FCC Slowly Returns to Full Operation After Shutdown

One post-government shutdown fact is clear — the FCC does not rebound from government shutdowns very well. From personnel to filing systems, it has been a slow process with multiple hiccups along the way.

On the personnel side, it took the FCC a few days to have everyone back at work. Emails that we sent on the first day after the shutdown included some automatic responses of when staffers would later return.  And of course, once a full complement of personnel were back at their desks, the build-up of items during the shutdown, along with required actions on applications pending before the shutdown began, meant that many staffers were initially overloaded. But slowly, we received responses. Our kudos to the FCC employees for their loyalty and dedication to the industries they serve.

As for FCC systems, the FCC delayed bringing some of them back online and then staggered deadlines to avoid system overload from too many filers accessing systems at once.  But keeping track of the extended deadlines was like going through a regulatory maze at times.  Earlier guidance when the shutdown began was that deadlines during the shutdown were extended to the first business day after normal FCC operations resumed.  That guidance was set aside by an initial November 13 public notice extending all deadlines that fell between October 1 – November 17 to Tuesday, November 18^th.  But a later public notice extended 3^rd quarter issues/programs list OPIF upload deadlines to December 1, and any EEO public file reports due October 1 to November 24 (EEO audit responses were also extended to November 24).

A related public notice provided additional guidance on processing priorities for applications filed between November 18-25 and permits that expired between October 1 – November 18. In addition, that notice announced that any STA that expired between October 1-December 4 was automatically extended to December 5.  Finally, for stations that had political time requests between October 1-November 12 that could not be uploaded because of OPIF being down, a new public notice issued November 17 directed stations in various states to make OPIF political file uploads in defined upload windows. The Media Bureau also set new deadlines for the Class A/LPTV modification and LPTV new station filings that were originally announced in early September.  For a full review of deadlines and extensions, please see our “Dates to Remember” section at the end of this newsletter.

Certain filing systems, especially the antenna structure registration system, have continued to have issues with long interruptions to their availability.  The FCC has stated that the staff will be flexible in working with stations as FCC systems are returned to operational status.