Reminders For Broadcasters Facing COVID‑19 Challenges

Cooley understands that broadcasters are facing significant challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic. We offer the following reminders as you deal with those challenges.

1. The Federal Communications Commission released guidance for stations that may be sharing news and news gathering resources to cover the COVID-19 crisis. The FCC clarified that any temporary shared news gathering efforts, including oral agreements, that occur over the duration of this emergency news event and are related to COVID-19 coverage, do not need to be referenced in any manner in the stations' online public inspection files. Any agreements that arose during or due to the emergency event that will continue beyond the current crisis (and so will not be temporary) must be reduced to writing and placed in the stations' online public files.