Television digest with electronic reports (Jan-Dec 1954)

'tim wHh Euctronks RiPOmS WYAH BUILDING WASHINGTON 5, 0. C. • TBJPHONE STBtUNG 3-)75S Special Report January 30, 1954 Full Text of rCC*s PROPOSED SCHEDULE OF LICENSE FEES Charges to Be Made for Handling of Applications, Modifications, Licenses Of All Broadcast Stations, Safety & Special Services, Experimental Services, Equipment Type Acceptance & Approval, Operator Licenses, Ship Inspections, Common Carrier Services Notice of Proposed Rule-Making Issued Jan. 28, 1954 as FCC Public Notice No. 54-76, Mlmeo 215 Comments Due by April 1, 1954 (see Television Digest, Vol. 10:5) In the Matter of » Establishment of Fees for the f lOggg Commission s Licensing and / Similar Activities ) NOTICE OF PROPOSED RULE MAKING 1. Notice is hereby given of rule making in the above entitled matter. 2. Pursuant to the provisions of the Independent Offices Appropriation Act of 1952 (5 U.S.C., Sec. 140), set out in Appendix A hereto. Congress has stated that work performed by Government agencies in connection with the issuance of franchises, licenses, permits, certificates, registrations and the like for any person, except those engaged in the transaction of official business of the Government should, to the full extent possible, be self-sustaining. In order to bring about the accomplishment of this objective, Section 140 of Title 5 authorizes the head of each agency to prescribe by regulation such fees and charges as he shall determine to be fair and equitable “taking into consideration direct and indirect costs to the Government, value to the recipient, public policy or interest served, and other pertinent facts.” 3. The enabling legislation referred to above also provides that the fees and charges shall be as uniform as practicable throughout the Government and shall be subject to such policies as the President may prescribe. In view of this provision, the Commission refrained from taking any action looking toward the establishment of a schedule of fees, pending consideration of the matter on an over-all Government basis by the Bureau of the Budget operating in behalf of the President. Such a study has now been completed, and the Bureau of the Budget has issued Circular No. A-25 relating to “Fees for licensing, registration, and related activities” which sets out, in some detail, uniform standards to be applied by the various departments and agencies of the Government in implementing the provisions of Section 140, Title 5 of the United States Code. 4. The attached proposed schedule of fees for the various Commission licensing activities has been drafted in compliance with the provisions of the Budget Bureau Circular. In order that interested parties may be advised as to the basis upon which the proposed schedule of fees has been prepared, the following information is provided: (a) The Commission has determined that all of its activities including the issuance, renewal, modification, transfer, or termination of any license or certificate must be characterized as licensing activities for which appropriate fees shall be charged with the exception of the enforcement activities of the Field Engineering and Monitoring Bureau and, to a limited extent, in the Broadcast and Safety & Special Radio Services Bureaus as well, and with the exception of the non-certification common carrier regulatory activities performed by the Common Carrier Bureau. And, in accordance with the policy of both the Congress and the over-all government program, the Commission’s licensing activities for which reimbursement charges are to be levied include both the direct and indirect costs of such activities. It has been determined that during the Fiscal Year 1953 approximately 45% of the Comrnission’s entire expenditures were in fact directly or indirectly related to licensing activities. This percentage of the Commission’s budget has been utilized as the full cost recovery base from which the fees set forth in the attached schedule have been derived. (b) In determining the proper groups or categories of licensing fees the Commission has made use of the primary functional divisions into which the Commission has been organized and has calculated separate fees for the licensing activities of each of the 4 functional bureaus as well as for the special licensing activities in the Office of the (3hief Engineer. By such a segregation it has been possible to avoid any subsidization of one type of licensing activity by another. At the same time, where personnel of one of the Commission’s bureaus have performed services which are related to the licensing functions for which another bureau bears primary responsibility, the expenditures for such activities have, for purposes of the attached schedule, been allocated to the licensing functions of the latter bureau. Thus, the antenna survey and initial inspection activities of the Field Engineering and Monitoring Bureau, which are directly related to the licensing of broadcast stations, have been included in calculating the expenses of processing broadcast applications. Similarly, the expenses of such separate offices of the Commission, as the Office of Opinions and Review and Office of Hearing Examiners, have been allocated among the various functional bureaus at a ratio approximating our budget estimates as to the relative amount of time spent by such offices on the several types of licensing activities. (c) Within each bureau the Commission has endeavored to avoid any undue multiplicity of separate charge. It has done this both upon the belief that such general grouping of related and similar licensing activities will aid both the Commission and the affected parties in complying with the new provisions with a minimum amount of additional time and effort and because of our recognition that no accurate allocation of exact costs between the various subcategories of the Commission’s licensing activities is possible. Accordingly, and in conformity with the provisions of the Budget Bureau’s Circular, fees for different services within each particular bureau have been limited to a few broad comparable classes of actions. (d) In the attached schedule no direct fees are proposed with respect to the institution of rule making proceedings; the cost of such proceedings has been considered as a portion of the normal costs of license processing in the areas covered by such rules. Moreover, no fees are proposed to be charged with respect to revocations or modifications of station licenses or suspension of operators’ licenses initiated by the Commission. Finally, it is proposed to exempt from the category of applications for which a fee 1