Journalism

Kansas City’s KCPT picks up gauntlet to expand local news coverage

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Three years ago, a delegation from Kansas City Public Television, including the board chair, trekked out to San Diego’s KPBS to evaluate how that station’s extensive radio, television and online news operation might be adapted in Kansas City. A few months later, an influential visitor to Kansas City, PBS NewsHour anchor Jim Lehrer, urged KCPT leaders to act on their nascent ambitions to develop a locally focused news service for the community. Over dinner at the restaurant Lidia’s, Lehrer “kind of threw the gauntlet down,” recalled Kliff Kuehl, KCPT president, challenging executives to step up the station’s commitment to news coverage. But the proposal to transform KCPT into a true local news hub remained mostly an aspiration until a surprise major grant from the Hale Family Foundation arrived in July 2013. Only then was the station able to turn its ambitions into something substantive and seemingly sustainable.

System/Policy

PBS responds to critical essay in latest Harper’s Magazine

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A 12-page essay titled “PBS Self-Destructs: And What It Means for Viewers Like You” in the October issue of Harper’s Magazine has prompted PBS to reply to the magazine and provide stations with talking points in anticipation of viewers’ responses. In the piece, writer Eugenia Williamson traces the history of the network with special attention to conservative interests that have buffeted PBS over the years. “[I]t doesn’t matter that the Republicans couldn’t defund PBS — they really didn’t need to. Twenty years on, the liberal bias they bemoaned has evaporated, if it ever existed to begin with,” Williamson writes. “Today, the only special-interest group the network clearly favors is the aging upper class: their tastes, their pet agendas, their centrist politics.

Education/Engagement

St. Louis stations dedicate Public Media Commons

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Some 800 people attended the Sept. 13 dedication of Public Media Commons in St. Louis, a unique 9,000–square-foot outdoor media environment located between Nine Network and St. Louis Public Radio that features two-story–high video walls and 5-foot interactive touch screens. The $6 million project, funded by local contributions, is a collaboration among the stations and the University of Missouri-St.

System/Policy

Commentary: With shift in plans, Greater Public hits the brakes on digital

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The departure of Jeannie Ericson from Greater Public and the cancellation of the short-lived Digital Day at the Public Media Development and Marketing Conference represent a damaging retreat from public media’s digital future. Over the past 11 years, the Integrated Media Association was one of the only focal points within public media for collaboration on digital strategy and realistic, shareable solutions for public TV and radio stations. Under the leadership of Mark Fuerst and then Jeannie Ericson, with the commitment of lots of smart people at local stations, iMA worked to bring public media into the digital age. When iMA merged with Greater Public last year, it seemed like a positive step toward integrating digital with our marketing strategies and revenue generation. One year later, Greater Public opted not to renew Ericson’s contract and to cancel Digital Day.

Tech

In maintaining towers, stations face higher costs, lack of space

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If any part of the broadcast plant ever merited the label “necessary evil,” a top nominee would be the tower. Expensive to maintain, fraught with potential hazards, bound by an ever-growing web of regulations, unloved by neighbors and often located inconveniently far away, a pubcaster’s tower still serves as the essential link between its program service and its audience. In the early years of public TV and radio — before streaming and podcasting and cable and over-the-top video delivery — pubcasters and their audiences depended completely on the reach of the signals their towers could deliver. When broadcasting was a new and developing communications medium, those towers were much easier to build. As long as they weren’t in an airport flight path, the NIMBY factor was rarely a concern as public TV and FM stations spread across the country from the 1950s into the 1970s.

System/Policy

Public TV organizations ask FCC to protect noncoms when repacking spectrum

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Three national public broadcasting organizations are asking the FCC to change its spectrum auction rules to ensure that channel repacking leaves no community without noncommercial television. The Association for Public Television Stations, PBS and CPB are concerned that repacking, or the channel shifting that will occur after the auction, could create such “white spaces.” Public television’s mission includes universal coverage, providing every American household with access to free educational television content. In a Sept. 15 petition, the organizations asked the FCC to “reconsider and revise” its auction rules based on the precedence that the agency has long recognized noncom TV spectrum as protected and distinct from commercial. The spectrum auction rules make no distinction between commercial and public spectrum.

People

CPB Board members elect Sembler and Gilbert as new leadership

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The CPB Board elected new leadership Tuesday in two unanimous votes. Chairing the governing body is Elizabeth Sembler, a Florida educator, with Nevada broadcaster Lori Gilbert as vice-chair. Each will serve one-year terms.

Outgoing CPB Chair Patricia Cahill presented Sembler with the chair’s gavel at the end of the board’s annual meeting in Washington, D.C. Cahill is the retired head of KCUR-FM in Kansas City, Mo., and was the first radio broadcaster elected chair. Sembler was first nominated to the board by President Bush and originally confirmed by the Senate in 2008. She was renominated by President Obama and confirmed for a second term this month.

Programs/Content

Science Friday producer settles with government over alleged misuse of NSF funds

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A for-profit corporation involved with public radio’s weekly Science Friday show has settled with the U.S. government over alleged misuse of a National Science Foundation grant awarded from August 2009 to July 2011. In the settlement announced Tuesday by the District of Connecticut U.S. Attorney’s Office, ScienceFriday Inc. and Ira Flatow, ScienceFriday’s president and host of the radio show, will pay $145,541 to resolve allegations that they mishandled NSF funds. The company also agreed to exclusion from participation in federal programs, grants and contracts until Sept. 15, 2015. ScienceFriday Inc. is a for-profit corporation based in Stamford, Conn., that produced Science Friday during the time of the contested NSF funding. The show is now produced by Science Friday Initiative, a nonprofit that contracts with the for-profit corporation for Flatow’s time and the show’s branding and logos.

Programs/Content

In Tampa, college broadcasters find advantages in pubradio affiliation

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The University of South Florida’s student-run radio station has forged a three-year partnership with Tampa’s WUSF Public Media to broadcast its programming as a digital multicast FM channel. The partnership, initiated this spring by student leaders of Bulls Radio, also provides mentorship and internship opportunities for USF students with the public radio station. WUSF is a full-service pubcaster also licensed to the university. It operates two public radio stations — NPR news and talk WUSF 89.7 FM and all classical WSMR 89.1 FM — as well a public TV station with four digital multicast channels. Last month, Bulls Radio began airing on WUSF’s HD 3 channel.

Programs/Content

Spoken-word contest gives students the stage to discuss the dropout crisis

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American Graduate and Youth Speaks, a nonprofit that focuses on empowering youth through creativity, hope to include more young people in conversations about high-school dropout rates with Raise Up, a hip-hop and spoken-word contest that will culminate with a performance this month at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., and a radio special. The organizations paired up this spring to encourage teens to submit original raps and poems related to the high school dropout crisis. By June 30, Raise Up had received over 750 video submissions, many filmed with webcams and smartphones. Twelve finalists were chosen for the contest’s next round. From those, five entrants will be selected to perform their poems at the Kennedy Center Sept.

CPB

Senate approves three Obama nominees for CPB Board of Directors

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The Senate approved three members of the CPB Board Thursday, one returning and two new. The three were nominated by President Obama earlier this year. New to the governing body for a term expiring in 2016 is David Arroyo of Brooklyn, N.Y., s.v.p. for legal affairs at Scripps Network Interactive. From 2008-12 Arroyo chaired the Board of Latino Justice, formerly the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund. He also was recognized by the Imagen Foundation as one of the most influential Latinos in entertainment in 2012.

Programs/Content

Chicago’s WFMT picks up distribution of Carnegie Hall Live

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PORTLAND, Ore. — Chicago’s WFMT announced Wednesday a deal with New York–based WQXR to distribute the 2014 season of Carnegie Hall Live. Entering its fourth season, Carnegie Hall Live kicks off Oct. 1 with a broadcast featuring the Berliner Philharmonker. The show is recorded and hosted by WQXR staffers in partnership with Carnegie Hall and was previously distributed by Minnesota-based American Public Media.

Programs/Content

PRPD, Day Two: NPR, stations prepare for debut of revised newsmag clocks

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PORTLAND, Ore. — This week’s Public Radio Programming Conference is giving attendees a chance to prepare for Nov. 17, the day when new clocks for NPR’s newsmagazines take effect and both stations and the network’s news staffers will need to adjust to the revised formatting. Wednesday’s proceedings featured two opportunities for discussion. At the first, NPR representatives fielded questions from station programmers, with Chris Turpin, acting senior v.p. of news, laying out changes in store.

People

Jones steps aside as PBS COO; Kerger announces additional executive hires

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Michael Jones, PBS’s chief operating officer since January 2009, is moving into an advisory role as executive vice president. In a Sept. 9 memo detailing several changes within PBS’s top ranks, President Paula Kerger announced that Jones will continue to report to her, serving “as a chief adviser working closely with me on a series of critical projects.” Those include management of an upgrade to public TV’s interconnection system and issues related to the upcoming television spectrum auction. PBS is currently conducting a national search for a new COO, Kerger said. It’s unclear how PBS has adapted its reporting structure for its senior executives during the search.

American Graduate

Next phase of American Graduate station grants to emphasize early education

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American Graduate: Let’s Make It Happen, CPB’s dropout prevention initiative, has awarded another $6.2 million in grants to 33 stations, this time supporting students from the beginning of their academic careers. The funding, announced Aug. 27, targets communities where the high school graduation rate is especially low among students of diverse races, ethnicities, incomes and disabilities, and where students struggle with limited English skills. Under the new grants, stations will work toward developing long-term solutions that begin with early education. “When we started this work, much of the initial focus was on middle- and high-school students,” said Jack Galmiche, president of Nine Network in St.