Where’s my license renewal?!

Texas radio station licensees are already starting to wonder when their license renewal will arrive from the FCC. Texas radio stations were required to file their renewal applications by April 1 of this year.

Typically, the FCC starts sending out renewals around the scheduled expiration date of the current license term, in this case, Aug. 1, 2013.

TAB is advised by its FCC legal counsel, however, that it might be a while before some Texas radio stations see their renewals. For one, there are more than 1,000 radio stations in the state.

Even if most of the applications are spotless, that’s still a lot of renewal applications for the FCC to review.

“The FCC has been moving slowly on many radio license renewals, even so-called clean ones,” said Scott Flick with TAB FCC counsel Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman.

Flick notes that numerous stations submitting renewal applications last fall did not see their renewals until just recently, and those were generally stations that had no rule violations or other issues to report in their renewal applications. 

Stations with rule violations or petitions filed against them are typically taking much longer for the FCC to process.

For the many stations that don’t see a renewal before the Aug. 1 expiration date of their current license, Flick confirms that such stations have continuing operating authority from the FCC while they are awaiting action on their renewal application as long as they timely filed their renewal application by the April 1 deadline.

Stations that missed that deadline have a host of other issues to address, including filing with the FCC to request authority to continue operating past their current license expiration date.

Questions?  Contact TAB's Michael Schneider or call (512) 322-9944.