Opinion ID: 461571
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the salzer application

Text: 16 In the Communications Amendments Act of 1982, Congress authorized the FCC to utilize a system of random selection, a lottery, to select licensees in certain broadcast services. Noting the overwhelming backlog of LPTV applications, Congress expressly stated its desire that LPTV licensees be chosen by lottery. 19 17 The legislature also specified a system of preferences 20 intended to promote diversity of ownership in mass communications media. In addition to the information necessary to assign preferences, the Commission decided to obtain two further certifications from applicants prior to permitting their participation in the lottery. Each prospective licensee is required to certify that she is the real party in interest with reference to that proposal, and that she has not submitted multiple mutually exclusive applications in order to obtain an advantage in the lottery proceeding. 18 On March 31, 1983, the FCC adopted rules to implement the lottery statute for the LPTV service, including provisions for the preference system and the required certifications. This order reaffirmed the Commission's selection of the complete and sufficient standard, and explained the impact of the new lottery-related requirements on the LPTV application form: 19 51. LPTV Application Form. The preference system being adopted in this Report and Order requires the submission of additional information on ownership characteristics and various other certifications by those who have already filed LPTV applications. Form 346, the application for LPTV construction permits is being amended to reflect the new information requirements. See Appendix D ... New mutually exclusive applications ... will be required to conform with all rules and policies in effect, as reflected in the new form. 21 20 The Lottery Report and Order summarized the contents of the forthcoming version of form 346 in Appendix D, and stated that a draft copy of the revised form was available for inspection at the FCC Dockets Branch in Washington, D.C. or, for a fee, through a private copy center. 22 The revised application form, the new requirements and a supplementary form that could be used to amend pending LPTV applications were also published by the FCC in mimeo form on August 19, 1983. 23 This mimeo provides helpful information, but the FCC concedes that it does not constitute official notice. 21 Revised form 346 was not available to LPTV applicants during the time period relevant to this case. Nonetheless, LPTV applicants were required to provide all supplementary information to the Commission after the publication of the Lottery Report and Order. Appellant Salzer failed to supply the required preference and certification information, either by utilizing the unofficially suggested supplementary form or by attempting to glean the new requirements from the Lottery Report and Order and devise her own submission. Her application was therefore dismissed.
22 On September 13, 1983, the FCC published a cut-off list for channel 7 in Honolulu, giving potential applicants thirty days to file competing proposals. On October 13, 1983, the cut-off date, the proposals of Salzer and the other forty-three appellants were filed. The applications were returned by the FCC staff as unacceptable under the complete and sufficient standard for filing because they lacked the preference information and certifications discussed above. Salzer contends that the LPTV rulemaking did not provide clear notice of the FCC's amendment requirements in this regard. Although we believe that Salzer had adequate notice of what information had to be filed, we hold that the Commission was impermissibly vague with respect to when the new submissions were required and what form they had to take. 23 Official notice of the revision of form 346 was clearly provided. The Commission's new informational requirements were adequately described and explained in Appendix D and in several individual paragraphs of the Lottery Report and Order. 24 Unfortunately, however, the unavailability of a revised version of form 346 and the ambiguous language of the Lottery Report and Order combined to mislead applicants with regard to the necessary timing and form of the required submissions. For example, one clearly reasonable interpretation of the Commission's pronouncement that new applicants would be required to conform with all rules and policies in effect, as reflected in the new form was that applicants would have to file on the new form only when it subsequently became available. Second, official notice of the existence of a supplemental form was never given. The FCC asserts that applicants could have engaged in self-help and made the required submissions in any form; however, the unofficial mimeo issued by the FCC appears to mandate the use of the FCC's supplementary form. 25 24 Our finding that the official pronouncements of the FCC were deficient vis-a-vis the timing and form of the necessary submissions is supported by the facts of this case. Of fifty-three applicants for channel 7, forty-four, the appellants in Salzer, failed to file the required supplement. The remaining nine filed the supplementary form provided by the FCC; none submitted a home-made form. Even agency counsel speculated at oral argument that those applicants who filed properly had done so because they had seen the unofficial notice. These circumstances are further evidence that the Lottery Report and Order left applicants confused as to how and when to provide the newly required information. 25 As this court has previously stated, the quid pro quo for stringent acceptability criteria is explicit notice of all application requirements: [w]hen the sanction is as drastic as dismissal without any consideration whatever of the merits, elementary fairness compels clarity in the notice of the material required as a condition for consideration. 26 The less forgiving the FCC's acceptability standard, the more precise its requirements must be. The FCC cannot reasonably expect applications to be letter-perfect when, as here, its instructions for those applications are incomplete, ambiguous or improperly promulgated. The agency failed to give adequate notice as to how and when the preference information and the real party in interest and multiple application certifications should be submitted. Thus, it was not entitled to reject the applications of Salzer and her forty-four co-appellants on the ground that they failed to include these submissions. 27 Therefore, we vacate the FCC's order dismissing these applications and remand this case to the agency for their reinstatement nunc pro tunc.