The present disclosure relates to systems and methods for indicating to a spectrum access system communication preferences of a base station and/or of a network operator. Different methods may be used to indicate the communication preferences, including a dedicated type parameter transmitted with spectrum allocation requests from the base station, a rule-based system where the spectrum access system accesses communication preferences of the base station and/or network operator through an identifier corresponding to a rule definition, or the like. The spectrum access system may assign a channel to the network operator based on its communication preferences, such as to determine a channel assignment to correspond to a channel aligned with a raster of communications to be used by the network operator. If the channel is not aligned, then the base station may shift a center frequency of the channel so that the channel aligns with the raster of communications.