FCC Proposes Ten Application Limit for New NCE Stations in 2021 Filing Window

In correspondence with members of Congress, Federal Communications Commission (FCC") Chairman Ajit Pai had signaled that an application filing window for new Noncommercial Educational (NCE") stations would be opening sometime fairly soon. In a Public Notice (PN") released October 19, the FCC confirmed that a filing window will be coming. The specific dates of the window will be announced in a subsequent PN from the Media Bureau.

The FCC tentatively has decided to limit each party applying during the window to no more than ten applications. The FCC states that, if it is determined that any party to an application has an attributable interest in more than ten applications, the Bureau will retain the ten applications that were filed first - based on the date of application receipt - and dismiss all other applications."

Comments and reply comments regarding the ten-application limit must be filed in the Electronic Comment Filing System (ECFS) within 15 and 25 days respectively after the PN's publication in the Federal Register. We will let you know when that occurs.