On April 30, 2026, the FCC at its Open Meeting will consider, among other items, a Third Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (FNPRM) regarding an accessible emergency information requirement. In particular, the FNPRM would propose to modify the rule that television broadcasters provide an aural representation of visual, non-textual emergency information (such as radar maps or other graphics) on the secondary audio stream of video broadcasts. Although the compliance deadline for this rule was May 26, 2015, the FCC has continued to waive the rule since then. The FNPRM's proposed revision would clarify that the accessibility requirement would be satisfied when a textual crawl provides emergency information duplicative of or equivalent to the visual but non-textual emergency information, so long as the textual crawl is also conveyed aurally.
The April 2026 Open Meeting is scheduled for 10:30 am ET on April 30, 2026, and will be held in the Commission Meeting Room, 45 L Street N.E., Washington, D.C. 20554. The FCC meeting is also streamed live at www.fcc.gov/live. Open captioning and sign language interpreting will be provided for this meeting. Other reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities are available upon request. E-mail your request to fcc504@fcc.gov or call (202) 418-0530.
Link to Announcement of the April Open Meeting Agenda:
https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-announces-tentative-agenda-april-open-meeting-13. Click or tap if you trust this link." rel="noopener">https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-announces-tentative-agenda-april-open-meeting-13
Draft FNPRM:
https://www.fcc.gov/document/amending-audible-crawl-rule. Click or tap if you trust this link." rel="noopener">https://www.fcc.gov/document/amending-audible-crawl-rule
For general information about the FCC's television emergency information requirements, visit: https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/accessibility-emergency-information-television/. Click or tap if you trust this link." rel="noopener">https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/accessibility-emergency-information-television/. For more information about this specific proceeding, please contact Diana Sokolow, Media Bureau, Policy Division, at (202) 418-0588 or Diana.Sokolow@fcc.gov. Individuals who use videophones and are fluent in American Sign Language (ASL) may call the FCC's ASL Consumer Support Line at 844‐432‐2275 (videophone).
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