§ 1740.6 - Eligible purposes of grants.

§ 1740.6 Eligible purposes of grants.

Grants shall be made to enable applicants to perform digital transitions of television broadcasting serving rural areas, regardless of the location of their main transmitter. Grant funds may be used to acquire, lease, and/or install facilities and software necessary to the digital transition. Specific purposes include:

(a) Digital transmitters, translators, and repeaters, including all facilities required to initiate DTV broadcasting. All broadcast facilities acquired with grant funds shall be capable of delivering DTV programming and HDTV programming, at both the interim and final channel and power authorizations. There is no limit to the number of transmitters or translators that may be included in an application;

(b) Power upgrades of existing DTV transmitter equipment;

(c) Studio-to-transmitter links;

(d) Equipment to allow local control over digital content and programming, including master control equipment;

(e) Digital program production equipment, including cameras, editing, mixing and storage equipment;

(f) Multicasting and datacasting equipment;

(g) Cost of the lease of facilities, if any, for up to three years; and

(h) Associated engineering and environmental studies necessary to implementation.