Last week, the government shutdown ended. Shuttered government agencies re-opened on Monday morning. The FCC announced yesterday that it has further extended the deadlines for filings that were due during the shutdown. This new announcement supersedes all of the FCC’s previous extension announcements.
Accordingly, the FCC has established the following general deadline extensions for filings other than NORS and DIRS filings and filings related to spectrum auction activities:
- All filings that were due between January 3 and January 7, are due today, January 30, 2019.
- All filings that were due between January 8 and February 7 are due on February 8, 2019.
ULS Deadlines
The FCC’s Public Notice stated that all Universal Licensing System (ULS) applications and notifications that were originally due on January 3 through and including February 8 are now due on February 8, 2019.
All applications that were filed in ULS during the shutdown will be entered into ULS over the next few weeks with a January 29 receipt date.
Responsive Pleadings
Any reply or responsive pleadings that were due during the shutdown have also been extended and are now due on February 8, 2019.
Special Temporary Authority
Any Special Temporary Authority (STA) licenses that were scheduled to expire from January 3 through January 29 have been extended to February 8, 2019 (with the exception of STA’s related to post-incentive auction transitions).
Fee Payments
The Commission has extended all fee payments originally due between January 3 and February 7 to February 8, 2019. However, this extension only applies to fee payments that can only be made through the FCC’s Fee Filer System.
Tower Construction Notification System
The Commission’s Tower Construction Notification System (TCNS) became operational this afternoon. Because the system had been offline while the FCC suspended operations, deadlines and Tribal review timelines for filings in the TCNS system have been tolled between January 3 and January 30. Therefore, the TCNS review clock for any Form 620 submissions filed prior to the shutdown were stopped on January 3 and resumed on January 30.
Additional Items
In addition to the extensions discussed above, Commission staff will consider requests for further extensions in individual matters on a case-by-case basis.
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For more information, please contact Tim Doughty (doughty@khlaw.com; 202.434.4271).