Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-04-01384/USCOURTS-caDC-04-01384-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Clark County School District
Intervenor
Federal Communications Commission
Appellee
North American Catholic Educational Programming Foundation, Inc.
Appellant

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued January 13, 2006 Decided January 31, 2006

No. 04-1384

NORTH AMERICAN CATHOLIC EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMMING

FOUNDATION, INC.,

APPELLANT

v.

FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION,

APPELLEE

CLARK COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT,

INTERVENOR

Appeal of an Order of the

Federal Communications Commission

Eric H. Zagrans argued the cause for appellant. On the

briefs was Howard J. Barr.

Gregory M. Christopher, Counsel, Federal Communications

Commission, argued the cause for appellee. With him on the

brief were Samuel L. Feder, General Counsel, Richard K.

Welch, Associate General Counsel, and Daniel M. Armstrong,

Associate General Counsel. Roberta L. Cook, Counsel, entered

an appearance.

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Todd Stansbury argued the cause for intervenor. With him

on the brief was Eve Klindera Reed.

Before: SENTELLE, Circuit Judge, EDWARDS and

WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge SENTELLE.

SENTELLE, Circuit Judge: The North American Catholic

Educational Programming Foundation (“the Foundation”)

petitions for review of a decision by the Federal

Communications Commission (“FCC” or “the Commission”).

The Commission denied the Foundation’s licensing application

for Instructional Television Fixed Services (“ITFS”) and instead

granted the license to the Clark County School District

(“CCSD” or “the District”). The Foundation contends the FCC

unlawfully waived the applicability of a rule limiting CCSD to

only four ITFS channels. However, we lack jurisdiction over

the Foundation’s petition because it was untimely filed. We

therefore dismiss the petition for review. 

I

ITFS licenses empower competing broadcasters—such as

the Foundation and the District—to provide educational and

cultural programming to schools, hospitals, nursing homes,

training centers, clinics, and rehabilitation centers. The FCC is

statutorily obligated to dole out ITFS licenses so “as to provide

a fair, efficient, and equitable distribution of” the microwave

spectrum. 47 U.S.C. § 307(b). Pursuant to this statutory

mandate, the Commission has promulgated rules that limit each

licensee to no more than four ITFS channels per market. See 47

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 In 2004, the Commission prospectively amended and transferred its

four-channel limit. See In re Amendment of Parts 1, 21, 73, 74 and

101 of the Commission’s Rules, 19 F.C.C.R. 14,165, 14,325 (2004).

The changes to the four-channel limit, which is now codified at 47

C.F.R. § 27.5(i)(3)(ii), do not affect this case.

C.F.R. § 74.902(d) (1993).1 If a licensee seeks licenses to

operate more than four ITFS channels, it must petition for a

waiver. See In re Amendment of Part 74 of the Commission’s

Rules & Regulations in Regard to the Instructional Television

Fixed Service, 98 F.C.C. 2d 925, 933 (1984) (“Waiver Order”).

“Such requests must include a complete description of how the

additional channels will be used for traditional ITFS purposes

and why present channel capacity is insufficient to

accommodate the additional needs. The waiver burden will be

exceedingly high particularly in areas where a large demand for

channels exists.” Id.

On May 13, 1992, the Foundation applied for an ITFS

license to serve the Henderson, Nevada market. Eighteen

months later, the FCC issued a public notice regarding the

Foundation’s application and called for competing applications

(if any) to be filed by December 30, 1993. On December 30,

1993, CCSD filed a competing application, along with a waiver

request, because the District already owned licenses for 8 ITFS

channels. On April 21, 1997, the FCC’s Mass Media Bureau

(“MMB”) concluded that CCSD was the comparatively superior

licensee for the Henderson, Nevada ITFS license. See In re

Applications of N. Am. Catholic Educ. Programming Found.,

Inc., Henderson Nevada, 12 F.C.C.R. 24,449, 24,450-51 (1997).

Accordingly, the MMB granted the District’s application (along

with its waiver request) and denied the Foundation’s application.

Id. at 24,453. More than six years later, on September 11, 2003,

the full Commission released an order denying the Foundation’s

petition for review. In re Clark County Sch. Dist., 18 F.C.C.R.

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18,815 (2003) (“Licensing Order”). On October 8, 2004, the

full Commission declined to reconsider its decision. In re

Application of Clark County Sch. Dist., 19 F.C.C.R. 20,169

(2004) (“Reconsideration Order”). 

Thirty-two days after the Commission released its

Reconsideration Order, the Foundation filed a notice of appeal

under 47 U.S.C. § 402(b)(1). After this Court issued an order to

show cause why the appeal should not be dismissed as untimely,

the Foundation refashioned its argument as a petition for review

of the grant of the District’s waiver application under 47 U.S.C.

§ 402(a). Because § 402(b)(1) has a thirty-day deadline, while

§ 402(a) has a sixty-day deadline, the Foundation’s challenge is

timely only if brought under the latter. 

II

It is well established that 47 U.S.C. § 402 “describes two

mutually exclusive channels for the review of FCC decisions.”

Vernal Enters., Inc. v. FCC, 355 F.3d 650, 655 (D.C. Cir. 2004);

see also Tribune Co. v. FCC, 133 F.3d 61, 66 & n.4 (D.C. Cir.

1998); Freeman Eng’g Assocs. v. FCC, 103 F.3d 169, 177 (D.C.

Cir. 1997); Friedman v. FCC, 263 F.2d 493, 494 (D.C. Cir.

1959). Section 402(b) provides for appeals of FCC orders in

nine enumerated situations, including licensing. For all other

final orders of the Commission, § 402(a) provides that review

shall be sought through the general petition process prescribed

in 28 U.S.C. §§ 2341-2351. Under § 402(b), an “appeal” must

be filed in this Court within thirty days of the date of public

notice of the order at issue. See 47 U.S.C. § 402(c). By

contrast, a “petition” for review under § 402(a) must be filed

within sixty days of the date of public notice. See 28 U.S.C. §

2344. Under either provision, an untimely appeal or petition

“must be dismissed” for lack of jurisdiction. Waterway

Commc’ns Sys., Inc. v. FCC, 851 F.2d 401, 405 (D.C. Cir. 1988)

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(emphasis in original (citation and internal quotations omitted)).

The Foundation contends that our jurisdiction is governed

by § 402(a). In the Foundation’s view, the Licensing Order can

be bifurcated into a “waiver decision” (which is challengeable

under § 402(a)) and a “licensing decision” (which is

challengeable under § 402(b)(1)). Because the petition is

limited to challenging the Commission’s “waiver decision,” the

Foundation argues that § 402(a) is applicable and that the

petition for review was timely. 

We reject the Foundation’s argument because it does

violence to the statutory text. Congress carved out a specific

provision—§ 402(b)(1)—to govern “decisions and orders”

affecting licensing. As a result, the Licensing Order is

challengeable only under subsection (b), not the generally

applicable subsection (a). See Morales v. Trans World Airlines,

Inc., 504 U.S. 374, 384 (1992) (“[I]t is a commonplace of

statutory construction that the specific governs the general.”);

see also Crawford Fitting Co. v. J.T. Gibbons, Inc., 482 U.S.

437, 445 (1987). Moreover, § 402(a) applies only to final

orders, see 28 U.S.C. § 2342(1), and the “waiver decision” was

not a “final order.” See Bennett v. Spear, 520 U.S. 154, 178

(1977) (holding an agency’s action is final and reviewable only

if, inter alia, it “mark[s] the ‘consummation’ of the agency’s

decisionmaking process–it must not be of a merely tentative or

interlocutory nature”) (quoting Chicago & Southern Air Lines,

Inc. v. Waterman S.S. Corp., 333 U.S. 103, 113 (1948)). As the

Commission has previously ruled, a licensee’s waiver petition

(and the FCC’s decision on it) is incident to a larger licensing

proceeding. See Waiver Order, 98 F.C.C. 2d at 933 (ruling that

waiver requests must be submitted by “ITFS applicants and

licensees seeking more than one channel group”). Accordingly,

a “waiver decision” does not “mark the ‘consummation’ of the

agency’s decisionmaking process.”

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The absence of finality is sufficient to preclude our

jurisdiction over the Foundation’s petition for review. See

Shurberg v. FCC, 1998 WL 202139, *1 (D.C. Cir. Mar 31,

1998) (per curiam); cf. Natural Res. Def. Council, Inc. v.

Nuclear Regulatory Comm’n, 680 F.2d 810, 815-17 (D.C. Cir.

1982). As an independent basis for dismissing the petition for

review, we note that “[j]urisdiction for review of FCC licensingrelated decisions is governed by § 402(b).” Waterway

Commc’ns Sys., 851 F.2d at 403 (emphasis added). This

jurisdiction includes Commission decisions which involve issues

“ancillary” to the grants or denials of licenses. For example, in

Tomah-Mauston Broad. Co., Inc. v. FCC, 306 F.2d 811, 812

(D.C. Cir. 1962), we held that a Commission order “ancillary”

to the grant of a construction permit . . . is reviewable under

Section 402(b)(6).” In contrast, in Freeman Engineering, we

held the denial of a licensing “preference” was not reviewable

under § 402(b) because “[t]he Commission does not grant

licenses at the time a pioneer’s preference is awarded. Nor does

the grant of a preference irrevocably commit the Commission to

grant a license.” 103 F.3d at 177. In this case, the

Commission’s grant of a rule waiver to CCSD was ancillary to

the ultimate licensing decision, as evidenced in part by the fact

that the waiver and licensing decisions were rendered

simultaneously.

Furthermore, the Commission’s decision to grant CCSD’s

waiver request was a logically necessary prerequisite to the

Commission’s decision to grant the District’s ITFS licensing

application. Without the FCC’s “waiver decision,” CCSD

would have lost the “licensing decision” because of the

Commission’s four-channel limit. Thus, the two halves of the

Licensing Order operated together to grant the District’s ITFS

application. Accordingly, we hold that the Licensing Order, as

an inseparable whole, is challengeable (if at all) only under §

402(b)(1).

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Because a “decision or order” may be challenged under §

402(b) only “within thirty days from the date upon which public

notice is given of the decision or order complained of,” 47

U.S.C. § 402(c), and because the Foundation filed its appeal

thirty-two days after receiving notice that the Licensing Order

was final, the Foundation’s petition “must be dismissed” for lack

of jurisdiction. Waterway Commc’ns Sys., 851 F.2d at 405

(emphasis in original (citation and internal quotations omitted)).

III Conclusion

In sum, the Commission’s “waiver decision” was

inextricably tied to its “licensing decision,” and therefore, the

Licensing Order as a whole is governed by § 402(b)(1). The

Foundation missed that subsection’s 30-day filing deadline, and

therefore, the appeal must be dismissed.

So ordered.

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