Claims by the American Cable Association (ACA) that a sale of Free State Communications KTKA-TV station in Topeka, Kan. to PBC Broadcasting would unduly impact retransmission consent negotiations have no merit in whether the FCC should allow the sale or not, the buyer/seller combo have said.
If that sort of thing bothers the FCC, it should consider as part of its retransmission consent rulemaking, the two companies said.
The ACA had asked the federal agency to narrowly tailor any approval contingent on how retrans agreements are negotiated, a request PBC/Free State called "outrageous."
Matt Polka, president-CEO of ACA of course disagreed. "It is critically important for competition and Topeka's 180,000 TV homes that the FCC prevent PBC from jointly negotiation retransmission consent for KTKA with any broadcast station in the same market," Polka said in an ACA-issued statement.
For more:
- Broadcasting & Cable has this story
- see this ACA statement
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ACA pushes retrans conditions on TV station sale