Federal Communications Commission	"FCC  XX-XXX"


STATEMENT OF
COMMISSIONER BRENDAN CARR

Re:	Rules and Policies to Promote New Entry and Ownership Diversity in the Broadcasting Services, MB Docket No. 17-289
Anyone who has spent any time at a tech or telecom conference—from New York to Silicon Valley—knows that there’s more progress to be made on diversity.
  	
For decades, the Commission talked about ways to help close the gap, including by establishing an incubator program to promote diverse voices in the broadcast industry.  After years of inaction, today, we take a small but important step in the right direction by doing just that. 
 
By providing the right incentives for established broadcasters to incubate new entrants, we aim to address two longtime impediments to minority ownership: access to capital and operational experience.  The average sales price for a radio station in 2016 was about $1 million, and new entrants and small broadcasters often lack the deep pockets necessary to get off the ground.

	To incentivize incubators, this Order will waive the Local Radio Ownership Rule for broadcasters who provide the necessary funding and training for a new entrant to stand on their own.  And the program will include safeguards to prevent fraud and abuse.

	Maintaining the status quo isn’t going to bring more diversity and new entry into the market, and the Local Radio Ownership Rule has remained largely unchanged since 1996.  So I am glad we’re modernizing our rules to provide the right incentives to increase diversity in broadcast ownership.  I look forward to seeing how this program develops, and whether the lessons we learn from this approach can be applied more broadly.  I thank the Media Bureau for its work on this item.  It has my support.