Television Broadcasting Services Savannah, Georgia

Federal Communications Commission

This document proposes to amend the Table of TV Allotments (Table) of the Federal Communications Commission's (Commission) rules in response to a petition for rulemaking filed by Georgia Public Telecommunications Commission (Georgia Public Broadcasting or Petitioner), the licensee of noncommercial educational television station WVAN-TV (WVAN-TV or Station), Savannah, Georgia (Savannah). The Petitioner requests the substitution of UHF channel *18 in place of its current VHF channel *8 at Savannah in the Table, with the technical parameters specified in the Petition. In support of its channel substitution request, the Petitioner asserts that allowing the Station to move to a UHF channel would serve the public interest by improving the community's access to WVAN-TV's locally produced programs. The Petitioner observes that the Commission has recognized that VHF channels have certain characteristics that have posed challenges for their use in providing digital television service, including propagation characteristics allowing undesired signals and noise to be receivable at relatively farther distances. Additionally, the Petitioner notes that the Commission has observed large variability in the performance of indoor antennas available to consumers, with most antennas receiving fairly well at UHF and the substantial majority not so well to very poor at high-VHF. An engineering statement provided by the Petitioner confirms that the proposed channel *18 contour would provide full principal community coverage to Savannah and that the proposed channel substitution contour would not cause impermissible interference to any other licensed facilities. When taking into account the ability of viewers to obtain PBS programming from other nearby stations, the proposed channel substitution would not cause any loss of service.