[opendtv] News: HOuse Passes DTV Bill
- From: Craig Birkmaier <craig@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: OpenDTV Mail List <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 21 Nov 2005 06:51:54 -0500
http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/CA6285138.html?display=Breaking+News&referral=SUPP&nid=2228
House Passes DTV Bill
By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 11/18/2005 10:54:00 AM
The full House passed the budget reconciliation bill 217-215 in the
wee hours of Friday morning. House Commerce Committee Chairman Joe
Barton (R-Tex.) cast the last vote, but don't look for a final bill
on a DTV hard date or converter box subsidy anytime soon.
Passing intact as part of that legislation was the Commerce
Committee's DTV transition bill.
That bill sets a hard date of Dec. 31, 2008, for the cut-off of
analog TV service and the return of spectrum for auction, bringing
billions to the treasury--some say as much as $30 billion.
But before Uncle Sam gets his hands on that money, $990 million will
be set aside for a converter box to let analog-only sets receive a
DTV signal after analog is cut-off on that date. The bill also
contains a number of other DTV-related items, including money for
first responders, a consumer education campaign and TV set labeling,
and provisions for allowing cable to convert an HDTV signal to
standard DTV, and DTV to analog.
Now comes the hard work of reconciling that bill in conference with
the already-passed Senate version, which sets aside $3 billion for a
subsidy; establishes an April 7, 2009 hard date; and gives twice as
much money to first responders (over a billion versus $500 million).
But that is about all it does because Senate rules prevent
legislating on appropriations bills.
The gulf between the two subsidies is philosophical as well as monetary.
The House version is a first-come, first-served plan that rewards the
first people who get an application, apply to the government for the
subsidy, then redeem the coupons for $40 toward a converter box (up
to two coupons per household).
The subsidy will only cover the first 10 million or so households who
need them. Some estimates put the number of analog-only households at
over 20 million, including many older people and minorities who might
not have access to online forms or be eager to have extended dealing
with the government.
The Senate subsidy would cover all who need the box, simply sending
everyone $40 coupons. Republicans see that plan as a welfare program,
while Democrats frame the House versions as an attempt to save tax
cuts by returning most of the billions from analog spectrum auctions
for deficit reduction at the expense of minorities and poorer people
who most need the DTV subsidy.
The Senate Commerce Committee plans to deal in a second bill with a
number of the issues it had hoped to deal with in the first,
including cable conversion of the DTV signal, set labeling, and
perhaps mandatory cable carriage of a broadcasters digital multicast
signals.
Since the conferenced bill must also meet the Byrd rule test for not
legislating on appropriations bills, the House might have to knock
out some of the provisions not directly related to a hard date and
subsidy and deal with those in a second bill of its own.
Whatever the outcome, the conference negotiations are likely to
stretch into 2006, if they even begin before the legislature returns
from its winter break in January.
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