KEVIN CRAMER NORTH DAKOTA WASHINGTON D.C. OFFICE: 1 032 LoNGWORTH Bun .DING WASHINGTON, DC 20515 202·225·26 I 1 BISMARCK OFFICE: 220 EAsT ROSSER AVENUE SUITE 328 BISMARCK, NORTH DAKOTA 58501 701·224-0355 March 19,2015 CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES WASHINGTON, DC 20515 FARGO OFFICE: 3217 FIECHTNEFI DRIVE, SUITE 0 FARGO. NoRTH DAKOTA 58103 701-356-221 6 MINOT OFFICE: 315 MAIN STREET SOUTH, SUITE 203 MINOT, NORTH DAKOTA 58701 701 -839·0255 GRAND FORKS OFFICE: CENTER FOR INNOVATION FOUNDATION Bt!ILDING 4200 JAMES RAY DRIVE, OFFICE 600 GRAND FORKS, NoRTH DAKOTA 58202 701-738-4880 The Honorable Tom Wheeler Chairman Federal Communications Commission 445 12th Street, SW Washington, DC 20554 Dear Chairman Wheeler, I have been contacted by some of my local video distributors about an issue that has been pending before the FCC for far too long. These video distributors, through their major trade association, have a long standing request that the Commission address a flaw in its implementation of the program access rules that effectively denies them the full legal rights and protections that Congress intended. As I understand it, my local video providers are some of the more than 900 small and mediwn­ sized multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs) across the country that rely upon a single buying group, the National Cable Television Cooperative (NCTC), to negotiate the bulk of their programming agreements. In 1992, Democrats and Republicans of Congress united in passing legislation specifying that MVPDs and their buying groups, without qualification, were to be protected from discriminatory treatment by cable-affiliated programmers under the program access rules. However, the FCC has defined the term "buying group" in an overly-restrictive manner so that today it excludes NCTC. As a result, the many hundreds of MVPDs that currently rely exclusively on the NCTC to negotiate their programming agreements are effectively without the program access protections intended by statute. The Commission has had pending for weJI over two years a Further Notice of Proposed Rulernaking in which it tentatively concluded the definition of a buying group should be updated, as my local video distributors have requested and expect based upon the law enacted by Congress. This Further Notice, which garnered the bipartisan support of three of the five sitting Commissioners, states: [It] appears that our existing definition of"buying group" set forth in Section 76.1000(c)(l) does not reflect accepted industry practices and thus may have the unintended effect of barring some buying groups from availing themselves of the protections of the nondiscrimination provision of the program access rules, in contravention of Congress's express intent in enacting Section 628(c)(2)(B) ofthe Act. We tentatively conclude that we should revise Section 76.1 OOO(c)(l) to require, as an alternative to the current liability options, that the buying group agree to assume liability to forward aU payments due and received from its members for payment under a master agreement to the appropriate programmer. CRAMER.HOUSE.GOV r• '{;_'\ \ 1\ecei~ecl &.ln'A\'''·" . 1'\/I.R ·;_ 0 'L\J\~ fCC Mail Room Since the Commission reached that tentative conclusion in 2012, no final decision has been rendered on this and related issues teed up in the rulemaking, leaving smaller pay TV providers and, by extension, their customers at risk of being treated in an unfair manner by cable-affiliated programmers. Based upon what I have heard and read, I believe the Commission should take action before the end of the Summer to update its definition of a buying group and consider the other issues raised to ensure that a buying group as it operates in the marketplace today, like the NCTC, can use the rules to protect its members from discriminatory practices, as Congress intended. I look forward to hearing back from you on this important matter. vin Cramer Member of Congress