The leadership of WNET said a federal investigation into the station’s use of federal grants totaling almost $13 million is wrapping up, and the organization is financially sound. “There was sloppiness as opposed to real wrongdoing in terms of our accounting systems, which has been addressed,” said James Tisch, chairman of the WNET Board, in an interview.

With the PBS premiere of Ken Burns’ much anticipated National Parks: America’s Best Idea quickly approaching, The Los Angeles Times is examining the filmmaker, his approach and his subject matter. “Though he’s generally respected by critics and scholars,” the paper said, “a backlash has been building, dismissing him as middlebrow, charging that he’s repeating himself, that he’s too earnest, too dark or naively patriotic.” As Tim Page of The Washington Post wrote of Burns’ 2001 film Jazz, in which Burns presented the improvisational music as a mirror of American culture, “This sort of unreflected populist Hallmark-ese seems a strange mixture of New Deal and New Age, and I don’t believe it for a moment.”

Latino Public Broadcasting has received a 2009 National Council of La Raza ALMA Special Achievement Award for its body of work for the year starting June 2008 in the development, support, and promotions of Latino-themed documentaries on public television. LPB Chairman Edward James Olmos and Managing Director Luis Ortiz accepted the honor during the ALMA pre-show on Thursday. The ALMA Awards show with hosts Eva Longoria Parker and George Lopez airs at 8 tonight on ABC.

Liza Minelli’s Las Vegas show “Liza’s at the Palace” will be shot for distribution by American Public Television, Playbill reports. The Tony-winning production will be available to stations in November, then released on home video in 2010.

Ira Glass, host of pubradio phenom This American Life, somewhat accidentally revealed last night that its Showtime version is ending. “I don’t know if I can say this yet, but we’ve asked to be taken off of television,” Glass told the audience at a panel discussion in Manhattan that included several of the show’s senior producers. As reported by FishbowlNY, Glass said that despite its four recent Emmy nods, the TV version would not continue. “Most journalism is about things that already happened, as it turns out,” he said. “But with television, you want to capture it while it’s happening.”

Network World, a news provider for network and IT professionals, is reporting that the Internet security firm Purewire has discovered malware in the PBS Kids’ Curious George web page. Purewire researcher Nidhi Shah told the news site that the company first observed a malware, or malicious software, infection on Monday when a Purewire customer’s computer picked it up. The log-in at the Curious George page may produce an error message that drags the user to a domain where “an attempt to exploit vulnerabilities on the user’s desktop applications is made,” according to the news report. A PBS rep said it is aware of the problem, which should be fixed by Friday afternoon.

Kermit the Frog is on the record about his relationship with oh-so hip pop star Lady Gaga: There is none. His denial to People magazine comes after the two arrived together at the recent MTV Video Music Awards and were photographed smooching as Kermit leaned out of the back of a limo. “It was not a romantic kiss,” he insists. “It was a kiss for good luck. Kissing a frog is good luck for the person giving the kiss–but bad luck for the frog if his pig finds out.” That would be Miss Piggy, who has long been linked to the green Muppet.

Garrison Keillor, 67, insists he’s fine, just fine, after a mild stroke earlier this month. He also tells The Associated Press that he has no plans to retire or to postpone the new season of his Prairie Home Companion that begins Sept. 26. “I’m not a collector of things. I don’t have hobbies . . . so work is what I do,” he explained. His staff confirmed to Current that Keillor fully intends to participate in the big meatloaf dinner and street dance that traditionally kicks off each first show. Keillor described his experience in the hospital in an essay on Salon.com

With the change of parties in the White House comes an echo at CPB. Its board unanimously elected a Democrat, Ernest Wilson, as chair today in Washington. Louisiana PTV chief Beth Courtney was named vice chair. Afterward Wilson told Current that the time is right for a reexamination and expansion of pubcasting comparable to the Carnegie Commission’s report more than 40 years ago. The outcome “shouldn’t be determined on 9th Street,” at CPB headquarters, but rather through discussion around the country, he said. The international communications scholar, now dean of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California, was first named to the board nine years ago by President Clinton and reappointed by President Bush.

PRI talk host Tavis Smiley was awarded the 2009 Interdependence Day Prize on Sept. 12 in Istanbul, Turkey, by the CivWorld project of Demos, a nonpartisan public advocacy organization. About 100 delegates from around the world attended the policy forum. CivWorld President Benjamin R. Barber, called Smiley a “fearless television broadcaster, intrepid interviewer and ardent humanitarian, who has become a voice for all humankind by putting honesty before interest, civil discourse before polemics, and integrity before advantage.” Past recipients include actor/activist Harry Belafonte; Lord Bhikhu Parekh, professor of political philosophy at the University of Westminster; and Polish Solidarity founder Adam Michnik.

Maryland Public Television has announced 18 layoffs, or about 10 percent of its staff, effective Oct. 6. There will also be furloughs, according to a station statement. Job cuts come from the technology, content, institutional advancement, communications and administration units. MPT President Robert Shuman said there’ll be no loss of programming.

CPB announced major funding to producers of the Michael Eric Dyson Show, a midday talk show for African-American audiences that launched in April on public radio stations in 18 markets. The $505,000 grant to producing station WEAA in Baltimore covers one year, but CPB anticipates multi-year support, according to a spokeswoman. In a news release, CPB President Pat Harrison described CPB’s commitment to ensuring a “diversity of voices in public radio.” “[T]his grant . . . is an investment in that commitment and an expansion of the relationship between public media and diverse audiences,” she said. “We’re very pleased that CPB is investing in WEAA’s national production capacity,” said LaFontaine Oliver, g.m.,

The CPB Board, meeting at headquarters in Washington, D.C., today pondered an intriguing concept: Using advertising, or even scrolling information at the bottom of commercial TV news broadcasts, to bring more attention to the important work being done by pubcasting. In a conversation sparked by talk of the new CPB-funded fluportal.org, several members commented on the need to get that H1N1 resource directly to the public, not relying entirely on local stations to push it out to local viewers. CPB is “continually frustrated” by the public not knowing how connected it is to communities, said CPB head Pat Harrison. “We need to take a look at what we can and can’t do, and how much money it would require.”

Public Radio Exchange has partnered to create a site for sharing community web and radio reports across borders. Its collaborator, the International Center for Journalists, yesterday announced the two-year project funded by the McCormick Foundation. ICFJ trainers will work on radio and web skills with journalists for participating Spanish-language radio stations in the United States and Latin America. The project kicks off with a panel discussion about broadband access in minority communities at the National Press Club Sept. 17.

Stations uncovered forgotten doc footage on several civil rights movements as they prepared for the preservation phase of the CPB-funded American Archives pilot project. Included were recordings of movement leaders Langston Hughes, Thurgood Marshall, Gloria Steinem and Harvey Milk as well as the Ku Klux Klan, some on 16mm film unseen for decades. CPB hopes to use the project to raise funds for a wider preservation effort. In the second phase of the project, 22 stations get grants to preserve and digitize historical content. Project manager Oregon Public Broadcasting said it will give CPB-funded grants totaling $2 million. The pilot focuses on the civil rights movement plus more recent recollections of World War II produced to accompany the PBS series The War.