Federal Communications Commission	"FCC  XX-XXX"


STATEMENT OF
CHAIRWOMAN JESSICA ROSENWORCEL

Re:  Update to Publication for Television Broadcast Station DMA Determinations for Cable and Satellite Carriage, MB Docket No. 22-239, Report and Order (November 17, 2022).

It is a good time to be a viewer.  Watching what you want, when you want it has never been easier.  But with so much video content out there, broadcast television still plays an important part in our evolving media landscape.  That’s because it is uniquely local, anchored in a signal that serves a community and provides its viewers with a special mix of real-time local news, information, and entertainment.  

Of course, broadcast stations have changed as viewers and their expectations have evolved.  For starters, they are no longer limited to reaching viewers over the air.  Today, most viewers of local broadcast television watch through a cable or satellite system.  Getting on the channel line-up of these systems now often takes place through retransmission consent negotiation.  As part of this negotiation process, cable and satellite systems have long used Nielsen’s Annual Station Index Directory to help determine each station’s local market for carriage purposes.  

Now that publication of this directory has ceased, we need to make sure that a successor is put in place.  To do so, earlier this year we started a rulemaking to determine just what that successor should be and today we are concluding this effort with a determination that Nielsen’s Local TV Report meets the requirements under our rules and the law.  After reviewing the record, we are confident that this new report contains what is necessary to determine the local market for each full-power television station.  It will continue to make it possible for broadcasters to serve their communities with the local news, information, and entertainment they need.  

Thank you to the staff who worked on this effort, including Ken Lewis, Lyle Elder, Maria Mullarkey, and Nancy Murphy from the Media Bureau; Kim Makuch, Mark Montano, and Andrew Wise from the Office of Economics and Analytics; and Susan Aaron, David Konczal, and William Richardson from the Office of General Counsel.



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