Current (https://current.org/category/news/pubmedia/page/7/)
Can you remember when you first heard the word “paradigm”? All of sudden everything was “paradigms” — shifting, evolving or disappearing . . . paradigms. Well, “social capital” is in much the same state these days.
CPB broke format in May 2001, giving its top radio honor, the Edward R. Murrow Award, to one of its own employees, Rick Madden, its v.p., radio. Madden delivered this acceptance speech during the opening session of the Public Radio Conference in Seattle on May 17, 2001. I first walked into noncommercial radio at the University of Notre Dame as a freshman and never walked out. That was in 1963, four years before the Carnegie Commission labeled us public radio. My radio passions ran contrary to my father’s notions of what my interests should be.
Issued by the Association of Independents in Radio (AIR) and the Producers’ Advocacy Group, June 1999, and revised Jan. 23, 2001. PDF. INTRODUCTION: The Association of Independents in Radio* (AIR) and the Producers Advocacy Group** (PAG) present the following code in an effort to clarify and standardize rates and practices for working with freelancers in the public radio industry. In recognition of the central role freelancers and independent radio producers play in enriching the content of almost all the important programs on public radio, AIR and PAG recommend the following guidelines when public radio networks, stations or shows use the work of freelance radio producers:
LIVING WAGE: Freelance producers should be paid at a rate which allows a decent living.
More than three years after promising digital channels to broadcasters, the FCC held a hearing Oct. 16, 2000, about what the broadcasters should do in exchange for the spectrum. Most of the testimony was about possible FCC rules requiring political and children’s programming, but former FCC general counsel Henry Geller suggested, as he and others have said before, that the public interest would be served more effectively by assessing spectrum fees and paying pubcasters to do the public-interest programming. This article was adapted from Geller’s statement. The broadcast regulatory scheme, adopted in 1927 and continued to the present time in the 1996 amendments to the Communications Act, is one of short-term licensing, with the licensee committed to serving the public interest — of being a public trustee or fiduciary for its service area.
The National Forum for Public Television Executives, meeting in Dallas Oct. 2-4, 2000, agreed upon the following petition to put before the PBS Members Meeting later that month, Oct. 24. The petition is divided into three amendments to a less specific “placeholder” petition that the Forum had submitted earlier. In addition to the amendment on Organizational Change (immediately below), there are amendments on System Educational Strategy and New Business Models.
Public broadcasters are ramping up efforts to secure support of their position in the Senate after the House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved legislation that could force the FCC to permit religious broadcasters to use reserved noncommercial educational channels without determining whether they carry educational programs or not. The Noncommercial Broadcasting Freedom of Expression Act, H.R. 4201, passed the House 264-159 on June 20, with six Republicans and 153 Democrats opposed. The legislation, sponsored by Rep. Charles W. “Chip” Pickering (R-Miss.) but largely rewritten by House telecom subcommittee Chair Billy Tauzin (R-La.), gives nonprofit organizations the right to hold noncommercial educational (NCE) radio or television licenses if the station broadcasts material the organization itself deems to serve an “educational, instructional, cultural or religious purpose.” The bill notes that religious programming “contributes to serving the educational and cultural needs of the public,” and dictates that the FCC treat it the same way it treats educational programming. Before the legislation’s passage, the House rejected an alternative offered by Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) that would have mandated the reserved channels be primarily educational.
In 2000, members of Congress introduced four bills to head off FCC restrictions on religious broadcasters using reserved TV channels. The issue arose when a religious broadcaster had agreed to a channel swap with Pittsburgh pubTV channel WQEX and the commission considered requiring it to air some nonsecular “educational” content. See Current stories about the proposed Pittsburgh channel swap and the furor over restrictions on religious broadcasters. House bill H.R. 4201 (below) | Earlier House bill H.R. 3525 | Senate bill S. 2010 | Senate bill S. 2215
Noncommercial Broadcasting Freedom of Expression Act of 2000, H.R. 4201
Introduced April 6, 2000, by Rep. Charles “Chip” Pickering (R-Miss.) , H.R. 4201 addresses concerns that the FCC will attempt to regulate religious broadcasting on reserved educational channels. Mr. PICKERING (for himself, Mr. OXLEY, Mr. TAUZIN, Mr. LARGENT, and Mr. STEARNS) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Commerce
A BILLTo amend the Communications Act of 1934 to clarify the service obligations of noncommercial educational broadcast stations.
In March 2000, the FCC reduced its 1997 fine of public TV station WTTW, finding that three of the four underwriting credits at issue were permissible after all. The original fine was levied in December 1997. [Text of 1997 letter.]
Before the Federal Communications Commission Washington, D.C. 20554
In the Matter of Window to the World Communications, Inc., Licensee of Station WTTW(TV), Chicago, IL, Facility ID #10802
For a Forfeiture
File No. 97040529
FORFEITURE ORDER
Adopted: March 3, 2000 Released: March 6, 2000
By the Chief, Enforcement Bureau:
1. In this Order, we grant the request of Window to the World Communications, Inc. (“WTTW”), licensee of noncommercial television station WTTW(TV), Chicago, Illinois, for a reduction in the $5,000 forfeiture proposed in a Notice of Apparent Liability (“NAL”) issued for violation of the statutory prohibition against the broadcast of advertisements on noncommercial stations.
The Temporary Commission on Alternative Financing for Public Telecommunications (TCAF) delivered its recommendations to Congress on Oct. 1, 1983, after extensive research, including an Advertising Demonstration Program at a number of public TV stations. Documents below:
Letter of transmittal
Membership of TCAF
Executive Summary
Chairman’s letter of transmittal
To the Congress of the United States:
In accordance with Congress’ direction in the Public Broadcasting Amendments Act of 1981, Public Law Number 97-35, the Temporary Commission on Alternative Financing for Public Telecommunications hereby submits its Final Report. This report describes the Advertising Demonstration Program in which selected public television stations experimented with the carriage of limited advertising. The report includes findings, conclusions, and recommendations to Congress concerning the financing of public broadcasting.
This is the PBS Board’s governing document as amended Feb. 6, 2000. For comparison, see also
the original PBS bylaws of 1969, and the most recent version, amended November 2011. Article I
Name
The Corporation shall be known as the PUBLIC BROADCASTING SERVICE (PBS). Article II
Offices
2.1 Registered Office.
Five months after the conflict developed between Wake Forest University (Winston-Salem, N.C.) and its public radio station, WFDD, the faculty’s Senate Ad Hoc Committee on WFDD released this report Feb. 2, 2000. See also coverage in Current and case study on the conflict in the Public Radio News Directors Guide. Events Triggering This Inquiry
Proposed Guidelines on Confidentiality Policy
The Public Trust and Internal Management at WFDD
The Committee’s Process
Conclusions
Memo from university Vice President Sandra Boyette to university Counsel Leon Corbett
Appendix
Separate statement by member Michael Curtis
Report to the University Senate on the WFDD Matter
Introduction
In October 1999, the President of the University Senate appointed an Ad Hoc Committee on WFDD. She asked the committee to inquire into events at public radio station WFDD during September 1999 and to report to the University Senate with proposals for avoiding such events in the future.
Undated document supplied by NPR, January 2000. No Commercial Obligations or Influence
NPR is an independent, nonprofit organization that carries no on-air advertising. One of the ways NPR helps fund its programming and general operations is by seeking underwriting support from corporations, foundations and associations. These tax-deductible donations provide virtually all of NPR’s contributed income. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations govern all underwriting announcements by NPR and public radio stations.
FCC members approved the proposed sale of WQED’s second station, WQEX, in a split vote. See also the
text of the order, Dec. 15, 1999.William Kennard and Gloria Tristani (Democrats)
Michael Powell and Harold Furchtgott-Roth (Republicans)
Susan Ness (Democrat)
Statement of Chairman William Kennard and Commissioner Gloria Tristani, dissenting in part
We disagree with the majority’s decision not to designate Cornerstone’s application for hearing. Under Section 73.621 of our rules, an applicant for a reserved channel must demonstrate that the station “will be used primarily to serve the educational needs of the community.” If there is any substantial and material question of fact on that issue, the Commission must designate the application for hearing on the issue of whether the applicant’s proposed programming is primarily educational.
On Dec. 15, 1999, the FCC approved a swap/sale deal that would have enabled Pittsburgh public TV station WQED to sell its second channel, WQEX, to raise capital and pay longstanding debts. (The deal fell through Jan. 18, 2000, when Cornerstone TeleVision backed out.)
See also separate statements by the commissioners. WQED developed the complex plan after the commission in 1996 declined to drop the noncommercial reservation on WQEX.
When producer Robert Saudek died in 1998, his New York Times obituary called him “the alchemist-in-chief of what is often called the golden age of television.” From 1952 to 1961, the product of Saudek’s alchemy was Omnibus, a weekly that did what public TV now aspires to do, but on commercial network TV. It turned out to be one of the last but finest gasps of the Cooperation Doctrine — the notion that commercial broadcasting could ignore the bottom line and the largest available audience. [More on the Cooperation Doctrine.]
For the December 1999 pledge drives, PBS distributed the first-ever TV retrospective on the famous series, “Omnibus: Television’s Golden Age,” from New River Media. The writers are William M. Jones, professor of political science at Virginia Wesleyan College and author of Omnibus: American Television’s Season in the Sun, from Wesleyan University Press, and Andrew Walworth, executive producer and president of New River Media.
“Credibility is the currency of our programming.”
With the search for Ervin Duggan’s successor now underway, public broadcasting has an opportunity to reflect on how the next PBS president should deal with the many controversial issues facing the system — 30-second spots, leasing of the digital spectrum, and delivery of PBS programs on DBS, to name a few.Amidst these raging debates, we should not lose sight of our commitment to diversity and multiculturalism. How will we provide a narrative space for different ethnic and racial groups to express their hopes and fears, their struggles and triumphs, their successes and failures? How will we allow various ethnic minorities to speak in what one commentator calls the “voice of color.” (1) In short, how will we allow the diversity of perspectives to be aired, the marginalized voices to be heard, and the American stories to be told?Attempts to bring perspectives that are considered “outside the mainstream” have sometimes engendered a lot of controversy, both within and outside the system. In some cases, public broadcasting has been subject to threats to reduce or even eliminate its governmental funding. In the face of these political and funding pressures, should we shy away from programs that contain unconventional or unpopular views, such as the personal struggles of a black homosexual man?
The Carnegie Commission on Educaational Television, a 15-member panel created in 1965 by a major foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York, released its report, Public Television: A Program for Action, on Jan. 26, 1967. Carnegie I popularized the phrase “public television” and assisted a legislative campaign for federal aid to the field. (Public radio was added later by Congress.) See also the the Summary of recommendations. Members of the Commission
James B. Conant, Former President, Harvard University
Lee A. DuBridge, President, California Institute of Technology
Ralph Ellison, Author
John S. Hayes, United States Ambassador to Switzerland
David D. Henry, President, University of Illinois
Oveta Culp Hobby, Chairman of the Board, Houston Post Company
J.C. Kellam, President, Texas Broadcasting Corporation
Edwin H. Land, President, Polaroid Corporation
Joseph H. McConnell, President, Reynolds Metals Company
Franklin Patterson, President, Hampshire College
Terry Sanford, Former Governor of North Carolina
Robert Saudek, Robert Saudek Associates, Inc.
Rudolph Serkin, Concert Pianist
Leonard Woodstock, Vice President, United Automobile Workers of America
James R. Killian, Jr., Chairman [of the Commission and] Chairman of the Corporation, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Preface
This Report of the Carnegie Commission on Educational Television is addressed to the American people.
Summary of Recommendations, July 1993
These are the recommendations of the Twentieth Century Fund Task Force on Public Television, released in the July 1993 report Quality Time? The complete 188-page paperback, including a background paper by Richard Somerset-Ward, published by the Twentieth Century Fund Press, is available for $9.95 through the Brookings Institution (1-800-275-1447). See also Current coverage, Aug. 9, 1993, and list of members. On mission
The mission of public television should be the enrichment and strengthening of American society and culture through high-quality programming that reflects and advances our basic values.
After stations’ list practices exploded as a political issue, an organization of public radio fundraisers, the Development Exchange, issued this advice written by the associate director of its Center for Membership Support. Comments
The value of members acquired by mail cannot be disputed. Members acquired by mail have better first-year and multi-year renewal rates than those members acquired by on-air or telemarketing. DEI continues to strongly recommend that stations develop and maintain aggressive direct mail donor acquisition campaigns as part of a balanced fundraising strategy. Despite the recent controversy surrounding list trades, do not stop trading your list.