Fighting Over a Sliver Of a Long Spectrum     
The calls are coming from the communications industry, which wants access to the frequencies to bring a range of new wireless services to market. Lawmakers, meanwhile, hope the billions of dollars the federal government will reap by auctioning the spectrum to interested companies will help trim the budget deficit. And emergency first-responders - whose influence in Washington has risen sharply since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks - want a slice of the airwaves to upgrade their radio systems.

The alignment of those three interests has improved chances that Congress will give broadcasters the boot from the coveted frequencies. A plan that is gaining momentum in both chambers would require TV stations to return the analog spectrum to the government by 2009 as part of a transition to digital broadcasts on other channels. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee chairman, has scheduled hearings on the issue for July 12, and aides say they are beginning to draft a bill. Joe L. Barton, R-Texas, House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman, has already floated a draft digital TV transition proposal with a 2009 deadline.

Industry analysts and congressional aides widely expect this to be the year Congress takes on the TV broadcasters, though they acknowledge that proponents of the measures will have to work within the limits of a Senate agenda that will now include what many expect will be lengthy hearings on a nominee for the Supreme Court.

"There are some very powerful policy drivers," said Paul Gallant, a media analyst for Stanford Washington Research Group, which provides policy analysis for institutional investors. "The odds favor passage of a bill."

In 1997, the Federal Communications Commission, implementing provisions of the 1996 telecommunications overhaul (PL 104-104), gave broadcasters a free slice of spectrum to use for digital television. Later that year, lawmakers in the budget act (PL 105-33) tried to mandate a transition to digital TV by setting Dec. 31, 2006, as a deadline for stations to stop broadcasting on analog frequencies. (1997 Almanac, p. 3-34)

The National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), the industry's leading trade group, mounted fierce opposition to the proposal, arguing that TV sets in millions of American homes could go dark if analog broadcasts were cut off. In the end, the bill allowed stations to keep the analog frequencies until 85 percent of their market had equipment capable of viewing digital signals - a threshold that has effectively granted stations indefinite control of the spectrum.

Broadcasters are using similar rhetoric this year as Congress considers new proposals to strip them of the prized frequencies. But now lawmakers are weighing those arguments against what they are told are compelling benefits of clearing the spectrum for commercial and public safety uses.

Industry Eyes Spectrum
Industry supporters of the digital transition say there are much better uses for the broadcast spectrum than outdated analog television. Signals on those frequencies - which are in the 700 MHz band and correspond to TV channels 52 through 69 - can pass through walls easily and travel long distances.

Those characteristics make the spectrum perfect for wireless broadband services. One emerging technology, WiMAX, is being designed to offer wireless Internet connections that can reach as far as 30 miles, a much wider span than the "Wi-Fi" connections offered at many airports and coffee shops.

Among WiMAX's biggest backers is Intel Corp., which is investing in firms planning to deploy the technology, developing some of the component hardware that will carry wireless signals to consumers, and promising to build WiMAX chips into laptops by 2007 or 2008.

Peter K. Pitsch, Intel's communications policy director, says freeing up the frequencies for uses such as WiMAX would give consumers more broadband Internet options. "It could be a unique opportunity to promote broadband competition everywhere, and low-cost deployment in rural areas, especially," he said.

Aloha Partners, a wireless company that already holds some licenses in the 700 MHz band, is building a broadband network intended to reach mainly rural areas left behind by the cable and phone giants. The company could bid for additional frequencies after the digital TV transition.

Traditional wireless carriers have plans too. For example, T-Mobile, the fourth-largest U.S. wireless carrier, is considering ways to expand its data services using the TV spectrum.
"We're very enthusiastic about doing even more in advanced wireless and broadband," said Kathleen Ham, T-Mobile's managing director of regulatory affairs. "However, there needs to be more spectrum in the market for this expansion to occur."

Satellite providers may also want a piece of the spectrum to speed up communications between their broadband Internet users and network backbone, known as the "return path" of Internet communications.

Some companies, such as Qualcomm Inc., have plans to use the broadcast spectrum to bring television and other entertainment to consumers on their mobile phones. "We think there's a really significant market for content on mobile phones," said Alice Tornquist, a Qualcomm lobbyist. Tornquist said the company already is targeting selected markets for trials.
Lawmakers are hoping the communications industry will be willing to put up a lot of cash in an FCC auction to win the rights to the vacated TV frequencies. Republican budget writers are counting on that revenue to help trim the deficit this year.

Estimates for how much money the spectrum auction might bring have varied. Recent estimates submitted separately to Congress by the Brattle Group, working on behalf of Qualcomm, and Aloha have pegged the value at between $20 billion and $30 billion.

Hill aides say the Congressional Budget Office, which will have the last word on the matter, is contemplating a figure closer to $10 billion. Either way, that is a substantial sum that could help ease painful cuts to other government programs.

Echoes of Sept. 11
While the budgetary benefits of the digital transition appeal mainly to fiscal conservatives, the potential benefits for policemen, firefighters and other emergency personnel are broadly popular.

Of the 108 MHz in analog TV spectrum that will become available with the transition to digital TV broadcasts, Congress has reserved 24 MHz for first-responders. Emergency agencies would be able to use the additional frequencies to help make their differing communications systems compatible with one another. The Sept. 11 commission said radio malfunctions and communications miscues contributed to the deaths of many firefighters and police officers at the World Trade Center. (2004 CQ Weekly, p. 2266)

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., cited the benefits for public safety when he introduced his own digital TV bill (S 1268) on June 20. "Access to this specific spectrum is essential to our nation's safety and welfare . . . and can assist multiple jurisdictions in deploying interoperable communications systems," McCain said.

Barton said his draft legislation will "make it easier for these public servants to catch criminals, fight fires and save lives."
All the lobbying by the industry and public safety groups has made its mark on lawmakers and given the digital TV legislation a good chance of passing this year, said J.H. Snider, a senior research fellow and spectrum policy expert at the New America Foundation.

"I wouldn't say the broadcasters are less powerful, but their opponents have more clout now," Snider said.

Broadcasters, though, are not going down without a fight. In late May, NAB began running ads in Capitol Hill newspapers urging lawmakers not to give more than 20 million homes "a snow job" by taking away their television service. The Government Accountability Office estimates that about 21 million Americans rely on over-the-air TV programming.
Those efforts have paid some dividends, though they won't fend off Congress' digital TV push altogether. Instead, lawmakers in both parties are supporting a subsidy to help households with analog TV sets buy equipment that can process digital signals.

While the parties have yet to agree on the size of the subsidy - the Democrats want all analog sets covered, while Republicans want only the poorest households targeted - both sides agree that some amount will be in the final bill. (CQ Weekly, p. 1124)

Snider says he will not be surprised if broadcasters win some other benefits in final negotiations on a digital TV bill. The stations want Congress, for example, to guarantee that all their digital programming is carried by cable providers after the digital transition. Digital "multicasting" allows broadcasters to transmit multiple programming streams on a single channel.
The broadcasters' best chance of stopping the digital TV measure altogether may lie in the Senate, often a trap for complex legislation and possibly more so in a year when one or more Supreme Court confirmation fights could tie up significant floor time.

Another complication in the Senate is the measure's likely vehicle: a broader budget bill later this year seeking governmentwide savings. Strict Senate rules on what types of provisions can go in reconciliation bills may make it difficult to include the digital TV language.