The CommLaw Center blog of law firm Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman is cautioning broadcasters to pay closer attention to their public files. Media attorney Scott Flick observes that the Federal Communications Commission is taking a “hardening line on public inspection file violations.” In 1997, the FCC established a base fine of $10,000 for public inspection file violations, but tended not to issue fines for the full amount unless it was an egregious problem, such failure to keep a public file at all for some period of time, Flick writes. But over the past decade, $10,000 has become the standard fine for even minor public file violations — and in one recent case, the FCC adjusted that figure upward and issued a $15,000 fine.

Here’s some actual good news coming in the wake of the Florida state funding elimination. WSRE-FM in Pensacola won’t have to discontinue the longtime SightLine daily reading service for listeners with visual impairments after all, reports the North Escambia news website. WUWF-FM, University of West Florida’s UWF Public Media, approached the station with the suggestion to relocate the reading service and coordinating responsibilities there, but continue to use WSRE’s SAP (Second Audio Program) channel to deliver the service as it has for nearly two decades. (Although it had been impacted by state cuts, WUWF wasn’t hit quite as hard as WSRE.)

Public media reporters and producers made a strong showing in the 10th annual Society of Environmental Journalists awards: ProPublica and Frontline staffers for “The True Story Behind the Oil Spill”; PRI’s The World for ongoing environmental reporting; Maine Public Broadcasting for “Science Skeptics, Corporate Lobbyists and the Assault on Maine’s Environment”; and PBS NewsHour for “In Middle East, Coalition Aims to Ease Tension Over Water Resources.” A full list of winners is here.

Member Benefits Inc., which runs local member benefit programs for more than 140 pubcasting stations, kicks off its new MemberCardConnect website today (Aug. 8). (Here’s a look at the page for Chicago Public Media.) The company says the new site merges station content, branding and social networking tools with expanded MemberCard benefits and online rewards. Each station’s page contains sections highlighting underwriters and sponsors and announcing upcoming events, as well as links to station social network pages and an RSS applet.

Pubcaster David Rubinsohn has added yet more initials to his resume. In addition to working for TJL Productions and APT, he’s now director of public TV sales for DLT Entertainment. The television production and distribution firm said in a statement Monday (Aug. 8) that it’s looking to expand content choices to pubTV. Rubinsohn formerly headed programming at WHYY in Philadelphia, and was v.p. of programming and distribution at New York’s WLIW. Titles from DLT include Benny Hill and Rumpole of the Bailey.

Robert Miller, past director of educational publishing at WNET, has launched a new website with a unique approach to teaching African-American and Mexican-American history. Our History as News uses a newspaper format that is “engaging, exciting, immediate,” Miller told the Hispanically Speaking News site. “Because we use advertisements, short news articles and original illustrations, as well as feature stories and editorials, we offer people with all levels of reading skills the opportunity to learn.” The Black Chronicle tells the story of African-Americans from 1778, when Rhode Island Slaves were promised their freedom if they fought in the Colonial armies, up through 1954, when Rosa Parks refused to sit in the back of the bus.

KCRW’s Diana Nyad, the 61-year-old champion swimmer making her second attempt to swim from Cuba to Florida without a shark cage, has officially ended her quest about halfway through, after nearly 30 hours in the water. CNN is reporting that Nyad was vomiting when she was brought aboard a boat at 12:45 a.m. today (Aug. 9). Nyad “struggled through ocean swells, shoulder pain and asthma Monday before she was forced to give up the 103-mile swim,” CNN’s account says. Her team told the network that strong winds and tricky currents figured into her decision. Her Twitter feed reports that as of 8:30 a.m.

KQED-FM/88.5 is enjoying a nice ratings run. The station arrived at No. 1 in the San Francisco market for the first time in April. Jo Anne Wallace, g.m., was cautious, noting the station “didn’t celebrate, but we took note of it.” After a slight dip for pledge in May, the station was again atop the local ratings in June, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. “Since launching a news initiative in July 2010, increasing staff and the frequency of locally produced newscasts to 16, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., KQED has pushed past KGO (810 AM) in the overall ratings and been dominant in the prized age demo of 25-54,” the paper notes.

Current‘s first Pledge Pipeline previews 36 shows heading to public TV on-air membership drives in December 2011, March 2012 and beyond. Producers and distributors provided this information in response to Current‘s questionnaire. December ’11 ’60s Pop Rock: My Music Producing organization: TJL Productions. Distributor: PBS. Length: 75 minutes in four acts (SD 4:3). Status: postproduction. Executive producer: T.J. Lubinsky. Contact: Jim Pierson, piersonjb @ aol.com, 310-936-3616. ♦ Peter Noone of Herman’s Hermits and Davy Jones of the Monkees host an all-star 1960s pop rock concert reunion of more than a dozen hit acts. Premiums include DVD, CD. Alone in the Wilderness, Part 2 Producing organization: Bob Swerer Produc-tions.

Television viewers in Great Britain, the Middle East, Russia and India could soon be watching American public TV shows, if two initiatives get up and running in the coming months. The PBS UK channel is being bankrolled by W. David Lyons, an entrepreneurial oilman from Calgary, Alberta. The programming will be assembled by PBS Distribution (PBSd), a partnership of PBS and WGBH that holds international rights to a “significant number” of public television titles, said Jan McNamara, PBS spokesperson. In a separate venture, Virginia-based MHz Networks, which feeds international content to some 30 American public TV stations on its Worldview multicast channel, will reverse direction with its MHz America package, pushing local shows from at least five pubTV stations and independent producers to foreign markets.

Garrison Keillor is still confident in his decision to step aside from full-time hosting duties at public radio’s Prairie Home Companion in July 2013. “I think it’s a great plan,” Keillor told the Louisville, Ky., Courier-Journal in a story Sunday (Aug. 7), “so that the host is able to step to the side before he becomes halting and pitiful, a lumbering galoot out on stage. I don’t need to be that person. I want to leave at the right time.” Keillor said he expects to continue supplying regular dispatches from Lake Wobegon — perhaps even in a big-screen movie. “There are people interested in backing it,” Keillor said.

Talks exploring a union between two major public broadcasters in western New York state will culminate with the $4 million sale of Buffalo’s WBFO-FM, the dominant NPR News station in the region. WNED, a public TV and radio operation with a weaker AM signal for news, in addition to an FM for classical music, will buy the news station from the State University of New York’s University at Buffalo, retaining its call letters and news format. With the stronger FM news signal, WNED plans to enhance WBFO’s appeal to Canadian audiences, who comprise 68 percent of member contributors to WNED-TV, according to Don Boswell, president.

At 7:45 p.m. Eastern last night (Aug. 7), KCRW’s Diana Nyad entered waters off Havana to began her second attempt to swim the 103 miles between Cuba and Florida. Matt Sloane from CNN is in a support boat and Tweeting what could be a 60-hour journey; CNN also is tracking the swim here. Sloane report at around 9 a.m. Eastern this morning that 20 miles into the swim Nyad is doing well, with the exception of a few minor shoulder pains. CNN reported the start of her odyssey last night. “I’m almost 62 years old and I’m standing here at the prime of my life,” she said as she walked toward the sea.

Chicago Public Media WBEZ-FM is working on plans to boost its output of local news during middays in response to two new local FM news outlets, reports Chicago media critic Bob Feder. Torey Malatia, president of Chicago Public Media, outlined details for staffers Friday (Aug. 5). Currently the station airs local newsmag Eight Forty-Eight and international affairs talk show Worldview, both WBEZ productions, along with various programs from other sources. “Some of those purchased programs would probably remain, but the weaker ones would go away,” Malatia said. “But we haven’t gotten as far as targeting any of them yet.”

Long after giving a title to her new serious comic book, On the Media co-host Brooke Gladstone is having to explain it away. When forced into giddy sound-bite mode on The Colbert Report July 26, she was quick to say that The Influencing Machine doesn’t follow the alarmist line you’d expect. “This title is what I want to fight — the popular notion that the media are controlling our minds,” she said. “It’s really a mirror.” Calling the book “Our Harmless Media Lapdog” wouldn’t have fit the book, either. More like “The Pandering Machine,” because Gladstone offers plenty of evidence that journalists, in their desire to please audiences, do plenty of damage by cheerleading wars and ignoring unpleasant developments below the surface of public life.