Senate Looks to Spend $3B on Digital TV

[Neilium]

Senate Looks to Spend $3B on Digital TV
By JENNIFER C. KERR
The Associated Press
Thursday, October 20, 2005; 9:22 PM

WASHINGTON -- Lawmakers want to spend $3 billion to make sure millions of Americans won't wake up to blank TV screens when the country makes the switch to all-digital broadcasts.

The subsidy was approved Thursday by the Senate Commerce Committee as part of legislation that would set April 7, 2009, as the firm date for television broadcasters to end their traditional analog transmissions and send their broadcasts via digital signals.

Digital television promises sharper pictures and better sound than analog TV. But millions of Americans with older TV sets rely solely on free, over the-air-television, and they'll need some type of a converter box to keep receiving their television service. Cable and satellite customers won't be affected.

Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, said Congress needs to do something to help consumers with the older analog sets, an estimated 21 million households. "If we're mandating this (digital) conversion, we cannot leave people behind because they can't afford" digital television sets, he said.

The draft of a House bill would end analog transmissions on Dec. 31, 2008. It does not mention a subsidy for set-top converter boxes. So, lawmakers will likely have to work out differences between the two bills, though Stevens said he did not anticipate a big fight with the House over the deadline or the subsidy.

The subsidy program would be paid for by money raised from the auction of the analog spectrum the broadcasters are vacating. The subsidy would be available for all those households with older televisions, and it would pay for converter boxes for all the TVs in a particular household, regardless of financial status.

Stevens estimates that the converter boxes would cost about $50. His plan would call for the government to pay roughly $40, and the consumer would make a co-payment of $10.

Some fellow Republicans have questioned whether the $3 billion is too high, given other spending priorities such as Hurricane Katrina recovery.

The move to all-digital broadcasts will free valuable radio spectrum, some of which will be allocated to improve radio communications among fire and police departments and other first responders.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a member of the committee, tried to move up the hard date up by two years to April 7, 2007. But other senators said a sale in 2007, unlike one in 2009, wouldn't raise as much money for the converter boxes and for reducing the federal debt.

McCain said first responders can't wait four years for the analog spectrum. "There's only one thing more important than money _ and that's lives," he told the committee before his amendment to speed up the conversion was defeated.

The sale of the analog spectrum is expected to raise at least $10 billion. Besides the $3 billion for converter boxes, the Senate bill proposes reserving $1 billion for public safety to buy new radio communications equipment and $250 million for a national alert system. Another $5 billion would be set aside for debt reduction.

The seemingly random date of April 7, 2009, isn't all that random. Stevens wanted to make sure that any digital switch wouldn't come in the middle of popular programming during the holidays, football bowl games, and the March Madness college basketball playoffs.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/20/AR2005102001979.html