12/18/2023

Twenty-seven Congressional Members Want the FCC to Restart Employee Data Collection from Stations

The FCC has not collected this data from stations since 2004

The two-decade moratorium on a requirement that stations file annual reports about their employees with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) may be coming to an end. There is a growing push in Washington, D.C. for the FCC to resurrect the rule. This week, 27 members of Congress called on the agency to wrap-up work on a pending proceeding and reinstate the collection of broadcast workforce diversity data.

"The FCC is required by law to collect this information, and without it, the Commission and Congress are deprived of a key tool to assess the makeup of the media workforce," their letter to the FCC says. "When Congress codified the Form 395-B collection, our hope was that this data would provide valuable insights regarding diversity in broadcasting. The importance of these objectives has only increased in the intervening years. We urge you to act swiftly to put Form 395-B back into use."

The FCC has not collected annual employee reports (Form 395-B) from stations since 2004, when agency lawyers raised unconstitutionality concerns about quizzing broadcasters about the race and gender of their workers. The Commission launched a rulemaking in 2021 (MB Docket No. 98-204) that is designed to refresh the record about employee data collection requirements to obtain further input on the legal, logistical, and technical issues surrounding FCC Form 395-B. Among the issues the FCC is looking for feedback on is whether employee data can or should be kept confidential. It points out that none of the previous federal court decisions required the data be kept from the public.

Please select this link to read the complete article from Inside Radio.