In a followup to a Current investigation (Aug. 23 and Sept. 7), the New York Times reports today (Nov. 22) that Mykalai Kontilai, the new owner of Nightly Business Report, agreed to leave the instructional programming business in 2000 and paid $250,000 as part of the settlement of a fraud suit. Kontilai confirms making the payment but denies agreeing to step out of the field. Ronald Reed, former president of AGC/United Learning, an educational content provider that has since become part of Discovery, told the newspaper: “We felt, from our point of view, that it would be best not to have him in the industry,” after discovering “what we considered to be inappropriate business practices.”

The Week, a digest newsmag, has a good gathering of links to last week’s coverage of the ongoing attacks on NPR and its government funding. One comment on the post: “Even us conservative southern rednecks love NPR. It should be a sacred cow!” Another, a roundup of opinion columns, is on the Atlantic’s site.

A group of 40 New Jersey officials and pubcasting leaders met for more than eight hours Friday (Nov. 19) to hear advice from journalists and academics on saving the New Jersey Network after state funding ends soon (Current, July 6, 2010).  Included were State Treasure Andrew Eristoff, an aide to Gov. Chris Christie, Sen. Nia Gill (D-Essex) and execs from WHYY in Philadelphia, jazz station WBGO in Newark, and WNYC and WNET/Thirteen in New York City. Steve Adubato Jr., president of Caucus Educational Corporation, a producer of public affairs, cultural and educational programs for more than 20 years, told the Star-Ledger that the conversation made it clear that the current television-centered pubcasting model is not sufficient.

WBUR General Manager Paul La Camera is departing his post at the end of the year, he told the staff at a station meeting today (Nov. 19). “I’m going to be 68 next month and I think that’s an appropriate expiration date for someone to be running a dynamic contemporary media entity that increasingly has to surge into the digital world,” La Camera said after making the announcement. “To be frank, I’m more of a traditionalist, and that’s not necessarily my strength.” La Camera was appointed g.m. in October 2005.

Leave it to Roger Ebert to pen a love letter to NPR. The movie critic (and prolific blogger) today (Nov. 19) came to the defense of the beleaguered network. “NPR surely is the voice of America — the voice I hope the world is listening to via the internet,” Ebert writes. “It is the voice of our better nature. We are not all snarling dogs of Left and Right, feasting on shreds torn from the Body Politic. Some of us (maybe most of us, when the mood is right) are kind, curious, sane. We are interested in other peoples, other lifestyles, other choices.

South Carolina Educational Television has hired Linda O’Bryon, former chief of content at Northern California Public Broadcasting, as its new president and c.e.o., the San Francisco Chronicle is reporting. She takes the helm Dec. 1. O’Bryon had supervised producers, editors, reporters and tech personnel at pubTV stations in San Francisco, San Jose and Monterey, and two pubradio stations in Sacramento.

The Media Rating Council, which ensures standards of audience measurement, has removed accreditation for Nielsen’s measurement of its 154 diary-only markets, retroactive to 2009, according to Broadcasting & Cable. The magazine quotes “insiders” who say that with more folks dropping their land lines for cellphones, Nielsen is using address-based recruiting of ratings homes in its diary markets, instead of selecting by phone number. The new method resulted in sample sizes coming up short in two of the four quarters in 2009. Nielsen said in a letter to station clients that the issue has been resolved, it has requested a new MRC audit, and it expects to be accredited again soon.

Producers made “a big mistake, one that was virtually certain to come back and bit them and PBS,” by editing out Tina Fey’s remarks about conservative women during during her acceptance speech for the Kennedy Center’s Mark Twain Prize on Nov. 9, PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler writes in today’s (Nov. 18) column. The broadcast on PBS Sunday (Nov. 14) ran 22 minutes long, one of the producer, Peter Kaminsky, told Getler. Producers had only 24 hours to trim the show. “We had no problem with anything she [Fey] said,” Kaminsky said. “It was a humor judgment call forced by time.”

Texas Republican Reps. Joe Barton and Michael Burgess have called for a Government Accountability Office investigation of NPR’s funding. In a letter to the GAO, first reported Nov. 18 by Broadcasting & Cable, the lawmakers asked government investigators to follow the trail of federal funding in public radio — including CPB grants awarded to NPR and federal aid to local stations that may be re-directed to NPR. They pose five questions, including whether any federal funds pay for program production or the salaries of NPR personalities or editors, and whether NPR used federal aid to manage its contractual relationship with former news analyst Juan Williams or to pay for the internal review of his dismissal.

The House of Representatives today (Nov. 18) voted down a move to defund NPR, in the first Republican-ordered floor vote since the GOP-dominated Midterms on Nov. 2. The vote was 239-171. It was actually a procedural maneuver related to a debate rule on H.R. 1722, the Telework Enhancement Act of 2010. The House vote was to close debate and thus avoid voting on the NPR proposal, which had been put forward by Congressman Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.) Following the vote, the Association of Public Television Stations issued a statement. “APTS stands in solidarity with public radio stations across the country who provide an invaluable service to their local communities,” said APTS Interim President and CEO Lonna Thompson.

Las Vegas PBS/Channel 10 is handling pledge in a very different way this season. “We are the only station in the U.S. trying this,” General Manager Tom Axtell, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. From Nov. 26 through Dec. 12, no more 10-minute begging breaks; now they’re three-minute segments. Fundraising is “mostly host-free and lower-key,” the newspaper noted, with “Do Your Part” graphics popping up during shows, flashing the per-viewer contribution required to keep it on the air if every viewer contributes. Those figures are the station’s costs for acquiring and broadcasting the program, divided by number of viewers based on Nielsen stats.

In the midst of all the talk of defunding CPB, here’s a letter to the editor to boost your spirits. Reader Jon M. Nelson wrote to the Lake County Record-Bee in Lakeport, Calif., asking for public support to bring PBS to the county two hours north of San Francisco. Nelson thinks PBS is an especially important educational source for the children of the county. He said an engineer from PBS affiliate KRCB in Rohnert Park, Calif., about 75 miles away, told him the equipment costs to pick up its signal would be around $25,000. “We need to get together to raise funds for this project of adding public broadcasting into our lives here in Lake County,” wrote Nelson, of Lucerne, Calif.,

In an interview with Howard Kurtz of The Daily Beast, Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes unleashes on those who challenge the rightward partisanship of the cable news channel and provocative rhetoric of Bill O’Reilly, who recently joked about beheading Washington Post political columnist Dana Milbank. Ailes blasts Jon Stewart of The Daily Show for bashing conservatives, but takes his criticism to another level when the subject turns to NPR’s dismissal of news analyst Juan Williams. “They are, of course, Nazis,” Ailes said, referring to NPR’s leadership. “They have a kind of Nazi attitude. They are the left wing of Nazism. These guys don’t want any other point of view.

FCC Commissioner Michael Copps, speaking to the National Congress of American Indians Wednesday (Nov. 7) in Albuquerque, announced a Tribal Issues Commission meeting on March 3, 2011, in D.C. This year the commission adopted an order to streamline Native American broadcast radio assignment and allotment procedures. “Even though more than a million Native Americans and Alaska Natives live on over 55 million acres of Tribal lands across the U.S., there are only some 41 radio stations licensed to Native Entities,” Copps said. “The new Tribal Priority gives precedence to American Indian Tribes and Alaska Native Villages, or companies controlled by Tribes, that want to set-up new radio stations to serve their local communities.”

It’s a wrap. After 36 years, Austin City Limits retired its legendary Studio 6A last week (Nov. 8) with a performance by Lyle Lovett, whose first appearance was as a backup singer to Nanci Griffith in 1985. The series will start the 2011 season in the new—and much roomier—Moody Theater in downtown Austin, Texas. Here’s a sample of the wide press coverage the event received, including remembrances from Scott Newton, the show’s photographer, who started shooting the action in 1978.