House STELA Compromise Bill To Be Introduced
House Energy & Commerce leadership Tuesday (Nov. 18) will introduce a bipartisan compromise version of the STELA Reauthorization (STELAR) Act that it says reflects bipartisan input from the Senate Commerce Committee, say sources familiar with the bill and a copy obtained by Multichannel News (
http://energycommerce.house.gov/sites/republicans.energycommerce.house.g...). It includes some retrans-related provisions that likely won't sit well with broadcasters.
It combines elements of a House-passed bill and the STAVRA version that passed out of the Senate Commerce Committee (
http://www.multichannel.com/news/policy/stavra-bill-passes-senate-commer...) in September, including retaining the elimination of the set-top integration ban--after one year--and giving broadcasters an extra six months to unwind joint sales agreements per an FCC decision earlier this year as well as preventing coordinated retrans among noncommonly owned same-market TV stations.
According to a committee source speaking on background, House E&C Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.), ranking member Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), Communications subcommittee Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.) and ranking member Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) together will introduce the new version of the bill that reauthorizes the compulsory satellite license to that 1.5 million people can continue to receive distant network TV station signals.
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multichannel.com