A Message from TAB's President
:
A year ago, Texas broadcasters were confronting some of the most daunting state and federal policy challenges our industry has ever faced. I’m delighted that today we can reflect on hard-fought victories on both fronts.
In DC, TAB played a pivotal role with NAB in derailing the renewal of STELAR, protecting retransmission consent and codifying the related good faith negotiation process.
Once again, we led the country in securing Congressional opposition to a Performance Tax on Radio stations. This followed our success at the end of 2018 in helping defeat a federal Ad Tax and secure an additional $1 Billion for the Spectrum Repack fund that for the first time also provided reimbursement for Radio and Low-Power TV stations’ repack costs.
In Austin, TAB successfully defended the Anti-SLAPP law and helped pass legislation restoring transparency to public officials’ deliberations and how our tax dollars are being spent. We also quashed an attempt to strip the one-party consent rule for recording conversations.
We defeated legislation that would have banned the advertising of new cell- and plant-based meat products, shut off access to 9-1-1 recordings, and withdrawn Texas from the nation’s existing time zone system.
We further advanced multiple deregulatory measures at the FCC ranging from EEO recordkeeping to KidVid rules, engaging directly with FCC officials such as Commissioner Michael O’Rielly who keynoted the
TAB Show
.
The TAB Show itself once again was a major success, bringing NAB Show-caliber content and technology to your backyard at an affordable price.
Just days into 2020 we’re in the midst of launching multiple new training events for newsrooms, sales teams and engineers, and partnering with multiple colleges to introduce more students to careers in multimedia marketing and advertising.
TAB is continuing our fight against a Performance Tax and prepared to confront potential attempts to undermine our success on STELAR.
We also are preparing to defend the vast array of state sales and franchise tax exemptions and exclusions TAB has secured over the past 25 years as state lawmakers begin seeking revenue to sustain their extraordinary expansion of funding for public schools ahead of the 2021 legislative session.
Our success to date and in the future is due largely to your individual engagement, from responding to our legislative calls to action, to your membership dues and generous support of the PEP program’s PSAs for non-profit and governmental entities.
Simply put, your investments in TAB at every level are paying dividends for your bottom line.
On behalf of the TAB Board of Directors and our entire team in Austin, I thank you for your leadership and support. Here’s wishing you much prosperity, good health and happiness in the New Year.
As always, please call on me if we can assist you in any way.
