It’s been a difficult 12 months for One Ministries, the licensee of a digital full-power television station licensed to a coastal Mendocino County, Calif., community. In April 2023, the Senior Deputy Chief of the FCC Media Bureau’s Policy Division sided with Comcast in a dispute over “must carry” status in the San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose DMA community of Santa Rosa. One month later, it submitted a Petition for Reconsideration.
Comcast filed opposition. One Ministries responded. Now, the Media Bureau’s Chief has spoken, and it is standing by the Policy Division decision.
As such, KQSL-8 in Fort Bragg, Calif., will not be added to Comcast systems in Sonoma County’s county seat as a “must carry” offering.
For One Ministries, its argument in the Petition for Reconsideration is that the Order favoring Comcast from one year ago “failed to consider the effect of excluding Santa Rosa from KQSL’s market on localism, which it states is the essential component of the
market determination process.”
Furthermore, One Ministry believes the Bureau failed to consider several statutory factors.
What did Holly Saurer, Chief of the Media Bureau, have to say about that argument?
“The Petitioner has not shown any material error or omission in the Bureau Order or
raised facts not known or not existing at the time its Petition was filed. The Petitioner simply disagrees with the weight the Bureau afforded the evidence presented. The Bureau considered all of the evidence submitted and arguments presented by the Petitioner in the underlying proceeding and analyzed them in conjunction with the statutory market modification criteria, paying particular attention to the value of localism.
“In the PFR, the Petitioner merely restates its version of the facts previously presented to the Bureau, and reiterates arguments previously considered and rejected in the Bureau Order,” Saurer added. “Nothing in the PFR alters the conclusion made in the Bureau Order that the facts do not support the grant of the underlying Petition to modify the market of KQSL, Fort Bragg, California, to include the Santa Rosa Communities served by Comcast.”
