PLANNING FOR GROWTH IN YEARS OF RESTRICTED RESOURCES

The affiliates believe the NAB should now be working for “clean” legislation thatwould reinstate the 35% cap. By “clean,” they mean legislation without otherregulations they don’t want but many lawmakers do. There has been talk aboutcoupling the 35% provision to tightening up other just-relaxed restrictions or toreduced license-renewal periods, tougher indecency enforcement, free time for politicalcandidates, and other troubling fare.Because of those potential add-ons, Fritts thinks pushing for 35% legislation is toorisky. Fritts would like to believe such “clean” legislation might pass the House (as itdid last week) and Senate. But he is pragmatic enough to fear that somewhere alongthe line, perhaps in the wee hours of a cold October night during a conference toreconcile House and Senate bills, the bad stuff could be added.So, two weeks ago, Fritts got himself into hot water when he announced the NABwould oppose all legislation and sent word to NAB’s friends on Capitol Hill. Theaffiliates were not happy. They felt Fritts had abandoned the clean 35% effort way tooearly, and they let him know it. With their own team of lobbyists and Washington reps,the affiliates continued to work for the clean 35% bill in the House and, to the surpriseof many, got it. (When newspapers reported last week that broadcasters suffered astunning loss on Capitol Hill, they missed more than half the story. For many stations,it was a big victory.)The latest word from the Senate is that it will produce a companion bill. For the firsttime, Washington insiders are saying that a clean 35% law is possible, despite PresidentBush’s veto threat.I agree with Fritts that the NAB should walk way from the 35% bill. Fritts’s warningis real. And to win passage, affiliates have to go into debt to lawmakers hostile to theirbusiness. They will one day collect on that debt.Then again, I don’t work for the Barrett-Fisher-Frank triumvirate. Fritts does.BEA—Educating tomorrow’s electronic media professionals 62