After months of promoting February 17th as the date to shut down analog signals, why did it change to June 12th?
That’s a great question. For more than 18 months local stations have had to adhere to the government’s educational requirements of on-air announcements, on-screen graphics, and on-line countdowns. With less than two weeks to the deadline, congress voted to change the date. Now, June 12th is the last day that local full-power stations can broadcast their analog signals. Late last year the government’s converter box discount coupon program ran out of the money originally budgeted. Instead of distributing more coupons, consumers were put on a waiting list. As previously distributed coupons expired, they were recycled and sent to new applicants. This caused come consumers to become confused and congress got concerned. In addition, some reports indicated that a significant number of households would not be ready for the switch by February 17th and would lose their TV signals. After much debate, congress and the Obama Administration decided to delay the switch deadline to June 12th.
