Fox Seeks Cross-Ownership Extension In NYC Market

The FCC is seeking comment on whether to grant Fox Television Stations another temporary waiver of the newspaper/broadcast cross-ownership rule to continue to own WWOR Secaucus, N.J., reports Broadcasting&Cable.

Fox has owned the station under a series of temporary waivers since 2001 so that it could own both WWOR and WNYW, as well as the New York Post. Fox already has a permanent waiver to own the paper and WNYW but has only gotten temporary waivers for the WWOR-New York Post cross-ownership, the most recent in August 2014 when the FCC renewed the license over opposition by various groups.

Last month, with that temporary waiver nearing its expiration (it actually expired March 1), Fox asked for the waiver to be kept in place until 90 days after the FCC has ruled on petitions by broadcasters to reconsider the FCC's decision in the quadrennial review last August under Democratic chairman Tom Wheeler. That decision was not to eliminate the newspaper-broadcast crossownership rule.

FCC chairman Ajit Pai is no fan of the rule, and Fox is counting on that.