A television station in Philadelphia, PA has been fined nearly $90,000 for operating its transmitter from an unauthorized location and for failing to provide agents of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) with access to the station’s premises for the purposes of inspection.
According to a Forfeiture Order issued by the Commission in March 2016, the operators of Class A television station WPHA-CD failed on multiple occasions in 2011 to make the station’s studio available for inspection by agents of the Commission’s Enforcement Bureau. In addition, an Enforcement Bureau agent determined through the use of direction-finding equipment that the station’s transmissions were emanating from an antenna structure located more than 1000 feet from the location listed on the station’s license.
As a result, the FCC issued a Notice of Apparent Liability in 2014 for the station’s “apparent willful and repeated violations” of its rules. Despite an appeal from the station’s owner, D.T.V., to cancel the proposed fine, the Commission upheld its original finding and issued the Forfeiture Order.
Read the complete text of the Commission’s Forfeiture Order against WPHA-CE.
