WASHINGTON, D.C. — The FCC’s Enforcement Bureau late Friday extended the deadline for stations to upload responses to their Commission-hosted online public inspection file in response to Equal Employment Opportunity audit letters for 2025.
The Enforcement Bureau randomly selected radio and TV stations in the 2025 audit, and on August 8 sent letters to these licensed media properties.
Now, they have until October 17 to upload responses to the “OPIF.”
And, the Bureau has issued “further guidance” to stations needed to comply, with an explanation regarding the second paragraph of the audit letter requesting certain audit data from respondents.
In particular, the Enforcement Bureau issued the following additional guidance for questions 2(b)(vi)(a-b), (vii-viii):
In coordination with the Media Bureau, EB finds that, in order to protect privacy and confidential business information from public disclosure, pursuant to section 1.3 of the Commission’s rules (Rules), good cause exists to waive the requirement that responses to the Inquiries be uploaded to a station’s OPIF.
The responses to these inquiries should instead be submitted under separate cover via email to the Enforcement Bureau at [email protected].
The email should also include a statement indicating that the remaining audit data was uploaded to a station’s OPIF.
Additionally, the Enforcement Bureau clarifies that station employment units with fewer than five full-time employees (defined by section 73.2080(e)(1) of the Rules as employees regularly assigned to work 30 hours a week or more) are exempt from responding to the Inquiries.
Finally, respondents are not required to include advertising contracts in response to the inquiries.
