
quite frankly. We do that on a weekly basis.

Often times it may be a face-to-face meeting or it may be a phone
conversation, but we have put those measures in place over the last
several months in an effort, once again, to do better.

We have a program, as I mentioned in my opening statement, on Sunday
evenings called [Heat From the Street]{.underline}, and it is hosted by
some young local people, and the primary goal of that program a lot like
the bluegrass program, is to provide a platform for local artists to be
heard.

We listen for what the public wants, and often times \-- and I did
mention this one artist named Sherica, \-- we will hear a lot of rave
reviews from some particular artist that will end up getting play on our
radio station. Or in our cases we have invited a lot of our local
artists who have risen to that point to perform at some of our events.

So those are some of the efforts that we have instituted to make sure
that we\'re doing the best that we can, and again on a day-to-day basis
trying to get better.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: "What ideas do any of you have as broadcasters to make
local coverage of local political campaigns a lot more interesting?

From my perspective, simply airing debates isn\'t enough, and ads often
turn voters off. Can anyone be more creative?" Good luck with that one.

(Laughter.)

MR. KEELOR: Sometimes we\'re the victims of the subject matter we have
to cover.

(Applause.)

Ironically, because we are not a newspaper and you cannot print another
page, we have a finite amount of airtime and a finite amount of
commercial time. And it is true in our stations\' cases that we are not
able to devote as much time to maybe to the agricultural secretary race
or something like that, that we do the county commission, city council
and so forth. I think we have to prioritize and I think the public
understands that.

But the invitation that we made for free time went out to all candidates
and the internet offer went out to all candidates. So that\'s when we
were really disappointed that we really didn\'t get access to that
because I think it\'s our obligation to provide access and to provide
the platform, but I don\'t see any way we can make the candidates come
or make the people see it.

MS. ROSE: In our case we do have some long form interview programs also
where candidates have a chance to talk at length about their platforms
and interests. We tend to focus on larger races, senate races, statewide
races or congressional races as opposed to township races. But that
opportunity is there, particularly when a race is heated.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: To Ms. Merritt, there\'s a question for you. "What
other means can be used to keep the airwaves free other than having to
rely on commercial advertising?"

MS. MERRITT: Well, commercial advertising, do you mean air play?

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I don\'t know.

MS. MERRITT: It\'s kind of the same thing, isn\'t it?

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Well, if I can elaborate.

MS. MERRITT: Please do.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I\'m reading the mind of someone, but I think the
suggestion is one thing that we keep in mind is that in our system of
broadcasting, the government doesn\'t fund or subsidize the media at
all.

In a lot of countries, like Commissioner Adelstein mentioned, in
England, the government deals with a lot of the concerns we\'re raising
by having a government-sponsored medium, the BBC. Citizens are taxed
roughly \$150 per year, regardless if they\'re watching in order to
subsidize the cost of that programming.

And we certainly have public broadcasting in the United States, so the
commercial motives of advertising are absolutely essential to the
survival of stations in our system. So I guess maybe someone\'s reacting
to your point about advertising and being all they care about.

MR. KEELOR: Mr. Chairman, \--

MS. MERRITT: Well, it\'s my turn.

MR. KEELOR: Go ahead.

MS. MERRITT: I, you know, I really am just taking what the Clear Channel
president said, so I\'m not changing his words and, you know, I think
that my impression was I\'m very confused about what the question was.

Are there other means for me besides the radio? Yes, there certainly
are. And if you\'ll read my bio, I think you\'ll see that I have used
them very well. I tour all around the country and in Europe, and I get a
lot of exposure in magazines.

Unfortunately it\'s very difficult to even break even as a musician, and
there is no contesting that the radio is the main source that people
turn to when they want to hear a song. And so as a musician and my
colleagues who are musicians and artists, to have access to that medium
defiltered for the majority in this country through two or three large
companies really means that our chances are very, very slim.

And, you know, I agree with you, Commissioner, that I\'m very proud that
the government does not get involved with radio in this country, that
the media is run on its own, that it\'s not a government media.

But by the same hand, these companies are really being allowed to go \--
they are given \-- right now they have protection because they can
become as large as they want and they can be concerned with their bottom
line, when really what the FCC in my opinion, humble opinion, is about
is protecting the airwaves and the people and not these larger companies
and their interest in profit. And, you know, I think it\'s great that
they\'re doing well, but their job is content.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I\'m going to ask two more questions and then we\'re
going to start with the open mic session.

Without public service, specific public service performance standards,
how do you as broadcasters know how to meet and exceed community
expectations?

MS. KWEI: Well, in our situation there may not be particular guidelines,
but quite frankly our company sets their own guidelines and what our
expectations are on a local level. Radio One expects us to provide a
certain amount of public service airtime for local organizations,
organizations, events, fundraising and things of that nature.

We also, as part of our marketing and promotions department, and I would
say this is probably station by station, we reach out to local
organizations monthly and annually trying to find opportunities in which
we can help them get the word out about their particular event, in some
cases partner up with them and make their event even larger than what it
might have not been had it not been for Radio One\'s involvement.

So again, just in our isolated situation we\'re told, quite frankly,
what the expectation is. And it\'s up to me as the general manager to
make sure on a day-to-day basis that we\'re delivering that expectation.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: And finally we\'re asked this question, because I want
to take a chance and answer it.

"Local ownership has lost control and diversity. We need efforts there
to ensure minority ownership and more programming diversity. What could
we do?"

I wanted to use that question to take an opportunity to talk about the
FCC recently launched a diversity task force, or what we call a federal
advisory committee, that is focused intensely on the question of
minority and female roles in the media and the communications industry
at large.

It\'s composed by leading citizens throughout the country who are
dedicated to a successful commitment to diversity. They had their first
meeting and are actively working on policies and recommendations to the
Commission and the government that we can follow consistent with the
legal restraints to promote diversity.

And I know that Congressman Watt mentioned the importance of that, and I
want to invite his participation in that and let you all know that and
answer that question.

So with that, Madam Secretary, why don\'t you announce for us the
procedures for the open mic and we\'ll proceed to that section?

SECRETARY DORTCH: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Members of the audience who
wish to speak should line up at the nearest lectern. We will alternate
lecterns during the session. If you are in the overflow rooms and wish
to speak, please come to the meeting chamber and we will accommodate as
many as the fire marshall permits. A staff member at each lectern will
let you know when it is your turn to speak.

In the interest of letting as many people present their views as
possible, speakers should limit their remarks to no more than two
minutes. The green light will signal for the first one and a half
minutes. When the yellow light signals, you will have thirty seconds to
sum up your remarks.

Please try to observe these minutes. We also ask that you turn off your
cell phones. Thank you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Yes, sir.

MR. RASH: Mr. Chairman, my name is Dennis Rash. I am chairman of the
North Carolina Bicycle Committee, and if I may add a word of welcome to
Charlotte and North Carolina.

The North Carolina Bicycle Committee was created by the North Carolina
General Assembly to assist local governments in developing policies and
standards for planning and maintaining and operating bikeways safely
across North Carolina. We\'re advisory to the Secretary of the
Department of Transportation and to the Board of Transportation in
furtherance of this policy.

North Carolina has the second largest state maintained road system in
the United States. We are specifically charged with representing the
interests of bicyclists on all matters concerning bicycles and a safer
environment for bicycling in North Carolina. And it is that safer
environment that I wish to speak to.

Here is a case study of localism gone amuck. On September 22 and 23,
Clear Channel Communications Raleigh affiliate, G-105, during morning
drive time, aired an extended discussion about how much fun it was for
the motoring public to run cyclists off the highways.

From the E-mails and the listener comments I\'ve received, I understand
the G-105 announcers provoked and baited their call-in public to explore
ways motorists could arrest cyclists. Several ways suggested was
shooting pellet guns, and throwing empty bottles at passing vehicles.

One of the announcers opined that he would enjoy driving his bicycle on
a pathway.

North Carolina law specifically classifies bicycles as vehicles and
regulates their lawful use. So the announcer was dead wrong on that. As
a matter of common courtesy and safety, he was beyond wrong. He was
provocative and callous.

And I got an E-mail from a Chapel Hill cyclist about how a pickup
several days after that had intentionally crossed the center line and
run him off.

Here is an example of where the FCC, if it chooses to expand
consolidation, must seek additional regulation for the safety of the
public.

I have an extended statement that I will give the Secretary, but we hope
very much that you will take this into consideration in your rulemaking.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you. Just for the record, we did receive
complaints about that at the very end of September and our enforcement
bureau will be looking into that matter, so thank you for bringing it to
our attention.

MS. O\'DANIEL: My name is MaryLee O\'Daniel. I\'m here to voice my
frustration as a member of a minority that is largely disserved by the
television industry. That minority is the blind. I know that we have had
the wonderful service of closed-captioning for many years and it\'s
wonderful.

There has also been available audio description, but I only know of two
places where I can access programming with audio description. One of
those is on public television, the television system that can least
afford to do so, and the other one is one movie a week on a cable movie
station.

I\'m well aware that there has been a lobby in recent times to require
television networks to provide approximately four hours a week of audio
described programming for the blind, but we need to have some common
sense about that.

It would be lots of fun to have my favorite programs, [The
District]{.underline} and [Whoopi]{.underline} audioscribed, but it
would take away a lot of the fun of listening to [Whoopi]{.underline} if
I hear that beep, beep, beep and knew that the severe weather warnings
were being scrolled across the screen and I would have no idea what they
were.

I appreciate talking with you, and I also would like to say that a lot
of our stations have done a good job of giving public service
announcements and repeating the telephone numbers, but when they tell me
on the radio or the television to call 1-800-POWER-ONE when my power is
out, which number is the letter P? Is it six or seven? And which number
is the letter W? Is it nine or zero?

We do need audio description for the important public service
announcements and the severe weather warnings. Thank you very much.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you. I would add too that\'s something we would
urge Congress to help us with. The Commission did once have audio
description, but was also struck down in the court. So we\'re looking to
Congress to hopefully put that back.

Yes, sir.

MR. JOHNSON: Mr. Chairman, I also would like to welcome you to
Charlotte. I appreciate personally the efforts that the Commission has
made to come here to listen to the public about certain statements.

My name is Harry Johnson. I am also a bicyclist and I\'m going to be a
little more succinct than Mr. Rash. I agree with him completely.

I\'m incredulous, absolutely incredulous, that these two clowns on the
morning drive time are still employed by the station. It\'s unbelievable
to me. Promoting bodily harm to the general public live, on the air, is
beyond reason.

Contrary to what Clear Channel\'s website said, and you can go on it
very clearly and it says what kind of community support they\'re
involving themselves with, it is a concern that Clear Channel appears to
be promoting a pattern of community abuse for the sake of rating points.

Bigger is not better. Bigger insulates management, station management.
Bigger insulates profits. Bigger insulates ownerships from
responsiveness and responsibilities to the community to which it
purportedly serves. Thank you.

MR. NEWMAN: Hello. My name is Gray Newman and I was elected this past
November to that most local of offices, to the Mecklenburg Soil and
Water Conservation Board. We\'re all the way at the bottom of the
ballot, so just keep on going.

I want to address my comments to Mr. Keelor. I think it\'s wonderful
that you all do offer free advertising or free announcements, free
airtime for candidates and local candidates. If that was available here
in Charlotte, nobody bothered telling us about it.

My entire budget for my campaign was \$700, and I was the big spender. I
got over 36,000 votes. That\'s less than two cents a vote. And if
something like free web space or free airtime had been available, I
think that would have been wonderful.

And I would urge the radio stations and the TV stations in our market to
talk to Mr. Keelor and get some of his ideas on this. Thank you.

MR. SMITH: Mr. Chairman, I\'m here on behalf of two fantastic radio
stations in the State of South Carolina. My name is William E. Smith. I
am the executive director of the Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas. Our job
is to raise money for our Shriner\'s hospitals for children.

These two gentlemen and these two radio stations and their personnel
have been absolutely magnificent, and this is why I\'m here because they
do something for the community. Not just for Rock Hill and Fort Mill,
South Carolina, but for the two Carolinas.

Through their efforts they have worked and generated a radio network for
the Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas which raises money for the burn and
crippled children\'s hospital to exceed 60 stations in the two
Carolinas; four and a half hours of broadcast time. So I have nothing
but wonderful praise for these men and their efforts. Thank you, sir.

MR. McCONNELL: Good evening. My name is David McConnell. I drove down
here from Asheville, North Carolina. I\'m an independent media
developer, but I\'ve been working for the past couple of years with the
Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce and regional economic developers in
western North Carolina.

We\'ve been losing manufacturing jobs at a break neck speed. We\'ve done
a lot of research to determine that the media can be a pretty major
economic driver for our area. Unfortunately what we\'ve discovered is
that\'s there\'s an extreme lack of media infrastructure. We don\'t have
public access stations. We\'re finally getting some low power FM
licenses.

We\'ve been doing lots of interviews with our best and brightest
graduates from the area. They\'re all leaving for larger markets. A lot
of this is due to the fact that the majority of our stations, both
television and radio, have been brought up by Sinclair, by Clear
Channel, by others.

They\'re becoming increasingly automated; they\'re doing less and less
local coverage, and it\'s a serious concern in our area because we
don\'t have a lot of resources and we\'re trying to find something to
really help the region.

So, what do we do? We\'ve talked to people endlessly in lots and lots of
sessions, and we\'ve come to a few conclusions, like, how do we increase
localism? We have to increase community involvement in the media. We\'ve
got to increase real community news coverage, not just the leading and
bleeding stuff. We\'ve got to increase resources for aspiring media
developers. We have to provide real-world experience for these people.

How do we foster local commercial development, which I think is one of
the functions of the FCC. We have to create a local media infrastructure
and ensure local representation, ensure local control, and guarantee
opportunities for local ownership for media entrepreneurs.

So specifically what I would like to see the FCC do, there have been a
few steps lately that have been really good, I would like to see further
expansion of the low-power FM programs so that we could get more than
just a hundred watts. We\'re starting one up now; maybe we get five
miles. We\'re trying to go regional; we\'re in a small rural community.

We really need to see more licenses, we need to see more power. We need
to increase the number of LPFM licenses. We need to increase cable
franchise requirements so that we can start to really implement some
pretty serious community media infrastructures both on-line and
television who need to reinforce localism. And we need to not weaken the
current ownership rules. Thanks.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you.

MS. COLE: Good evening. My name is Marja Cole. I\'m the executive
director of the American Red Cross in North and South Carolina. In
Winston-Salem, the coverage we get from our local broadcasting stations
is, as my daughter would say, awesome.

We have two TV stations, we have WTV, WTWV-20 and WXII, Channel 12. We
have six radio stations that we work with, WSJS, Kiss-94, WBFJ, Joy-FM,
the Light, 1340, and WTQR. All these radio and TV stations represent all
different audiences, all kinds of music, all kinds of formats and so
forth; they all help us do so many amazing things in our community.

They respond to eleven special event blood drives and one CPR day that
we do every year that enables people to come and learn CPR and first aid
at no cost. They also, of course, provide coverage for all the
disasters, both nationally and locally that we cover.

And soon WXII is going to sponsor a telethon for us to help us raise
money for nine chapters in the State of North Carolina, not just ours.
And during Hurricane Floyd Channel 12, WXII, helped us raise almost two
million dollars for relief for this effort.

They also sponsor our Twelve Days of Christmas program and many others
drives. Together these broadcasters have collected last year alone 2,079
units of blood which ended up helping more than 6200 people in our
community.

We\'ve had a partnership with our broadcasting group in Winston-Salem
for more than thirty years. Without them we could not do our business. I
feel like I\'m representing all the other organizations in Winston-Salem
because they do this for everybody, and across the state all the
broadcasters help the Red Crosses do their work. Without them there
would not be the work that we do, and I thank them all.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Yes, sir.

MR. BROWN: I\'m Sam Brown from Charlotte. I represent the Common Cause
of North Carolina. We\'ve got about 2500 members living in North
Carolina.

Common Cause believes that the dissemination of information, free and
fair, is a necessity for democracy to work. So owning media is not just
a business, it\'s a public responsibility, indeed it is a trust. Profit
must not be the dictating force for policy in the media.

One of the serious mistakes the Federal Government made was during the
last couple years giving away TV frequencies that were done under the
radar because the media did not inform the public the way it should
have. That\'s an example of what the media can do against the public
good.

Just as strict government control turns out propaganda and silences
dissenting voices, monopoly ownership would have its ill effects in the
media.

The increased size that was recently granted by the FCC moves the media
toward monopolistic ownership and fewer and fewer CEOs making decisions
about who gets heard on local stations and who gets silenced, and what
issues are ignored or covered.

Common Cause is in favor of democracy. We\'re in favor of things being
done that promote the people\'s interest, and with regard to the FCC as
an agency of the people, not a manager for big business to take over
greater and greater segments of the media market. We just wanted to
express that concern.

Incidentally, it has occurred to me that this has the appearance of a PR
effort to recover self-respect for the FCC after having ignored the
public outcry against the increasing percentage of the media market that
can be owned by fewer and fewer owners. Thank you very much.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I\'ll only say we\'ll work to prove you otherwise.

MS. WALKER: Good evening. I\'m Kathy Walker and I have an advertising
agency in Greensboro, North Carolina. And I have a great pleasure to say
that a lot of my issues have already been covered, but I want to get
really get out there and say maybe we should consider a ban on paid
political advertising and talk about free, but limited and equal airtime
for political candidates and their campaigns.

(Applause.)

That is desperately needed to serve the American people\'s interest, and
I\'d like to quote Walter Cronkite while I\'m here.

There is no more important challenge facing our democracy than to free
our political system from the choke hold of money and special interest.
Candidates should not have to put themselves on the auction block to
raise the resources needed to communicate in the modern era. Our
politics should be driven by ideas, and not money.

Broadcasters have become the leading cause of the high cost of modern
politics. Broadcasters have been given billions of dollars worth of
exclusive licenses, free of charge, to use our scarce public airwaves,
but only on the condition that they serve the public interest. The best
way for this great medium to discharge its responsibility under the law
is by providing free airtime before elections so that without having to
raise money with special interests candidates can deliver and citizens
receive the information needed for our democracy to flourish.

I\'ve worked with the media for thirty years and have owned my own
business for twenty of those, and I think today we\'re at a critical
point to stop the progression of media monopoly. A few years ago the
rules were relaxed and I\'ve seen many negative changes as a result.

We must recognize the power of the media and take a stand to ensure that
the news, information and entertainment that we receive isn\'t
controlled by a select few. That\'s it.

MS. DEAN: My name is Blanche Dean and I\'m from Durham, North Carolina.
I\'m here representing my fifty-plus cycling and volunteer team and many
other cyclists participating in charity rides throughout North Carolina
and the Triangle area. The community of cyclists, and not just the ones
I\'m representing here tonight and their supporters, object to Clear
Channel\'s continued ploy on inciting the public to violence against
cyclists.

The media mogul, Clear Channel, has run similar campaigns in Cleveland
and Houston. Their recent broadcast on WDCG, also known as G-105 in the
Raleigh area, was not the first time, but we\'re hoping it will be their
last.

As you heard, on the mornings of September 22nd and 23rd, Clear
Channel\'s employees, Bob and Madison, were using the airwaves to
instruct the motoring public to commit a Class E felony by violating
North Carolina General Statute 14-32, assault with a deadly weapon
inflicting serious injury.

They were encouraging intentional assaults and harm to cyclists saying
cyclists had no right to be on the road, they should be run off the
road, and even have things thrown at them. One personality indicated
that he carries empty Yoo-hoo bottles in his own car for just that
purpose.

While I believe that these actions should not be protected under free
speech because they meet two criteria; first, inciting the public to
violence, and second, the likelihood of success, which has been
demonstrated by the increased aggression for cyclists since these
abhorrent broadcasts.

I\'m sure Clear Channel\'s personalities have been strictly coached on
which words not to use that make them fall outside the realm of
protection. My own husband and a teammate were forced off the road by a
motorist who screamed at them to get on the sidewalk where they belong.

Clear Channel is guilty of reprehensible corporate conduct at its very
best. The actions of Clear Channel and their on-air personalities should
not be tolerated or permitted. Clear Channel needs to be reprimanded and
made to cease this type of broadcast or else have their license lifted.

Broadcast radio stations are charged with operating for the public good
and as a public service. Many cyclists perform a public service by
riding in charity rides and raising funds for research to find cures for
things like Multiple Sclerosis, diabetes and AIDS.

Recently 900 cyclists participated in the MS-150 bike tour in New Bern,
North Carolina and raised more than \$640,000; another 900 for the M.S.
Tour to Tanglewood, and raised more than half a million.

These are the people that are being targeted by Clear Channel\'s
personalities and employees. This is a definite public disservice. Shame
on them. They should not be allowed to continue. If the FCC can\'t
control this type of activity, perhaps the community must band together
and solicit the aid of local law enforcement officials like our Attorney
General\'s Office.

AUDIENCE PARTICIPANT: Mr. Chairman and members of the Commission, thank
you for coming here and thank you for allowing us to speak. I\'ve heard
the stories and I know I\'m not going to listen to Clear Channel
entertainment anymore, but I want to talk about a different kind of
story, and it comes from a chain of network radio stations.

In my opinion a licensee shouldn\'t just perform the minimal public
service due under the license. Any licensee should be a public asset and
should be easily recognizable by the public as an asset. This network
that I\'m speaking of, Our Three Sons Broadcasting in Rock Hill, is just
that.

It\'s locally owned by people who have lived in that community for
twenty years, they have chaired charities, they have \-- they\'re the
lay people in the church, they have been the heads of associations.

As a former elected official, I can guarantee you it was as accessible
or more accessible than any other kind of medium there regardless of who
the candidate was and regardless of the cause or what the cause was. And
being on the board of some nonprofits, I can speak to the fact that
there\'s no greater ally in getting your word out than what this network
is.

Rather than chase ratings and rather than do the bare minimum you have
to do, what a licensee should do is they ought to pursue the excellence
of their community, they ought to care about whether that community is a
better place to live, and mainly because it\'s the place where they live
and where they raise their children.

Again, I commend them for the job they do and thank you for coming.

MR. PRICE: My name is Bill Price. I\'m with Country Cable out of Grand,
North Carolina, and I\'m a satellite TV retailer. I sell Direct TV and
Dish network satellite TV systems.

And in our market out of Greensboro there\'s a lot of customers in the
fringe areas that do not receive a clear signal off of a local antenna.
Therefore they get their signals from the satellite providers.

And that license is coming up for renewal in 2004, and we\'d like to
recommend that you ask Congress to extend that and keep it on
permanently so that our customers won\'t lose their distant network
programming, their regular network programming. Thank you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you.

MR. ECHOLS: Mr. Chairman, I\'m Doug Echols, the Mayor of Rock Hill,
South Carolina. I want to thank you for this opportunity to participate
in this hearing tonight.

Life in America is really found on our main streets, and where all
citizens are engaged in learning and living, where various entities
interface to make communities better; it is a process to be enhanced.

I\'m speaking tonight in support of South Carolina broadcasters, and
most particularly in our \-- for our two local radio stations, WRHI-AM
and WRHM-FM in Rock Hill. It\'s been previously mentioned, the
principles in these two stations live in our community and are very much
an integral part of our community and have used their talents to support
a lot of community activities.

Over the past twenty years the station has offered a thirty-minute
public affairs show called [Straight Talk]{.underline} from a local
restaurant which showcases issues of importance to our city, our county
and our community. I\'ve personally appeared on that show and appreciate
the forum it has given me to discuss community issues that are important
to all of our citizens.

In addition they cover city council, county council, delegation meetings
and so forth, and many other political events.

Rock Hill and York County have numerous community events, festivals, the
Jubilee Harvest of the Arts, Summerfest and so on, as many communities
do. These radio stations have always been involved in the promotion and
development of live broadcast from these events.

Also at emergency times these stations step up to provide dependable
information as an asset to the community so that our citizens are better
informed.

The City of Rock Hill, York County and the surrounding area is a better
place for having these two stations at work on behalf of our citizens
and our community. And I submit to you that that is the case throughout
North and South Carolina.

I encourage the FCC through all its regulations to facilitate a system
of diverse media options which help to make people better informed and
Main Street a stronger place. Thank you.

MR. JONES: Hello; my name is Russ Jones. I\'m the general manager of
Carolina Metro Radio Corporation out of Blacksburg, Virginia owned by
the Baker family, actually who has a number of stations, but the ones
I\'m responsible for are regionally here in North and South Carolina.

And actually the question I am posing is on behalf of the Hispanic
community. We\'ve got a strong outreach to the Hispanic community. Since
1997 we\'ve been developing the stations throughout the Carolinas.
Presently I\'ve got five full-time Spanish stations and we\'re very
local. We\'re all done on a local level.

I\'m sure that everybody in Charlotte will be familiar not with myself,
but with Armory Pulsai (phonetic) who is here. She\'s in contact with
all the local government officials all the time reaching out to the
community.

But the question that we\'re constantly asked and she\'s constantly
asked and I\'m constantly asked is why are these stations an FCC
concern, but why do stations go off the air? I know that\'s the way
they\'re licensed as daytime stations or low power at night, but it\'s
very hard to reach the community.

For example, we\'re the only station in Charlotte and we\'ve got 10,000
watts of power. Especially when there\'s an emergency situation, severe
weather and other national or local news stories that pertain to the
Spanish community. At 5:15 on November 1st our station will be off the
air and our Spanish audience will all of a sudden hear a news talk
station out of Boston, which does nothing to reach the Hispanic
community at all.

And on a local level I think you find a lot of your \-- especially the
minority format stations are going to be not the big 100,000 watt FM
stations that run 24 hours a day, but more of the smaller stations
either at low wattage or licensed sunrise, sunset.

So just the question that I see you need to consider is a way to reach
the minorities with those changes. Thank you.

REVEREND KING: Chairman Powell, we want to welcome you from the city of
Rock Hill and the County of York and the State of South Carolina. On
your next time around I want you to know you can come to Rock Hill. We
are the All American city inclusive. And by the way, if you don\'t mind,
I\'ll tell you that I\'m praying for you.

To you, the Commissioners, and to the panelists, as well as those who
are here now, my name is Reverend Ronald A. King. I am the founder and
director of the Feed the Hungry Program for North and South Carolina.

I represent Christians To Feed the Hungry; this is a grassroots,
self-help organization. Our responsibility is basic; we serve our
community and we see no problem in that. There is a fine line between
North and South Carolina and it doesn\'t stop at the 90 mile marker. The
problems are on both sides of the line and we tend to cooperate. We tend
to be inclusive and not exclusive.

What I\'m saying to you now is that WRHI-AM, WRHM-FM stations have
provided a special service to its communities. It has given
opportunities to people such as I and others who are in the same
position to serve our communities unrestricted. That is inclusive to the
Oriental, Hispanic, Islam, Jewish communities, as well as the
Afro-American community.

I have been at this since November the 12th, 1976. We are well known in
what we do. We started WRHI-AM and WRHM-FM stations and from that we\'ve
grown to the Charlotte market, Power 98, the PEGs, believe it or not, to
President Jimmy Carter. We\'ve been acknowledged by President Bill
Clinton and also President George Bush.

Our efforts are complete. All we\'re trying to say is that more stations
like WRHI should be allowed to continue in their endeavor. They need to
do the job that they do.

And one other thing is that we rely on our station for our local city
council information and delegation and our up-to-date information. Our
local radio stations are well known and we want to say that we thank you
for coming. We want you to continue to come and to examine these issues
because there are many.

And these people who are here now have a complete effort. Those from the
bicycles to special interest groups, even to those who own these
stations, let them know that we who are on the bottom rung of the ladder
need that opportunity to get to you. We thank you.

AUDIENCE PARTICIPANT: Good evening, Commissioners and thank you for the
opportunity to address the panel tonight. I\'m here to talk about radio.
I think the radio serves American\'s communities best when it was part
of the community. The keys were local talent, local programming,
interactivity with listeners.

When DJs and the program directors programmed stations, local bands
would get air play, listeners would respond strongly, the buzz would
spread, and a hit would be made; songs were competing based on
popularity and quality. Contrast that to the current system. We\'re in a
play/listener program nationally, spots in a play/listener program are
auctioned off to the highest bidder.

And, Commissioner Adelstein, I could E-mail you tons of newspaper
reports describing the system of independent promotion. We\'ve moved
from a diversity of music to a monotony of music spanned across multiple
markets in tune to the lowest common denominator.

Whether a song stays in rotation in my market depends on how it tests
out on a fifteen-second sound byte on a phone poll in New York or Los
Angeles. We have a local audience listening to the radio, but radio
stopped listening to its local audiences long ago.

We must also mourn the tremendous loss of talent in the industry the
last few years. Very quietly and very quickly, most local DJs in smaller
markets are fired. DJ\'s in larger markets were then paid a nominal fee
to voice track shows for the empty studios. They have marginalized
pretty much the whole industry.

Tens of thousands of DJs have lost their job practically within a six
month to a year period across the country. It didn\'t end there. Record
station managers, news staff, promotion staff have all been laid off. At
the end of the day, the remaining staff puts the station on auto pilot
and turns off the lights and the signal is cut by fifty percent. Even
the signal\'s a casualty. The computer system running the station is
called profit.

All of this was made not possible by deregulation, but made inevitable
by deregulation. I urge you to return radio back to the people. Thank
you.

MS. SCIENSKI: Good evening. My name is Gloria Scienski and I\'m the
executive director of the Make A Wish Foundation of central and western
North Carolina. We basically cover half the state, and I\'m here for two
reasons tonight.

First I\'d like to thank Magic 96.1, WWMG and Clear Channel for all they
do for our community, both for adults and children, but especially for
sick kids in our community.

Second I\'m here to tell you that from a local perspective, broadcasting
and localism is alive and well thanks to Magic and Clear Channel. Our
organization has a great working relationship with our local radio
station, Magic 96.1.

We would like to thank WWMG, Magic 96.1 for helping us to accomplish our
mission. They sponsor the Make A Wish Wednesdays for four consecutive
weeks during November for two consecutive years, and have raised over
\$300,000 to help local sick children. This money paid for more than
sixty wishes for children right here in our own community.

Additionally I\'d like to thank them for opening up their studio and
sharing in the power of the Wish. Children, their families, health care
providers, volunteers and donors, joined the radio talent to tell Wish
stories and raise money to fund additional missions.

Each member of the Magic Clear Channel team extended their efforts far
beyond anything we at Make A Wish imagined. Magic and Clear Channel is
definitely committed to the children in our community and to our
community. Not to sound too hokey, but Magic makes magic for our kids.
Thank you.

MS. PERFEDA: I\'m Karen Perfeda (phonetic), vice president of radiothon
for Children\'s Miracle Network. Our organization was founded in 1983 in
hopes to raise funds and awareness for 170 of the premiere hospitals
treating children in the U.S. and Canada.

While our organization is not political, we\'d be remiss if we did not
share the story of radio\'s local efforts on behalf of our hospitals.

Six years ago we began our radiothon efforts under the leadership of Bob
Lynn, a former executive with Capitol Broadcasting. As we began to call
on stations across the country, one of the top factors in getting a
station\'s agreement to host a three to four-day event was that all
money raised would stay in their local markets.

Thanks to underwriting at Forresters, an international financial
organization, we were able to offer national support to this program
which benefits the stations, local hospitals and the children they
treat.

In just six years 200 stations have joined our efforts and this year
we\'ll raise \$30 million for their hospitals. Our stations represent
every major ownership group as well as many smaller companies, and not
one of these stations charges for their time.

Mr. Goodmon of Capitol Broadcasting has WRAL which just did their tenth
event for us and in four days raised \$900,000 for Duke Children\'s
Hospital. Last year 60 Clear Channel stations participated giving more
than 3,000 hours of time and raising \$6.6 million.

We found stations eager to be an active part of their community, taking
their commitment beyond the airwaves to include a variety of fundraising
events and activities within the local Children\'s Miracle Network
hospitals.

Thank you for giving us this opportunity to tell our story and also to
thank our stations for helping better the lives of children.

MR. WALKER: Mr. Chairman, Committee members, thank you for holding this
forum and welcome to Charlotte. My name is Bucky Walker. I am the
chairman of the board of governors for the Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas.
We\'re an organization representing 22,000 Shriners of the two
Carolinas. Our philanthropy raises money to support 22 hospitals
throughout the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Last year on active role we had
188,000 little heros that we treated.

I must quickly elaborate a little bit on who I am and what I represent
to give you a backdrop as to why WRHI is so very important and critical
to us.

For the operating year \'03 we have a \$605 million operating budget.
Extract 25 million for research and development, the balance \-- I\'m
sorry. 92 percent of that balance goes to the daily operation of the
hospitals. We only have eight percent that goes into administrative
ends.

We accept no third-party monies, no government, no insurance, and
certainly no family pays. Well, then, how do we get all this money?
We\'re talking about \$1,600,000 a day. Well, we get it from people like
Alan Elliott and Manny Kimbell.

Let me give you an example. We\'ve been down there in Rock Hill now for
three years, and quickly they have probably raised for us in excess of
\$60,000. They\'ve given freely of their time. We must spend at least
from July through December roughly twenty hours on the air, and to boot
that, they \-- let me quickly summarize and say that sometimes I think
they\'re just like the Shriner organization. They give so much I believe
they\'re a nonprofit organization, not solely focused on the money that
I\'ve heard so much here tonight.

If you want your records on the air, call these men over here. They\'ll
get it.

MS. MERRITT: I\'ll do it.

MR. WALKER: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

AUDIENCE PARTICIPANT: Good evening, Mr. Chairman and Commissioners and
panelists. I\'m Paige Throop (phonetic), and I\'m the director for the
Children\'s Miracle Network locally here at Children\'s Hospital at
Carolina\'s Medical Center. And I want to talk about one issue that\'s
been brought out, Chairman Powell, in your opening remarks were we want
to find out how these stations and broadcasters are responsive to the
needs of the community.

And I just want to say it goes beyond the legal obligation, I want to
share with you some examples that it\'s truly a personal commitment to
our community.

Lite 102.9 is a Clear Channel station here in Charlotte, and for the
past three years they have broken their format and given us four days of
airtime to tell our story and the story of tens of thousands of children
served in our community at the Children\'s Hospital at Carolina\'s
Medical Center.

And we\'re so proud to say a hundred percent of that money stays right
here, and also to let you all know, they have raised \$900,000 in the
last three years and are looking forward to a great fourth year in
December.

But these efforts are just not for those four days. The entire station
is behind the children of Charlotte and our area, and we truly serve
children from across the region. We serve children \-- we had 6700
children served at our hospital on an in-patient basis last year, about
100,000 on an out-patient basis, and 74 out of 100 North Carolina
counties children were served, and 33 out of 40 South Carolina stations.

And truly the station really embraces this effort to help children that
are babies who weigh less than a pound to children up to 18 years old.

Also I just want to say that the hosts, Tony and Jen, they have shared
throughout the year the stories of these children and really it\'s a
personal commitment. And our localism is not just on the radio, but we
have great partners with WCMC, which is NBC-6 and a few other stations
here in Charlotte.

They\'ve been our wonderful partner for the last six years, and their
commitment is just not for that one day for our celebration broadcast.
They support us with PSAs, covering grassroots efforts events throughout
the year.

So our \$2.2 million we raise, we raise one dollar at a time. We
couldn\'t do it without the great work of those two people that I
mentioned, and when I look around this room I see great people at
WSOC-FM and many other radio stations that have helped us with PSAs and
community service efforts throughout the year and we hope it will
continue. Thank you so much.

MR. BELL: I\'m Frank Bell; I\'m the director of the YMCA in Rock Hill,
South Carolina. And I\'d like for you to know that I consider local
ownership of radio stations crucial, and in Rock Hill, South Carolina we
have that.

We have two wonderful owners that care about the community, Alan Miller,
one of the owners. I go to church with Alan. We\'ve been on several
committees together in the community. Our annual Come See Me Festivals,
I help Alan with high school football, and we\'re one of the few
stations around that still cover high school football on Friday nights.

We do an Easter egg hunt together each year with hiding 75,000 Easter
eggs for 5 to 10,000 kids, and believe me, I wouldn\'t do it without
Alan\'s encouragement. It\'s not exactly a fun day. We also have Manny
Kimbell; Manny\'s on the YMCA\'s board of directors and he puts in
countless time at the Y. He\'s chaired our campaign, capital campaign,
that\'s just raised \$7 million to help build two new YMCA\'s, and we
consider Manny and Alan an important part of our community.

In addition to the local news, and they do a great job with that, the
emergencies have to be mentioned. They don\'t happen often, but when
they do, the radio, the local radio is the only source for gathering
news.

At the YMCA we have a child care program with more than 400 kids in the
program, and in the South when you have a snow or an ice storm it\'s
often in the middle of the night and you don\'t know if school\'s on or
off, whether the kids should go to school, whether the Y is open.
They\'re the guys that I call and I could call them at home if I need to
to make sure that local news is gathered during this crisis for many
families when they\'re trying to decide what to do with their children.

In addition to that, when Hurricane Hugo came through a few years back,
and that was a big deal, all TV stations went out and a lot of radio
stations went out and they managed to pull themselves together. And a
week or so after the storm had hit, when people were still needing a hot
shower, the YMCA called and they knew because of the local radios. And
after a week or so, I\'m sure that\'s more than an emergency.

In addition, I have to mention, a lot of times local news can be a more
important gatherer of national news, and we also had an opportunity to
do that. We had a bus stolen that ended up in Honduras, and the local
radio station made sure that the world found out about it. Paul Harvey
picked up on it, the BBC picked up on it, all because the local radio,
they did the story.

And yes, we did get it back a year and two days later on a banana boat
to Fort Lauderdale, Florida straight from Honduras.

MS. COWAN: I\'m Lois Cowan and I\'m co-owner of some bicycle stores in
Cleveland, Ohio and I\'ll try not to repeat what\'s been said already.
The anti-cyclist drive time broadcast started on June 30th in Cleveland
and it continued for six days. You\'ve heard about the Raleigh ones.

On September 2nd, KLOL in Houston rebroadcast a program that\'s
especially disturbing because it was three days after a horrendous
accident involving twenty bicycles and a truck that left two Houston
riders dead. Houston is also extremely difficult for a cyclist.
There\'ve been 13 people killed while riding bicycles in Houston in the
last year.

During the broadcast, Clear Channel employees and callers encouraged
motorists to do things like speed past the bicycles and slam your brakes
on. One of the DJs actually said they\'re all wearing helmets, so
they\'ll live; throw things such as bottles and cans at cyclists; have
your passenger open the car door at the rider, have the passenger hit
them with a whiffle ball bat; shoot at the tires with pellet guns;
swerve towards the cycles to scare them and force them off the road; or
bump the back wheel with the bumper of your car.

It\'s my understanding that the FCC will deny applications for license
renewal if the licensee exhibits poor character. Since approximately
45,000 cyclists a year are involved in accidents with motor vehicles,
encouraging, provoking and inciting motorists to attack cyclists shows
extremely poor character.

Clear Channel refuses to release tapes or transcripts of the programs.
Since they chose to pay \$10,000 towards cycling advocacy in Cleveland,
broadcast apologies, and run hundreds of public service announcements, a
reasonable and prudent person would assume that they feel they have some
liability or license exposure.

We want Clear Channel to stop promoting violence and we want Clear
Channel to undo the damage they\'ve done. And I have part of some of the
broadcast where they are personally attacking me, and I was the person
who asked that question, and I just wanted to hear the response, and
they also ridicule the FCC, so you might want to listen to those tapes.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Let me make an announcement and then make a proposal. I
would like to extend the open mike time a little longer. It was our plan
to try to go to about 7:50 or 7:50, 7:55, take a very short five minute
break, start up again at 8, and we\'ll just shave a little bit off on
the card questions at the end of the second panel if that\'s acceptable
to everyone.

MR. WATERS: Good evening. My name is Steven Waters and I\'ve travelled
several hours to be here to represent the League of American Bicyclists
and its 300,000 affiliated members across the country.

As you\'ve heard, Clear Channel Communication\'s radio stations in three
cities recently broadcast some talk shows with the hosts telling the
listeners encouraging violence against bicyclists. This also occurred on
Clear Channel\'s station in San Jose, California in 2001, on WDCG,
G-105, what DG \-- what G-105 basically did was advocate what amounts to
assault with a deadly weapon or felony assault against bicyclists.

This reckless promotion of violence against bicyclists is reprehensible
and shows that Clear Channel stations are not operating in the public
interest.

Indeed, when one of the DJs in Cleveland was asked by [The
Cleveland]{.underline} [Plain Dealer]{.underline} newspaper whether his
show helped the public, he said, quite frankly, I\'m not here to serve
the interest of the community; I\'m serving my interest by being here.
End quote.

The fact that Clear Channel has promoted violence against bicyclists on
four separate radio stations demonstrates a pattern of behavior that
clearly warrants FCC scrutiny.

As the broadcast promoted criminal behavior and the causing physical
harm to bicyclists, this matter goes beyond free speech issues to the
heart of whether or not it is in the public interest to allow stations
owned by this company to continue broadcasting.

The League of American Bicyclists urges the FCC to heed its own mandate
and follow the lead of Commissioner Copps in ensuring that licenses are
not renewed without examining how stations are serving their local
communities. And thank you very much for this opportunity to speak for
input.

MR. HAND: Good evening. I\'m David Hand, I live in Raleigh, North
Carolina. I\'d like to speak to a couple of points about the WDCG
incident. The damage that\'s been done in our community extends beyond
cyclists.

What they\'ve advocated that commuters do is a felony; people acting on
their advice are putting themselves in jeopardy of being sent to prison.
They know that road rage is a problem in our area. They live in our
area; they know that that\'s a problem that local government\'s trying
to address.

Instead of doing their part to address this problem, they\'re seeking to
profit from it. It\'s really disgusting abuse of the public trust and
the right of the privilege of broadcasting on the airwaves.

Station management contends that after several days of reflection on
this issue, after we had spoken with their advertisers and had some of
their advertisers pull the ads, it suddenly occurred to them that
inciting violence and killing innocent Americans is not humorous nor
entertaining. That was their initial response throughout, that this was
humor and entertainment.

I would like to ask that the FCC let us know what expectations they have
in exchange for access to the public airwaves beyond evaluating the
license when it comes up for renewal. These people use the public
airwaves every day, they need to be conscious of their commitment to the
public good every day and they need to be held accountable for that.
Thank you.

MR. HAYES: Mr. Chairman and members of the Commission, my name is Wes
Hayes. I serve with the South Carolina Senate from York County and Rock
Hill right across the border. And seeing the challenges we face at the
state level, I\'m kind of enjoying seeing the challenges you face at the
federal level.

I don\'t have a lot to add to your problems tonight. I just wanted to
first of all commend you for being here. I think \-- I can\'t think of
anything better that you can do than to go out throughout the country
and find out the opinions of people on various issues, and I commend you
for that.

I want to just say a word for two stations that have already been
mentioned many times, WRHI and WRHM down in Rock Hill. They are truly
the voice of our community, and I don\'t say that lightly. I\'ve never
seen anything like the coverage they give to the meetings and local
events, to emergency coverage and to the political campaigns, to local
sports. They really are the voice and certainly I think it\'s something
that should be applauded.

The only comment that I can say negative about the station is when you
get very far from Rock Hill you can\'t pick them up, so they need a
little bit more power, so if you can see granting that to them. So I
just wanted to commend them and thank you for being here.

T.J.: My name is T.J. and I\'m with the Ace and T.J. show on WNKS here
in Charlotte, part of the Infinity Broadcasting Corporation of
Charlotte. And you\'ll have to forgive me if I sound a little bit
exhausted; we just got back from taking our fourth 727 load of children
with terminal illnesses to Disneyworld for an all expenses paid, once in
a lifetime trip.

Over the five and a half years that my partner and I have been in
Charlotte we\'ve raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for charities
from \-- everything from the Red Cross to hurricane relief, to prom
dresses for girls who couldn\'t afford them locally, to the family of an
officer that was killed in the line of duty.

So you local artists will have to forgive me if we haven\'t had the time
to take on the responsibility of launching your music career.

(Applause.)

Ms. Merritt, you seem to contradict yourself a little bit when you say
that you don\'t want the government to be involved with radio, yet
you\'re asking an ever-growing, ever-expanding federal government to
mandate the play of your records on radio stations.

MS. MERRITT: I certainly am not indicating that.

T.J.: And you say that the radio stations shouldn\'t be worried about
their bottom line when you openly admit that that\'s what you\'re trying
to reach is your bottom line.

MS. MERRITT: I\'m not \-- if you want music, you\'re going to have to
find a way, we\'re going to have to find a way to cooperate because we
both need to stay in business. But, you know, I certainly don\'t live by
a pool. I struggle to make ends meet and I have a lot of respect for
that. So I\'m not here to promote my career. I\'m here to give North
Carolina musicians a voice so that they can keep contributing just as
you have.

(Applause.)

T.J.: Do her comments count in my two minutes? Let me say this, I know
this will be indecent language to a lot of people in here, but ours is a
society built on capitalism. And in order to make a profit, you have to
abide by the rules of capitalism. And we can service the community and
still make a profit to keep these radio stations and TV stations on the
air. And tomorrow morning your newspaper will show up with whatever the
heck the people want to put in it in there. Thank you very much.

MS. GARNER: Chairman Powell, distinguished Commissioners, members of the
panel, Ladies and Gentlemen, my name is Elsie Garner. I\'m the president
and CEO of WTVI, Charlotte\'s own public television station.

In the debate over localism and broadcasting, I would request that the
FCC give consideration to that last bastion of locally controlled, free
over-the-air, public television and radio stations.

The FCC had the foresight to reserve channels for nonprofit, educational
use many years ago. I urge you today to continue to reserve for the
future a chair at the table for public use, because without some care,
this local resource could disappear in digital transition.

I request you to establish rules to guarantee cable and satellite
carriage for the digital age. Otherwise, public television will be faced
with operating costs for two stations at once with the exposure of only
one station. And in the digital world, satellite television should not
be exempt from the kinds of requirements that apply to cable when it
comes to digital signals for the protection of local stations such as
WTVI.

WTVI is owned and operated by a local broadcasting authority. 83 percent
of our budget comes directly from the community we serve. That\'s local
government and local business, local foundations, and yes, local viewers
like these people behind me. This means we have to be responsive to
local issues and local preferences.

WTVI broadcasts approximately twice the PBS national average of locally
produced programs such as the election debates for city council and the
school board, and our Ready to Learn Service as has been cited twice by
the Department of Education as one of the country\'s five best outreach
services.

Overwhelmingly I hear from our viewers that they consider WTVI to be an
essential community resource in the heart of the Carolinas. Thank you
for the opportunity to come before you tonight and thank you for coming
to Charlotte.

AUDIENCE PARTICIPANT: Chairman Powell, welcome to Charlotte; we really
appreciate you being here. Commissioner Copps and Adelstein and Mr.
Goodmon, I\'m a couch potato, and I\'ve been forced to watch all this
stuff on television the last five years.

But I think you three gentlemen should be given the Congressional Medal
of Honor for patriotism for defending our democracy, because I see
democracy under attack in many different forms. But basically there\'s a
confluence between capitalism and our society and capitalism is winning.

There\'s a great book just coming out by William Grieder called [The
Soul of Capitalism]{.underline} in which he states clearly why there is
no soul in capitalism, and what we need to do to change things before we
lose what we have in America. But what you gentlemen have before you is
the chance to help really improve our country and our democracy, things
that have been stated by all these people. And I\'m so glad to be here
in the start in Charlotte, and I feel very honored you\'re here helping
us.

I want to offer one example. We had a great example by Ms. Merritt about
what happens to people when they let the different industries
consolidate to such a great degree that people are squeezed out and our
values are squeezed out with it.

My example, and it comes from my heart, is I have a favorite candidate
in the democratic election coming up, and I\'ve been watching C-Span for
the last almost year, I guess it is, and I\'ve seen them perform in Iowa
over and over and over again, and I know these people are doing well.

My candidate came on CNN, the first chance they had for mass media,
communication to the world, and he got of all the candidates \--
everyone got at least 55 percent more time than he got. One of them got
174 percent more time than he got. His name is Senator Dennis \--
Representative Dennis Kusinich from Ohio.

The polls that they tell us about are that he has two percent of the
population are for him. They don\'t poll in Iowa and they don\'t tell
you that.

MS. HARMAN: Thank you for allowing me to be here tonight to share our
story. My name is Rita Harman. I\'m with the American Cancer Society.
The American Cancer Society is a national nonprofit organization, and
our goal is to eliminate cancer. We also do research, education, service
and advocacy in the community.

We\'ve had an opportunity to partner with several radio stations and
television stations locally. WSOC, WGIB, WBAV, NPR, WFAE and several
other stations we\'ve had an opportunity to partner with over the last
few years.

They have given us an opportunity to share our message, to create
awareness about cancer and cancer prevention in the community, and we
certainly appreciate that. We could not have done that without them.

The American Cancer Society does not have a media budget, so we
appreciate the opportunity to go on their stations, to take survivors
and talk about their issues and what the American Cancer Society can do
for them and for those we hope will never be diagnosed with cancer.

We also appreciate the opportunity to partner with stations like the
Link, we partner with WBTV. They have given us an opportunity to
participate in \-- let me back up and say we have given them an
opportunity to participate in a program we call Relay for Life.

In partnering with them we\'ve been able to raise over \$500,000 for our
cancer research. And our hope is that in the future we will be able to
continue to partner with organizations like WBAV and like WBTV in order
to create additional awareness about cancer and cancer prevention. I
thank you all for this opportunity to speak tonight.

MR. DAY: Chairman Powell and Commissioners and panelists, my name is
Steve Day and I was one of the announcers from Los Angeles who provided
North Carolina stations with music and announcers back in 1987 when the
Fairness Doctrine was eliminated and the veto could not be overturned.
That displaced some 1500 to 2500 local announcers in small and medium
markets, and that continues today.

I have quit my LMA appointment job at a station in California because
the owners were telling me to take on the responsibility to offer local
programming to two other cities outside my city. This happens every day
in small and medium markets. I have travelled 2500 miles from California
in my car to tell you today that this is happening in over 10,000 radio
stations.

Does it concern the FCC at all that 75 to 80 percent of small and medium
sized stations do not have an individual or human being at that station
from 8:00 P. M. until 5 A. M. in the morning? Not all stations do this.

Would it concern the FCC at all to know that that percentage of stations
do not have an attendant from Friday at 8 P.M. to Monday morning when at
5 A. M. when the local crew comes in?

Ten billion dollars is invested in one diversified company alone, and
multi-millions are invested by those same banks that invest in Arbitron,
their rating service.

I\'ll be heading to D.C. tomorrow and I\'ll be talking with
representatives to change the legislation so that you can articulate
that said legislation of the political party that is in control. In
August I met with Representative Robin Hayes, one of his assistants. I
told him about this and he seemed very, very concerned.

I\'ll be talking with someone, an advisor, not the National Security
Advisor herself, but an aid to her to discuss would this be at all
important to those involved in terrorism \-- counter-terrorism to know
that this country is left alone at night until 5 A.M. in the mornings
and on the weekends.

I\'ll be asking representatives in Congress to help you find these
people, imprison them if necessary, and get to their pocketbooks.

MR. CUNNINGHAM: Hello. My name is Darrell Cunningham and I represent
Mothers of Murdered Offspring MOMO is a Charlotte-based 501C3
organization dedicated to the reduction of violence in our community.
MOMO has a good working relationship with our local radio and TV
stations, WSOC, WCNC, WCCB, WBTV, News 14 Carolina, WFAE, WBT radio,
WBAB, WPEG, WCHH, just to name a few.

We would like to thank the stations previously mentioned for helping our
organization throughout its history. For example, the promotion of our
nine annual nonviolence weekends, coverage of our community candlelight
memorial services, coverage of our balloon release and remembrance, the
celebration of our over ten years of service, and their continued
dedication to keep unsolved cases in the public eye and help seek
justice.

I recognize that there\'s been a great deal of attention paid to
broadcast localism at the FCC over the last several weeks. I\'m here for
two reasons.

First I would like to say thank you to the previous stations mentioned,
and I would like to say as a North Carolinian I\'m here to tell you from
a local perspective broadcast localism is alive and well in the
Carolinas. Thank you.

MR. FORCELLO: Mr. Chairman, my name is Bob Forcello (phonetic). I\'m
from the North Carolina Center for Missing Persons; a letter will follow
from the Secretary of Crime Control and Public Safety. I\'m the Amber
Alert project officer here in North Carolina. I\'m here to support local
broadcasting.

If it were not for the local broadcasters in North Carolina\'s
Association of Broadcasters there would be no Amber Alert. Since the
bill was signed into law in North Carolina on June 12th, we have had two
Amber Alerts. It\'s not business, I believe, that prompts the
broadcasters to get involved. I think it\'s community spirit.

The North Carolina Association of Broadcasters has been instrumental in
developing the Amber Alert program and keeping it alive. Again, a letter
will follow from the Secretary of Crime Control and Public Safety.

MS. PEVIA: Mr. Chairman, my name is Wanda Pevia. (phonetic). I\'m here
to tell you a little personal story. My daughter was abducted in June of
1999. She was returned home this past March 2003. If it hadn\'t been for
the local news media, the man who abducted my daughter, he would never
have been apprehended.

I want to thank the local news media and the local radio stations for
their help and support in apprehending him. Thank you.

AUDIENCE PARTICIPANT: How\'s everybody doing? Look, my problem\'s not as
big as some of the problems addressed here, but obviously local artists
being played on the radio is a big issue because we have a panelist that
is a representative of that.

So in turn I have a \-- I\'m part of a company. My name is Gus. My
professional pseudonym is G-U-\$. I\'m from Charlotte and basically
I\'ve been in music my whole life. So I\'m one of the best, but I
haven\'t been respected as that. I don\'t know why, but I know I\'m part
of this record label named Policy Entertainment Group LLC, and we\'ve
made many efforts, especially with stations like 92.7 about getting
play.

We have BDS encoding and MP-3 format and everything technically that
needed to be done. We\'re street certified because that\'s all I know.
And forgive my rugged exterior, but that\'s where I\'m coming from with
this.

So basically I was just pulling off what people have been talking about
today, they\'ve helped out local artists as much as they can. I\'ve only
heard of one referral to a local artist, which is, like, ridiculous
because we have, like, a million local artists that haven\'t been heard
on the radio and turning out, like I say, to the community.

And to the panelists, I appreciate your support and your inquiry about
this topic right here because it is important. I just want to stress
that importance. I\'m going to keep it short. Thanks.

MR. BOW: Mr. Chairman, my name is Wally Bow and I\'m a journalist living
in Asheville, North Carolina. I moved to Asheville in 1983 to become the
director of the news bureau at the University of North Carolina there.
I\'d like to describe the changes in local broadcast journalism I\'ve
witnessed over the last twenty years.

Over the first two or three years we could call a major press conference
for our major news we had, such as hiring a new chancellor or a million
dollar grant, and we would have three or four radio journalists show up
as well as three TV journalists, one from our local ABC affiliate and
one each from Spartenburg, the CBS affiliate, and Greenville, the NBC
affiliate, both of which had bureaus in Asheville at that time, and of
course we had local print done on us as well.

However, by 1990 this picture had changed radically as the locally owned
radio stations were bought up by bigger media companies and they began
dismantling the local news operations. By 1990 only one commercial radio
station in western North Carolina had a full-time field reporter and
studio news staff sufficient to produce a daily local news program.

I should add that the 24 county region of western North Carolina is
roughly the size of the State of Vermont. Today that radio station,
after being purchased by Clear Channel three years ago, no longer has a
field reporter. And instead of producing twenty minutes of local news
with hourly updates, the reduced news staff now only produces nine
minutes a day. None of that news reporting is done out in the field or
in the community and is regularly from the Associated Press.

The Greenville-Spartenburg TV stations after having been purchased by
large broadcast chains have closed their Asheville bureaus leaving us
only with our local ABC affiliate. Today a major news conference will
probably get zero broadcast journalists.

Clearly the growing concentration of media ownership has greatly reduced
the amount of local broadcast news media in the mountain region.

To add insult to injury, several years ago our local ABC affiliate was
purchased by Sinclair Broadcasting which soon began featuring editorials
by a fellow named Mark Himan from an undisclosed location identified
only as news central.

What was even more puzzling to viewers in the mountains was that every
four to fifth editorial blasted the liberal legislature not in North
Carolina, but in Maryland. Why are viewers in western North Carolina
hearing editorial commentaries about the Maryland Legislature? It turns
out that Sinclair is based in Baltimore.

Clearly Sinclair is using its local affiliates not to produce or comment
on the local news, but to promote their editorial viewpoints and issues
of little interest to the citizens of western North Carolina.

Please put the brakes on media ownership with further consolidation.
Please support issues like the Mayor of Charlotte mentioned allowing
local communities to enforce their cable franchise agreements, to have
more public access TV.

I do want to thank you for the low power FM radio initiative. Thanks.

MS. ELWELL: My name is Beverly Elwell and I am a hard of hearing
consumer. If localism means responsiveness by a broadcaster, cable
operator, satellite distributors, and other multi-channel video
programming distributors to its community, then we need to understand
that what\'s already in place by the FCC through the Telecommunications
Act of 1996, and that is about closed captioning and using closed
captioning correctly for deaf and hard of hearing consumers.

But I want to especially address why it\'s so important during
emergencies and disaster situations. As you see on this television we
have here, and you\'ve got a monitor over there, but this is realtime
captioning. Everything is being captioned, everything that\'s being said
is being captioned. And that\'s great when it\'s got a certain line that
is being scrolled and used for closed captioning.

When local networks use scrolling or the scripting process, then
sometimes they\'re using the same line so it covers up the closed
captioning which is not supposed to happen.

So what I would like to see as would other 600,000 deaf and hard of
hearing individuals in the State of North Carolina is that closed
captioning be used appropriately, and not have the local networks or any
network say well, we can\'t do that because of the bottom dollar that it
requires.

It\'s already the law; rules were already provided for it. We just need
to learn and enforce the appropriate use of closed captioning. Thank
you.

MR. CASTRO: Good evening and welcome to Charlotte. My name is Hermonie
Castro (phonetic); I\'m the chair of the Hispanic Political Coalition of
Mecklenburg County. And as a concerned citizen of Charlotte and having
lived in this community for over thirty years, I would like to bring
some points to the attention of the Commission.

First of all, during the time I have lived in this community, I have
seen the disappearance of locally owned media to the point that this
community in the television area has only one locally owned channel.
With the ownership of the media changing from local to a few national
and global companies, there has been a continuing separation of local
coverage and community involvement.

There are some exceptions as in WPEG, Power 98, a radio station that has
partnered with the Latino community in a campaign to register voters on
a daily basis. Over the last five years we have registered around 25,000
voters, and have through their community focus programs have been able
to educate the community of the civic duties of the succession of the
right to vote, as well as explaining how the municipal county and state
and government work and how to contact their elected official. They have
also sponsored the Latin-American Festival.

Another bright spot for us has been the Hispanic radio station, 1030 AM.
This station has excelled in the involvement and service to the Latino
community in all the areas that concern us.

To summarize, we would like to see more community coverage and
involvement of the local media and are opposed to the consolidation of
the ownership of the media as has recently happened with the Spanish
speaking TV and radio network, and is being sponsored by the FCC.

This consolidation will only result in the diminishing of balance and
diverse opinions that the American people deserve. Thank you.

MR. BRAWLEY: Mr. Chairman, thank you for extending the time for public
comment. My name is Bill Brawley and I\'m a former elected and appointed
official here locally, but I\'m speaking as a private citizen.

Recently I\'ve been aware of a commercial campaign that\'s touted how
good a major station owner is in the Charlotte area. I haven\'t heard
anything tonight to say the local stations couldn\'t be just as user
friendly.

I have 15 FM stations programmed with the buttons on my car. I\'m guilty
of channel surfing. When commercials come on, I look for music and a lot
of them belong to that major system operator. It is my perception that
all of their stations run commercials at the same time. My three
teenagers have made the same comment to me.

We expect corporations to use their financial integration to affect
their bottom line. It\'s the American way; it\'s the way we do things in
a competitive society. But broadcasting is not as competitive because
there\'s not free entry. There is limited space on the dial and you have
to allocate it. Economists call this the commons problem.

It relates to the common grazing areas in the English villages that were
often over grazed and in poor shape. The reason being it is in the
individual self-interest in maximizing its own benefit of the common
resource. We\'ve seen it tonight. How many people ran past the red light
and burned up the time that others of us would not have had had you not
extended the time tonight. We can\'t expect corporations to not act like
the people that are in them.

We must restrict the influence of any one group or any individual. So I
ask you to restrict the ownership rules further. Thank you.

MR. HONEYCUTT: Hi, I\'m Rick Honeycutt. I\'m a satellite retailer, and
the reason why I\'m here is the local broadcasters have been slow in
making high definition television service available to the satellite TV
retailer.

My customers tell me that the Charlotte broadcast station HDTV is not
currently available to everyone in the Charlotte TV market. For
instance, many rural households located within Ashe, Watauga, Caudwell
and Burke Counties cannot receive the broadcast high definition setting.

I have a two-part question. As the expert agent on the digital
transition, would you support the creation of a task force in
determining whether rural households currently receive the digital
signal or their local networks and independent stations?

And upon determination that some households are not able to receive this
signal, would you support allowing cable and satellite operators to
provide distant HDTV signals in the same way as they provide distant
analog service? Thank you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: We\'ll try to get someone to help answer your question.

MS. FOX: Hi. I\'m Susan Fox; I\'m from Charlotte. And as so many other
people have said and Ms. Merritt too, talking about the huge
corporations that are eating up all the media in local areas and how
destructive this is because all they care about is their bottom line.
And that\'s fine, but the public airwaves are a privilege and so
therefore it\'s a little bit different.

The FCC has a responsibility of making sure they use that responsibly
and not just take over the whole thing. The deregulation, I know,
started in the eighties, but it\'s just gotten worse and worse and
worse, and now it\'s coming to the part that if it\'s allowed to
continue, then we\'re all going to lose, and please don\'t let that
happen. Thank you.

MR. DELILY: Hello everyone. I am Jake DeLily (phonetic), a COO of an
independent music outlet for the Charlotte, North Carolina area. I just
want to start off by saying my father used to have a little saying when
he said a lie will travel all around the world, while the truth sits at
home putting its boots on.

And what you\'re hearing right now is a lie and I\'m going to say it in
front of these people and the representatives from the radio stations
because I\'ve been here my whole life. I\'m from Charlotte, North
Carolina. We\'ve been hearing from people who are not affiliated with me
who were involved in the same struggle for years before I even got \--
I\'m a graduate of North Carolina Central University and I was in school
during this time when other people were trying to do what I\'m trying to
do now, and the result is always the same.

I can call examples like Sunshine Edison, Anthony Hamilton, Jealousy,
and Horace Brown who are from Charlotte, North Carolina who had to leave
Charlotte to go to California or New York or New Jersey to get their
records played. And that\'s a fact.

I can also tell you that\'s a fact that if you are in the club or
somewhere on the radio station, your music is not going to get played
unless you\'re going to pay somebody, and that\'s a fact. And people may
dispute that, but I can give you facts and examples and people who can
testify and witness to these truths.

So I\'m not here to come and try to tell you about my life because I
don\'t want you to know where I\'m from. I\'m here on the strength of
the local artists. And I also want to take a leadership step and say
that along with everybody else in here, that their fight is my fight
because we both want the goal of what\'s right.

So to Ms. Kwei and to Mrs. Avery, on behalf of the urban artists, we
just want what\'s right and that\'s it.

MR. QUINTEE: Thank you. My name is Anthony Quintee (phonetic). I would
like to thank everybody who put this together. This is a beautiful
opportunity for the community to come out and vent, and that\'s a
beautiful gesture.

However, it\'s a tragedy that 100 percent of the community is not being
represented here tonight, and not because of ignorance, not because of
complacency, because of lack of knowledge, lack of knowing about this.

I personally called three North Carolina radio stations yesterday
evening. Two of them told me they knew nothing about this meeting; they
knew nothing of the FCC being in town this week. One of them informed me
that, you know what, they are in town, and they got a meeting at 7:15 at
the Charlotte Convention Center. Not here.

So yeah, there are lies; there\'s lies all over the place. I\'m a
starving artist; emphasis on starving. And just like every other artist
in here, I think I\'m the hottest thing that hit Charlotte since the
Carolina Panthers. But you know what? That\'s not for me to decide.
That\'s for the audience and the community to decide.

And they cannot decide if I do not have access of a medium to go to
somewhere where my music can be heard, where I can be heard, you know.
And for us being local artists here in Charlotte, North Carolina, I
mean, that\'s the only avenue we have. Without radio, it\'s hard; it\'s
hard. You have to come out of the pocket a little bit.

And, you know, I\'m sorry, you know, contrary to popular belief, in 2003
in North Carolina, and I\'m sorry to burst your bubble, payola does
exist. And it\'s very bad, it\'s buried all over America, you know.
That\'s really all I have to say. Thank you for coming.

MS. BLAGEN: Mr. Chairman and Commissioners, my name is Krista Blagen
(phonetic); I\'m with the Arts and Science Council and thank you for
this opportunity to speak. Advancing arts and science and history is the
driving force of the Arts and Science Council, and the primary area of
implementing our work is through our annual fund drive, and we are
currently the number one united artist fund drive in the country,
raising over 10.1 million to support cultural education, 28 cultural
affiliates, creative individuals and neighborhood local programming.

The Charlotte media have been very receptive to the critical role that
culture plays in the role of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg community and
enables the Arts and Science Council to get the word out. We rely on
those relationships to help inform listeners and viewers about our
efforts to enhance the cultural community and the quality of life.

Examples of support from TV and radio are covering ASC events and
projects on News 14, WSOC-TV, WBTV, WCCB, WFAE, WPEG, WBAV and WDAV and
a host of others.

We also receive in kind contributions and airtime from various radio
stations and TV stations for PSAs. And also another critical thing is
that media executives and staff people, also may serve and understand
the importance of the cultural community by serving on the ASC board of
directors and also on our great panels.

We just want to thank the Charlotte media for supporting the Arts and
Science Council and understanding the importance that art, science and
history plays in the role of enhancing our cultural community. Thank
you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I just urge the speakers to be very brief. We have a
whole other panel waiting patiently and I want to get these others done.

MS. ECHERVERRI: Good evening. Thank you for giving me the opportunity.
My name is Olma Echerverri and I am co-chair of the Hispanic Board
Coalition. And I can assure you that the chair and I prepared our
statements separately, so if I am repetitive.

I\'m here to commend the efforts of WPG, Power 98, in regards to voter
registration and civic involvement, as well as in helping to bring
together the African-American and Latino communities.

But there is room for improvement; there always is. When the station was
asked to give a public service announcement about the immigrant worker
freedom right, a nationally recognized event, this request was denied
because it was so-called too political. Well, in the world around us and
in this community that is precisely what we need to report, political
and controversial issues. Nevertheless, we continue to look forward to
building bridges with WPG for many years to come.

I also want to commend the local Hispanic radio station, WNOW-1030 AM.
They provide a daily life line between the limited English speaking
population in the community. We would like for them to remain
independent because we do not trust them any other way. Thank you.

MR. HUSS: Hi there. My name is Joe Huss, and I\'m just a concerned
citizen. And I\'m here to explain that TV, what\'s going on with TV. I
was never a big TV watcher and I didn\'t own a TV for many, many years.
But I decided I was being left out of the political process, watching
debates on TV, and also I like to find out the news on TV locally.

So I have a very valid interest in local news and local control. But
also I\'ve noticed the commercials. The commercials seem to be getting
more and more of the program. Now, that\'s fine to a point you change
channels, but children watch this stuff.

And, you know, there are studies that have been done and noticed that
these children, their attention span goes to only how long the program
is. We\'re kind of pre- programming our children to have short attention
spans. And you can think of the consequences that\'s going to be further
down the road.

Another point I want to bring is that my girlfriend has two young
children and she has to be concerned and I have to be concerned on where
they go to people\'s houses, neighbor\'s houses, because of what\'s on
TV. The sexual content, the language, I wouldn\'t want an eight-year-old
using a lot of the language they use on TV today. And yet, it\'s right
there, so we can\'t keep them from going into their houses unless we
know, you know, what kind of TV they\'re watching. And I think that\'s a
very important consideration because we\'re not protecting our children.
Thank you.

MR. CLEMENT: My name is Howard Clement. I\'m presently a member of the
Durham City Council, having served as mayor pro tem of the Durham, North
Carolina City Council. I\'m in my 21st year as a member of the Durham
City Council.

Since 1971 it\'s been my privilege to serve as a member of the minority
affairs advisory committee for WTVD, the ABC affiliate in Durham, North
Carolina. And since 1971 I want to commend WTVD for its efforts in
bringing minority interests to the forum using the television as a venue
for that possibility.

There\'s no doubt in my mind that television, and especially WTVD, has
had a great impact in our community over the years because of its
inclusion of minorities and other interest groups into its television
format.

During this period I also want to commend WTVD for advocating the
concerns and interest of the North Carolina Food Bank. Over 400,000
people, and I used to serve on the board of the Food Bank, of the North
Carolina Food Bank, over 400,000 people at risk for hunger and poverty
are served by the good work of WTVD and other media outlets.

Thank God for television; thank God for WTVD for serving the public
interest. As long as these mass media outlets continue to serve the
public interest and at the local level, I think the interest of the free
market and air transmission of ideas will be served.

And I want to thank the FCC for coming to this part of North Carolina. I
wish it could come to the mecca of North Carolina to have this hearing.
But the fact remains you\'re here and we are grateful for this
opportunity.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you very much and thank you for the patience to
get through everyone who wanted to speak. We did chew heavily into the
time. I would propose that we take just a two minute break; some of us
must take a two minute break, and we\'ll start again sharp.

I propose that we start no later than 8:30 and give the panelists who
have waited patiently an opportunity to finish, and hopefully we\'ll be
done by 8:50, 8:55 and that will give us plenty of time. Thank you very
much and we\'ll take a quick break.

(Short recess.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: If we could get started, please. We\'d like to start
our second panel, and because we did eat through a lot of time, there
are people who need to catch flights this evening. So we want to get
through it, and just to announce to the audience, there will be some FCC
staff, and I think my colleague, Commissioner Copps, is going to stay,
will be staying the night and will answer further questions, so you will
have another opportunity to speak.

So with that I have the pleasure of starting the second panel with Ms.
Terri Avery and I just ask you begin, please.

MS. AVERY: Good evening. I\'m Terri Avery, I\'ve been in the radio
business for the last 25 years working in several of the nation\'s major
markets and now in Charlotte with three stations here owned by Infinity
Broadcasting, a division of Viacom.

As operations manager and program director, I\'m responsible for
everything you hear on WPEG, WBAV and WGIV. I have the final say over
the programming, the music, the on-air talent, the station imaging, and
the commercial production. But I take input from the music director, the
marketing director, the production director, the news and public affairs
directors and the on-air personalities at each station. It truly takes a
team effort to make our stations sound great.

Our ratings just came in and the people of Charlotte voted WPEG number
one and WBAV number four in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area. And I have
to tell you, if it hadn\'t been for our communities, our
African-American communities, this would not happened.

I don\'t have a big budget to spend on promotions, so everything we do
is because we super-serve our communities. And let there be no mistake,
our number one goal is to serve Charlotte. Here are some specifics on
how we serve Charlotte and the surrounding communities.

WBAV is an urban music radio station and provides live local, state and
national news coverage each and every weekday beginning at 5 A. M. on
[The Front Page with Beatrice Thompson]{.underline}. Our hour-long
program provides up-to-the-minute coverage and news and information. And
throughout the day WBAV provides news updates. We also interrupt regular
programming for breaking news.

On Sundays we have Beatrice Thompson\'s [Straight Talk]{.underline}, a
one-hour public affairs program featuring live interviews and call-in
opportunities for listeners on topics ranging from healthcare to
education.

WPEG is our mainstream urban-formatted music station. Its programming
addresses the needs of Charlotte by dealing with topics such as racial
issues, health and the upcoming November elections and more. These
issues are tackled on [Community Focus Live]{.underline}, a one-hour
show hosted by WPEG news director, Sheila Stewart, and airing on
Sundays.

WPEG will interrupt regular programming to air breaking news and
emergency information as it did earlier this year when the entire State
of North Carolina suffered through a horrible ice storm and thousands
were without power. We aired updates around the clock to let listeners
know where they could go for shelter and safety.

Localism doesn\'t just mean that we air news and public affairs. WPEG
has a specialty one-hour program called [Future Flavas]{.underline}
which showcases local talent and new artists in the industry. Local
artists featured on that program have included Low Key, and Infinique,
who incidentally has signed a record deal with Rico Wade of the Dungeon
family in Atlanta.

Our on-air personalities are part of the community also. Our own
[Breakfast Brothas Morning Show]{.underline} do a series of block
parties in low-income neighborhoods. Janine Davis, who is part of the
[Breakfast Brothas Morning Show]{.underline}, and yes, there is a lady
in the [Breakfast Brothas Morning Show]{.underline}, she\'s active in
Girl Talk Foundation, a nonprofit group that reaches out to girls in
schools and the seminars talk about abstinence and building self-esteem
and image.

All in all, in conclusion our stations would not be where they are
without our African-American Communities. We do countless events in our
communities on a daily basis. Thank you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you very much. Next is Mr. Jim Goodmon, president
and CEO of Capitol Broadcasting. Mr. Goodmon.

MR. GOODMON: Thank you. I want to \-- don\'t start the clock. A personal
privilege here for thirty seconds. I don\'t like rude. And I think the
person who spoke, while he certainly did have his own opinion, was rude
to Tift, and I don\'t like that.

I don\'t know \-- I can\'t find, maybe somebody else can, anywhere in
the Communications Act that it says that we\'re \-- that the goal for
capitalism or free market is to make all the money we can. I can\'t find
it. The only thing I can find is localism, competition and diversity.

And for somebody to say that his goal is to try to keep the Viacom
stations on the air, that\'s the funniest thing I\'ve ever heard. Those
guys are doing fifty percent profit margins and are doing just fine;
they\'re the biggest company. So I just had to respond to that and start
the clock.

(Applause.)

The questions \-- your guys, Mr. Chairman, put together some questions
that we should think about for the hearing, and I think they did a great
job. They really did a good job and I want to speak to one of those
questions, number six.

What if anything should the Commission do to promote localism? Are
existing market incentives sufficient to ensure that broadcasters
adequately meet the needs and interests of their communities?

Well, in responding to that question I want to talk about the two
rulemakings that you all have before you. One is the quarterly reporting
rulemaking and the other is the minimum public interest standard.

And what we did with the Gore Commission, quickly is everybody agreed
\-- everybody in this room agrees, everybody that knows agrees, every
broadcaster agrees that broadcasters should serve the public interest.

The Commission, the Gore Commission in looking at that, we all agreed
that there should be standards, that there should be minimum standards.
I mean, how can you operate without standards? Now, we couldn\'t agree
on what the standards should be, but we agreed that there should be
minimum public interest standards and we proposed some very broad ones.

And I hope you all looked at that rulemaking because I think just the
adoption of some standards will get us all thinking about it, and will
really improve localism.

The second thing is the truth is that we all need to sit down and talk
about this, because we all know \-- everybody that \-- I\'m not
suggesting that broadcasters serve the public interest or don\'t serve
it. I\'m just saying that there\'s no reporting systems that anybody
knows. In particular, the public doesn\'t know.

So that\'s why the Gore Commission proposed a new quarterly reporting
form that would give some more information to the public about how the
station is doing. I am \-- you\'ve never heard me say that and you
won\'t, that I think our stations are better than anybody\'s. I\'m not
saying good, bad or indifferent. I\'m saying the truth is we don\'t
know.

There\'s no system by which any data is collected to set any sort of
standards in terms of serving the public interest. And I hope \-- I\'ve
read these \-- I\'ve learned some \-- I\'ve got some ideas for our
stations today from this hearing. I hope these hearings don\'t hold up
those rulemakings.

We\'ve got to get the minimum public interest standards done, we\'ve got
to get rulemaking done. And, Mr. Chairman, I can\'t ask \-- I could, but
I can\'t ask you for must carry if I\'m not committed to serving the
public interest. That\'s why I get it and you won\'t tell me what it is.

Now, that\'s an oversimplification, but do you see what I mean? The
whole idea is we\'re supposed to serve the public interest. Tell us what
the minimum standards are, you got a rulemaking, tell us what reporting
is, you got a rulemaking, and we can really roll and really get into a
discussion about what all this is.

When you were on the Commission I did this, so this Gore Commission was
five years ago. But I think this makes sense. Minimum standards \-- you
know, show me an industry without standards, and I\'ll show you an
industry without standards. I mean, I\'m not saying that the
broadcasting industry is bad. I think there are great broadcasters and I
think they\'re doing a good job.

But we can\'t have this discussion in terms of talking about how good
we\'re doing if there\'s not some reference point. I just really hope
that we can get to those two rulemakings soon. Thank you very much.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Next we have Ms. Mary Klenz, Co-president of the League
of Women Voters of North Carolina. Welcome.

MS. KLENZ: Welcome to Charlotte, Commissioners, and Chairman Powell.
I\'m also the past president of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg League of
Women Voters, and I would like to speak tonight to you about some of the
concerns that my organization have.

The League of Women Voters is very concerned with the high cost of
election campaigns, which is directly related to the cost of TV
advertising, and also concerned with the decline in public affairs
coverage and how these factors relate to civic participation, like
running for office and voter turn out.

One billion dollars was spent on political TV advertising in the 2002
election. That was 25 percent of all the money spent in all the
campaigns. Only 50 percent of eligible North Carolina voters turned out
in the 2000 election.

Meaningful political coverage has declined over the last thirty years.
Citizens get a majority of their news from TV and radio, and that main
source of information is available only through political ads. That
really does our democracy a disservice. It becomes a self-perpetuating
spiral downward. Less information, less voting, less information.

It is unfair that broadcasters charge such high prices for political ads
the closer it gets to election day. The airwaves belong to the public.
They use them at no charge with the understanding that they will serve
the public good. The League of Women Voters believes that they are not
living up to their part of the bargain.

Broadcasters have an abundance of talent and creativity at their
disposal. The weather is interesting, commercials are effective in
getting a message out, and they make outstanding use of graphics, color
and design.

Why can\'t all that talent be directed to programming that informs the
public on issues, voting, elections and who is running for office? Let
me cite a few examples of how effective TV can be when it becomes
involved in these issues.

The League used to be invited to answer viewer questions on local TV
stations during election time. I was astonished at the number of calls
we received; many times over 200 calls within a two-hour period. Without
exception we couldn\'t begin to take all the calls. Regrettably that
practice was discontinued.

WTVI is our local PBS station and it is known for its local programming.
The League has partnered with them on candidate debates for elections of
city council, mayor, county commission, school board and the three U.S.
house districts represented in our area.

I don\'t know of any other time when all local candidates on the ballot
in these local elections answered questions before an area-wide TV
audience. This is done with volunteers working with WTVI and we continue
to receive positive feedback from both voters and candidates.

We are concerned that business concerns seem to have overtaken \-- seems
to have taken precedence over the public interest. You Commissioners
have the job of figuring out how to balance these concerns with the
obligations that broadcasters have to provide meaningful information to
the public about voting and elections. From everything lay members
report to us, they are not getting that now. Thank you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: Thank you. Mr. Rustin, the Director of Government
Relations, North Carolina Family Policy Council.

MR. RUSTIN: Thank you, Chairman Powell and Commissioners for holding
these hearings and for providing the North Carolina Family Policy
Council the opportunity to participate.

The responsiveness of radio and television broadcasters to the needs and
interests of local communities and to the standards that define these
communities are of critical importance to the issue of localism.

While families across North Carolina and the nation have an
ever-increasing number of radio and television programming options, this
growth in choice does not necessarily translate into higher levels of
local consumer satisfaction. In fact, we are hearing more concerns from
both parents and children about the offensive and indecent content that
pervades much of television and radio programming and advertising today.

The growth in competition for market share appears to be driving many to
continually push the envelope of content and decency. The current trend
toward so-called reality shows is a prime example. Although these shows
may not rise to the level of indecency, they are designed to cater to
the base interest of the viewer.

In North Carolina we are fortunate to have the leadership of individuals
like Jim Goodmon, whose CBS and Fox affiliates preempted a number of
these programs because they demean marriage and family and run counter
to local community standards. If these stations were not locally owned
and operated, there is little doubt that these programs would have been
aired in the Raleigh-Durham area.

For this reason the North Carolina Family Policy Council testified at an
FCC field hearing on media concentration in March in opposition to the
proposed increase in the national media ownership cap. We believe that a
station owner who resides in his or her own local community is more
likely to understand and respond to local standards than someone making
programming decisions from hundreds or thousands of miles away.

Even communities fortunate enough to have some responsive local
broadcasters are still often overwhelmed by indecent radio and
television content. Consumers must have a reliable system to address
offensive and indecent programming.

Because the viewing and listening public bears the burden to prove the
content and the context of reported indecency, requiring local
broadcasters to maintain and make available several months of
programming tapes or transcripts, would aid citizens in their efforts to
ensure that community standards are being upheld.

In addition, consumers rely upon the FCC to ensure that broadcasters are
truly serving the public interest. Strict enforcement of indecency and
obscenity laws and regulations are critical. We thank the FCC, for
example, for its recent action regarding indecent content on the [Opie
and Anthony Show]{.underline}.

However, more swift and consistent enforcement action, including
higher-level fines and the initiation of license revocation hearings,
especially for repeat offenders, would instill a higher level of public
confidence.

Localism at its core requires the involvement of the local citizens.
Providing a system of local programming that is respectful of community
standards, as well as a realistic and responsive enforcement mechanism
for addressing indecency violations, will encourage citizens to become
more involved in local broadcasting and will help to ensure the quality
programming we all desire. Thank you.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: And finally Mr. Michael Ward, General Manager of
WNCN-TV.

MR. WARD: Good evening, Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, Ladies and
Gentlemen, Representative Price and Representative Watt. My name is
Michael Ward. I\'m the general manager of WNCN-TV, the NBC owned and
operated television station in Raleigh, Durham. That\'s right; I\'m one
of the big guys that everybody has spoken unfortunately about so badly
about this evening.

I\'ve spent more than a quarter century working in television, starting
out in my home state of South Dakota as a photographer to my current
position here as a key decision-maker for NBC and its operation of its
television station in the Raleigh-Durham market.

Across that career I\'ve worked many jobs at many television stations
and many different \-- and for many different kinds of owners, and I\'ve
learned one thing is true about TV. Successful television stations,
regardless of who they\'re owned by, regardless of the money behind them
or the lack of money behind them, are successful for three reasons:
local involvement, local relevance and local acceptance.

It doesn\'t matter where they go or whence they came from. Without those
three things embraced by the television station, the station will die.

The recent ownership of our station is a good example. Almost seven
years ago WNCN was owned by a company that provided paid programming,
religious programming and home shopping as it filled its air for its
viewers. Since NBC purchased the television station almost seven years
ago now, that low-cost cutting program strategy that did not work has
been replaced by a television station committed to local relevance,
local involvement and a gain of local acceptance.

A few of the things that we\'ve done during that time, of course, is add
about sixty percent more local news than was available before we came.
We\'ve added a half hour public relations or public affairs shows.
We\'ve set a set standard of public affairs announcements, public
service announcements on our air.

We\'ve produced a number of programs for various charitable and service
organizations across the state. We produce an annual show for the NAACP;
we produce an annual live ecumenical church service from downtown
Raleigh on Easter morning. We produce a weekly half hour local
artist-oriented music show featuring club artists in Chapel Hill, Durham
and Raleigh.

We broadcast countless specials, we provide realtime closed captioning
of every special news event that we do, and most recently preempted
prime time programming for two live mayoral debates for the local
mayoral race of interest in our market.

We produce healthcare, blood drives, breast cancer research drives and
on and on and on. But perhaps most importantly we require that every one
of our department heads and employees participates actively on a church
board, a local service board, charitable institution board, because
it\'s their personal conduit to our community that counts the most in
the actions that we take.

What\'s happened because of this? We\'re doing a lot better
businesswise. And the reason I come to speak to you tonight is to tell
you that local service is good business. It\'s practiced by most all, if
not every single broadcaster in the State of North Carolina associated
with the State\'s Broadcaster\'s Association, it\'s practiced by NBC and
its owned and operated television stations, both English language and
Spanish language.

Commissioners and Mr. Chairman, I\'m proud to tell you that the rules as
they exist right now for the support and development of localism work
and we\'re a shining example of the reason why.

Thank you for your time and I welcome your questions.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I\'m going to tell you, the hour has gotten late and
we\'ve cut into the questions because of extending the open mike. I will
present one and I think we\'re going to wrap it up and let anyone who
wants to speak with Commissioner Copps of our staff, do so. I\'m just
going to direct this to Mr. Goodmon.

I found it interesting I got an E-mail from a member of this Charlotte
community. He says he wants to register a complaint, and I don\'t know
if this is your station, WBTV, Channel 3 Charlotte.

This station is constantly preempting regular CBS programming for local
broadcasts such as St. Jude\'s. So far this year they\'ve preempted
programming three times, then they put the regular programming on at
2:30 in the morning. I hate this.

I\'m missing the ACC basketball, which is like religion here.

(Laughter.)

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I guess that raises a question that preemption is an
important part of local programming, but the consumers also have a
desire to see some of the programming that comes from the national
audience and is important to them as well.

Can you tell us a little bit about the thought process of when to
preempt and when you represent the view of the community and how you do
that?

MR. GOODMON: We\'re not WBT.

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I didn\'t think so.

MR. GOODMON: I wish we were.

(Laughter.)

MR. GOODMON: No, I don\'t. But it\'s interesting; in Raleigh we are a
CBS affiliate and we have ACC basketball and we\'re sort of in a
duplicate situation. I haven\'t found that \-- I mean, our preemption
pattern is such that the community is used to it. That is, they know
we\'re going to do ACC basketball. They\'re used to our preempting for
specials every now and then and they are also used to how we handle it,
which is we run it later at night.

Obviously there\'s some fans of a weekly show that are disappointed when
we preempt it for basketball, but I really believe our preemptions are
so predictable as WBT\'s that it\'s not a problem.

Digital is going to help this a lot. For example, we can run a couple of
things. We can do basketball and CBS on digital, and moving into digital
is going to help us in a lot of these areas.

COMMISSIONER COPPS: Can I ask a quick question on preemption while
we\'re on the subject, because this goes more to community values and
local values and I\'m interested \--

CHAIRMAN POWELL: I don\'t mean to cut you off, Commissioner. I just want
to \-- I also have to catch a plane regrettably, and I just wanted to
let you finish your question, but to take the opportunity to thank the
people of Charlotte.

I found this a useful and important and meaningful hearing. I appreciate
your patience, I appreciate your commitment, and I really think it\'s
been a very valuable exercise.

On behalf of myself and the staff at the Federal Communications
Commission, I applaud you and thank you for your efforts and enjoyed
your hospitality. Thank you very much.

COMMISSIONER COPPS: I\'m interested in kind of the decision-making
process. I know, Mr. Ward, you run an owned-and-operated station. How
many programs have you preempted in the period of the last year because
of your feeling that perhaps they were contrary to the values and
sensibilities of your community?

MR. WARD: I have not preempted based on my sensibilities of the
community and its values. We\'ve preempted for news specials, we\'ve
preempted for local events that we felt overrode the importance of what
the network offered or the other programming we had available.
COMMISSIONER COPPS: Let me ask Mr. Goodmon that. Have you felt the need
to overrule what the network fare was for your community?

MR. GOODMON: Yeah, we \-- yes, sir, and it had \-- yes; the answer is
yes. I mean, we just decided rightly or wrongly, just we decided that
we\'re not going to make fun of marriage. And we can\'t clean up
television; there\'s all kind of violent stuff all over television, and
we just said there\'s a line here and if people are going to meet each
other, then get married ten minutes later and fly off together, and
we\'re not going to do that.

And we just did that and I appreciate people thanking us, but I don\'t
\-- we\'re not right or wrong or anything. It\'s just a decision that we
made. I think, you know, we have a problem that the network will not
give us the material ahead of time, so we have to go on what we hear
about the program, we talk to the network about it, what we read about
it in the press. Sometimes we can get a pre- feed, but on reality
programs we can\'t. So just on the marriage thing we said no deal.

COMMISSIONER COPPS: Let me ask you a general question, and if anybody
else wants to comment on it perhaps they could.

But kind of the message I take from this meeting tonight is people in
this community impart great value to localism, and I think they\'re
proud and congratulatory of those broadcast outlets who are nurturing
and nourishing localism. And I take away an equally strong feeling that
people are, by and large, alarmed that there are serious threats to
localism.

And as we wind this hearing up, I\'m just trying to get clear in my own
mind, how do you start to get at something like this? Some say that, you
know, we shouldn\'t be talking too much about structural rules, maybe
these ownership rules.

But what I\'m hearing in this audience is a lot of people are saying
that structural rules and loosening the ownership cap that the
Commission voted may be pernicious to the cause of localism. Others say
that no, that\'s a cumbersome way to go about spurring the public
interest and encouraging the public interest and that there are some
sorts of behavioral rules as a whole menu of those.

Is there some kind of silver bullet here or are we looking at really a
mix whereby we have to address \-- if you\'re going to talk
intelligently about localism, we have to address not just the behavioral
rules, the licensing renewal and all that, but also be cognizant of the
lingering effects of those structural decisions.

Let me ask Jim to start with that and anybody else that wants to
comment.

MR. GOODMON: Right. I think it\'s a mix. I mean, we have multiple
ownership and in many cases it\'s working fine. I mean, what we\'re
talking about is you all just passed a rule that one company can own 370
television stations.

COMMISSIONER COPPS: Don\'t say you all because I wasn\'t a part of that.

(Laughter.)

MR. GOODMON: I mean, I\'ll tell you, we\'ve got a great group of owners.
The question is what is the \-- how far do we go with this. And I think
most people think we\'ve gone about far enough.

I would say that the single most important determinant of how a station
operates is who owns it. I mean, it ought to be. Now, you can have all
the rules you want to about what your stations are supposed to do, but,
you know, the stations reflect the owner.

And the larger the owner gets by definition, just by definition, the
more the corporate welfare \-- the larger it gets, the more the
corporate welfare drives the bottom line, which means by definition
there\'ll be less attention to localism. By definition. I mean, that\'s
just an economic definition.

I don\'t think Jim \-- I don\'t think the groups are too big now. I
think we\'ve got a good \-- I don\'t think anybody\'s saying we should
go back. I think all we\'re talking about is how far we want to go. But
I think there \-- the answer to your question is both; I think we should
have both.

COMMISSIONER COPPS: Does anyone else care to comment?

MR. KEELOR: Well, I agree with Jim; I think the ownership makes the
difference. And again, speaking only for our company and I\'ll give a
personal opinion here that some broadcasters would disagree with, but I
don\'t think there\'s \-- every acquisition we\'ve made in the last
three years has been a private owner.

And we have immediately taken a profit loss in that acquisition because
of the cost of a benefits plan, because of the way you wanted to outfit
the station, and the way we wanted them to serve the community.

But we took that step back knowing when we made those investments, three
to five years from now we would be ahead of the game and we were willing
to do it. Clearly not a lot of companies can do that. We\'re in an
unusual position.

But the statement that I would make is that I think I would be willing
to accept additional public defined interest standards if I were allowed
to own two television stations in the same market. And I know
Commissioner Copps does not favor that position, but let me tell you
folks, a lot of these complaints about radio, half the radio stations
mentioned wouldn\'t be on the air today had consolidation not happened,
and radio business was out of the business in a period, dead air.
Consolidation saved it.

Now, some of the things you\'ve heard we don\'t like; I agree with that.
The point is in some television markets that\'s going to happen if we
don\'t allow consolidation. We need to allow consolidation; it needs to
be with the right owners who are willing to make the right commitments.

But I have to tell you, I can wake up tomorrow morning and in Columbia,
South Carolina where we have had the number one station for fifty years,
and I\'m really proud of what they do, we are being penalized because
under the new rules, the newspaper can buy up a second television
station in the market tomorrow morning, the cable system can buy up a
third, the radio group in there can buy the fourth, and because I\'m the
leading station, I can\'t buy anything.

Show me the balance and the fairness and the equity of that. That we
have now been penalized under the rules for being the number one station
and serving our community. That cannot stand and that\'s why we\'re
supporting the court action against it.

But I would support public interest standards of a defined basis in
order to do \-- into the middle and small sized markets. That\'s my
position, not maybe my company\'s position. It certainly isn\'t probably
any of these positions or anybody else\'s.

But I agree with Jim; ownership makes all the difference in the world.
And one of the toughest things that\'s happened is when the FCC changed
the rules that allowed the financial players to get into the business,
and in three years turn them around and cut them to pieces, then sell
them again to somebody else. And there\'s a whole wave of money out
there waiting to do the same damn thing because they\'ve called us.

So, I mean, if I were to ask the Commission do anything, it\'s to look
at the responsibility of what an owner has to do, what he has to do to
invest in a station, and how long he has to keep it.

COMMISSIONER COPPS: And I think that point about public interest
standards and DT broadcasters are so integral. And to his credit, the
Chairman has done a masterful job in trying to encourage the digital
television transition, and getting the mechanics of that straightened
away and commitments from the broadcasters and cable and everybody.

But here is this gaping hole that you\'ve talked about, the central
overriding question, how is the ability to multicast going to be used to
benefit the public interest; and we have not done justice to that. I
think we are going to get it teed up, I hope we can get it teed up
because there\'s nothing more important we have do.

I am certainly willing to stay around here and perhaps some of the
panelists are too, but I know some of us have to get home and they have
commitments.

On behalf of Chairman Powell and Commissioner Adelstein and myself, I
want to thank everybody who has been a part of this hearing and the
panel. This has been very helpful I think to the Commission and we look
forward to doing other hearings around the country.

So thank you, Charlotte, and thank you, North Carolina, for helping us.

(WHEREUPON, the hearing was concluded at 9:04 P. M.)

\* \* \* \* \* \* \* \*

STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA )

) **[C E R T I F I C A T E]{.underline}**

COUNTY OF MECKLENBURG )

I, JoAnn M. Harris, Official Court Reporter, do hereby certify that the
aforesaid proceeding was taken and transcribed by me, and that the
foregoing one hundred-fifty (150) pages constitute a verbatim
transcription of the testimony of the foregoing proceeding. I do further
certify that the persons were present as stated.

I do further certify that I am not of counsel for or in the employment
of any of the parties to this action, nor do I have any interest in the
result thereof.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto subscribed my name, this 7th day of
November, 2003.

JoAnn M. Harris

Official Court Reporter