The FCC bestowed a rare gift upon the northwestern Montana town of Kalispell today — a construction permit for a new public TV station, licensed to Montana State University. As with many other full-power pubTV stations serving rural areas, the commission permitted the licensee to share programs from out of town — in this case, the Montana PBS programming originated at the university’s KUSM in Bozeman, which also airs on KUFM in Missoula and other repeaters in the state. The signal from Kalispell, 120 miles north of Missoula near Glacier National Park, will cover a population of just 98,700 spread across 7,500 square miles.

KPBS in San Diego is launching a new weeknight local news and analysis show, KPBS Evening Edition, beginning Sept. 26. “We’ve spent a lot of time preparing and planning for this program,” Tom Karlo, KPBS g.m., said in a statement. “We saw a tremendous opportunity on television to provide our community with intelligent, objective, and accurate news on global and local issues.” The program will feature local headlines as well as analysis, newsmaker interviews and video reports from the field. Topics will differ by night: Monday, business and technology; Tuesdays, health; Wednesdays, reports from the Fronteras local journalism center; Thursdays, community news; and Fridays, culture.

MacNeil/Lehrer Productions President Simon Marks is leaving his post at the end of this month, he told Current in an email today (Sept. 6). “I’ve realized over the past year that I greatly miss my daily dose of newsroom adrenalin,” he said. Marks is returning to his own company, Feature Story News, in both on-air and production roles. He has spent several weeks devising a management structure for the transition, and his predecessor Les Crystal will expand his ongoing advisory and consultative work during that time. Marks was associate executive producer for PBS NewsHour before his promotion last July.

NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday was originally conceived as the Sunday newspaper, but new host Audie Cornish wants it to be more like Sunday brunch, she tells Ad Week. “The kind of brunch I go to usually involves some alcohol, usually involves people telling stories and talking about what happened the week before, and what’s going to happen, and did you see this movie? I want that kind of energy.” Cornish also describes her approach for combating NPR’s stereotype for wide-eyed earnestness: “One of the things to think about is, if you find yourself saying ‘This is something our audience would like,’ you should just back away from the table, because you’re doing something that you think NPR sounds like.”

The Daystar religious network is purchasing KDYW, the former PBS affiliate KWBU in Waco, Texas, according to a filing with the Federal Communications Commission seeking approval for the deal. Licensee Baylor University is getting $250,000 for the station. Facing a $400,000 budget shortfall, KWBU went dark at the end of May 2010. The local nonprofit entity that will own the station is Community Television Educators of Waco, headed by Daystar’s Marcus and Joni Lamb. Its call letters were changed in May.

CPB is compiling an online list of 9/11-related pubcasting programming airing during the next several weeks. Spokesperson Nicole Mezlo told Current that the list is being updated as information comes in from stations and organizations around the country. Content includes two live presentations: A City Reimagined: Voices of 9/11 in Poetry and Performance, an evening of spoken-word performances of first-hand accounts of the day the terrorists struck the World Trade Center, and On Being‘s panel discussion, a collaboration with the Trinity Wall Street Church St. Paul’s Chapel at Ground Zero. The list also highlights local activities at stations.

WVPT in Harrisonburg, Va., is hoping an online talent contest helps them raise money to restore state cuts to their budget, reports the Augusta Free Press in Waynesboro, Va. Viewers can post videos showcasing their unique abilities at TALENT WAR$ @wvpt. Visitors view the films, select their favorite and “vote” for it by making a donation to WVPT on the site. Every dollar donated equals one vote for the video. The three participants with the most $1 votes by Jan. 3, 2012, win a first place award of $3,000; second place, $2,000; and third place, $1,000. As of July 1, cuts in state funding for pubcasting resulted in a loss of more than $200,000 for the station, said David Mullins, president and g.m.

A new memoir by Bob Edwards, the NPR personality whose 2004 ouster as Morning Edition anchor roiled public radio, is being offered as a free e-book download through Sept. 9, a week before the print edition’s release. “A Voice in the Box,” published by the University Press of Kentucky, recounts Edwards’s radio career, including his collaborations with NPR colleagues and sportscaster Red Barber, whose weekly appearances on Morning Edition were a keystone of Edwards’s 25 years as host. “You can think of this as the ultimate pledge drive premium considering most public radio supporters already have plenty of coffee mugs and tote bags,” says Edwards.

NJTV’s lack of live coverage of Hurricane Irene whipped at least one state lawmaker into a froth, according to the Star-Ledger. Assemblyman John Burzichelli (D-Gloucester), who opposed to the state’s decision to allow WNET to take over the former NJN, said NJTV officials should be embarrassed. “Its absence was glaring and unacceptable during a time of great crisis,” Burzichelli said in a statement Tuesday (Aug. 30). “NJTV promised to focus solely on New Jersey, but residents got nothing from them during the hurricane.” WNET President Neal Shapiro issued in a statement in response: “As we said in June, our video gathering capability and distribution wouldn’t be ready until after Labor Day.

Three years after its sale to a new community licensee, KCPW-FM in Salt Lake City is under the gun to raise $265,000 by Sept. 30. Wasatch Public Media financed most of its $2.2 million purchase of the NPR News station with a short-term loan from National Cooperative Bank; now the lender wants to get out of the business of public radio financing, the Salt Lake Tribune reports. Donors who backed the 2008 purchase reneged on their pledges during the recession, KCPW President Ed Sweeney tells the Tribune. “The challenge we have is how often can you ask your donors for help,” he says.

  PBS Hawaii has received a $5 million grant from the Clarence T.C. Ching Foundation to build a new facility in Honolulu. The station said it has an “urgent need” for the space as it is losing its lease at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, its home for the past 40 years. The commitment brings PBS Hawaii past the midway point in its $30 million capital campaign. In traditional island style, PBS Hawaii rolled out the announcement with a visual story. A Moanalua High School student, part of the station’s innovative Hiki No journalism program, introduced “A Tree Grows on Nimitz Highway,” a short video about the life of the late Clarence T.C.

From time to time, “the definition of public broadcasting and public service media should be reviewed,” writes Adam Powell, of the USC Annenberg Center on Communication Leadership and Policy. “The opportunity is immense.” In his post today (Aug. 31), Powell returns to the original 1967 report of the Carnegie Commission on Educational Television to examine how the system is living up to its responsibilities. One point: “Over the air, the mission of experimentation has largely atrophied,” Powell writes. “The PBS prime time schedule is filled with programs that are decades old, so there is little room for innovation or for new programs of any kind.”

PBS viewers writing to ombudsman Michael Getler want more diversity (“I am tired of giving money to a station that simply refuses to represent any race except for the white race”) and Bill Moyers (“How interesting that you have room for endless showings of Antique Roadshow … but no time slot for Bill Moyers!”) on the air.

WXPR-FM in Rhinelander, Wisc., is moving into a new building next year, it announced Monday (Aug. 29), joining a growing trend of pubcasting stations shifting to downtown locations. A capital campaign, “Hear the Future,” raised more than $400,000, and two local businessmen are donating 75 percent of the building cost. There’ll be space for four studios — a longtime station goal — and a new community features editor. The building has a news history: It used to house the Rhinelander Daily News. WXPR Station Manager Mick Fiocchi says the goal is to start remodeling “after the first of the year.”

MHz Networks is adding two English-language channels from China to its lineup in the Washington, D.C., metro area starting Oct. 1. CCTV News carries headlines, business, money and travel; CCTV Documentary runs cultural, historical, nature docs and more. “The addition of CCTV programming in D.C. opens a full-time window into China for all the residents of the region through free over-the-air and cable TV distribution,” said Fred Thomas, MHz c.e.o, in a press release.