COAT Affiliates Ask FCC for Universal Captioning of Television

Several COAT affiliates -- AADB, AAPD, ALDA, HLAA, TDI -- and others filed a petition with the FCC on January 27, 2011 for universal captioning of TV. The petition asked the FCC to begin a rulemaking to eliminate several of the current rules that allow exemptions for some TV captions. Specifically, these are the rules for captioning exemptions for:

* late night programming
* commercial and political advertising
* locally produced non-news programming
* interstitials, promotional announcements and public service announcements
* channels producing revenues under $3M annually

The petitioners also asserted that the Electronic Newsroom Technique should not be counted towards current compliance requirements and asked for rescission of the Anglers Exemption Order, a 2006 order granting hundreds of exemptions that did not follow the undue burden exemption procedure properly. A copy of the petition is attached below (PDF). Also filing the petition were disability advocacy groups Deaf and Hard of Hearing Consumer Advocacy Network, California Coalition of Agencies Serving the Deaf Community and Tucson Citizens for Better Captioning.

See FCC rules for these exemptions at http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/dro/exemptions_from_cc_rules.html

See FCC Fact Sheet on captioning at http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/closedcaption.html

File captioning complaints using FCC online form at https://esupport.fcc.gov/ccmsforms/form2000.action?form_type=2000C