FCCdata/eLMS: FM translator primary stations
Overview:
New functionality has been added into FCCdata to support the display of primary stations for FM translators. Normally, we are notified of translator primary stations through application activity including construction permits, minor modifications, license to cover and renewal applications. In the past, changes that only involved primary stations were never filed in CDBS, but instead were informal notifications sent to the FCC, which resulted in staff updating CDBS at the facility level. Recently, the FCC added the functionality for FM translators to make these notifications through LMS. eLMS is processing these notifications.
Unlike CDBS did prior to 2019, LMS does not support a listing of the translator's primary station at the facility level. This new functionality added to eLMS will address that.
Once per day during the morning run, eLMS will build a list of applications from both legacy CDBS and from eLMS to trace the history of a FM translator's primary station. The last primary station that was reported in the log will appear in eLMS as the primary station at the facility level.
Changes to the display in FCCdata:
For FCC FM translator facilities, FCCdata will now show in the header of a facility (in the far left column), the call sign and community of the last reported primary station. In addition, if information is available on the method of delivery, it will be displayed there too. The FCC supports method of delivery on original construction permit, modification and license applications only. It is not supported on renewal applications nor the new primary station change notification forms.
In addition, on the left side of the main screen under the engineering data, there will be a new section called "Primary Station History" that will be an extract from our primary service table that will show all of the primary station claims for this facility in the history of the facility.
Known issues:
To determine latest primary station, the data is sorted by submit date and then file number of more than one application is filed on the same date. In testing, we encountered at least one FM translator that filed a primary station change notification earlier in the day and a license to cover application later in the day and the applicant failed to change the primary station on the license to cover. This will result in the old primary station showing in the header and the latest entry in the log, however, because the Primary Station History log is displayed on FCCdata, it will not be missed.
Today's update did not address the issue with the primary station data showing on the dialscape (list of stations after the city name is entered). This will be a project for a future release.
Other changes:
Primary station data will no longer appear within the engineering records on the left side. This was causing a lot of confusion both externally and internally as it did not reflect primary station designations made on renewal applications nor the new primary station change notifications.
On FM engineering records, the display of NAD27 coordinates has been suppressed. These coordinates are no longer necessary as virtually all FM application types are now supported in LMS.
