WITF in Harrisburg, Pa., last week told 18 employees they are losing their jobs, according to the local Patriot-News. That will drop the number of full-time staffers from 85 to 67. The layoffs were spread throughout the operation, including technology, development and programming. Those leaving include “two of WITF’s better-known radio personalities,” the paper says: Craig Cohen, host of Radio Smart Talk since it started in 2008 and a nearly 10-year employee, and Melanie Herschorn, local reporter/host for All Things Considered for the last three years. “Every layoff is really a painful experience this time,” said Kathleen Pavelko, station c.e.o.

Joel Kaplan is the new ombudsman for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, effective June 1. Kaplan is currently associate dean at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, focused on its new graduate curriculum centered on multi-media storytelling and new media platforms. He has taught classes in news writing, investigative reporting, national political reporting, communications law, ethics and public affairs reporting. He’s also the author of two white papers for CPB that address the role of the ombudsman in achieving balance and objectivity within public media and in social media. “I look forward to working with CPB to improve transparency throughout the public media system,” Kaplan said in a statement, “encourage greater objectivity and balance in public media programming, and ensure the organization is responsive to audience comments and questions.”

Instead of paying for the state for management rights to operate New Jersey’s pubTV network, a new nonprofit formed by WNET/Thirteen will actually receive $4 million in fees and grants, sources with knowledge of the deal told the Star-Ledger. The subsidiary will receive a $2 million grant from the CPB previously awarded to NJN, and will keep about $2 million in tower rental fees that private companies pay the network, the paper said. A formal announcement of the five-year agreement is expected this week.

The Federal Communication Commission’s report on the future of media will be presented at the agency’s June 9 meeting, Broadcasting & Cable is reporting. An agency working group headed by veteran print journalist and Beliefnet founder Steve Waldman has been reporting on the topic since October 2009. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski and Waldman are also scheduled to appear June 10 at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism in New York, where they will discuss the report findings.

Boston pubcaster WGBH will extend its classical music service into Rhode Island through simulcasts on Bryant University’s student-operated radio station WJMF in Smithfield. The programming partnership, announced yesterday, includes a power-boost to WJMF’s 225-watt signal; the migration of student-programmed broadcasts to HD Radio, mobile DTV, and smartphone platforms; and a summer internship program for Bryant students. WGBH Radio’s 2009 signal expansion — the complex acquisition and signal-swap that converted commercial classical WCRB 102.5 FM into 99.5 All Classical, a WGBH-owned and operated noncommercial outlet with a much smaller service area — left classical-music audiences in Providence, R.I., without a full-time music station.

WGBH and AARP are co-producing a web-only reality series, 5 Weeks to a New Life, focusing on “revitalizing a marriage and other relationships, staying sexually active throughout life, looking good without resorting to Botox, financing dreams and living a life with purpose,” they said in a statement. The program follows two married couples and four singles facing the challenges of middle age, with guidance from personal-growth experts. The content “was designed not only to spark our thinking about what we want, but to inspire us to move forward,” said Laurie Donnelly, executive producer of WGBH’s lifestyle programming.

Due to a nearly 17 percent cut in state funding, South Dakota Public Broadcasting is eliminating 10.5 full-time positions for the upcoming fiscal year. The pubcaster said in a statement that jobs are being cut from outreach and education, engineering, television, radio and marketing — 15 percent of the total staff will be gone as of June 8. In addition, it’s reorganizing the education and outreach department into an online-based service, and ending initiatives including Ready to Learn and the overnight and daytime educational TV programming block. “The cuts made to the FY2011 budget required a system-wide analysis,” said Julie Andersen, executive director.

Nightly Business Report has launched a news bureau in Denver as part of an agreement with Rocky Mountain PBS. The bureau, which opened Wednesday (June 1), will cover stories of national interest happening in the region. NBR also opened a Silicon Valley bureau last November and recently began broadcasting on Sirius XM radio as part of an ambitious expansion process planned by owner Mykalai Kontilai, whose NBR Worldwide purchased the show last year.

Former NPR President Vivian Schiller will join NBC News in July as chief digital officer, overseeing digital strategy of both NBC News and MSNBC. Her responsibilities include strategic oversight of NBC’s digital extensions on the web and in mobile, interaction with the joint venture that oversees the msnbc.com digital network, and directing new emerging properties such as EducationNation.com and theGrio.com. She reports to NBC News President Steve Capus, who said her journalistic background and digital expertise brings “a strong new pillar to the NBC News leadership team.” Schiller, who served as NPR president two years, laid the groundwork for a national and local digital service strategy between NPR and its member stations.

New Hampshire Public Television is eliminating some 20 full-time positions to offset an “impending loss” of $2.7 million in state funding, which will be a 30 percent reduction in its $8.8 million annual operating budget. NHPTV spokesperson Grace Lessner tells Current that the full-time staff of 49 will fall to 30 as of July 1. Most of the affected staffers were notified on Wednesday (June 1), spokesperson Lessner told Foster’s Daily Democrat. She said cuts come from all departments, including administration, production and content. “It was devastating,” she said. Remaining staff will receive salary cuts of  between 4 percent to 10 percent and reductions in the station’s staff retirement plan contribution.

Fifteen projects by 22 teenage filmmakers will receive grants through Project VoiceScape, a collaboration between Adobe Youth Voices and P.O.V., public TV’s longest-running showcase for indie nonfiction films. The Adobe and PBS Foundations jointly announced the grants today (June 1). Here is a list of the winning programs (PDF).

In her last column as NPR Ombudsman, Alicia Shepard credited NPR for demonstrating a commitment to transparency and accountability by employing a journalist as an internal critic of its news coverage. “They say this is the loneliest job in the newsroom – the public thinks you are a shill for NPR and NPR employees think you are an internal affairs investigative unit,” she wrote. “Often I’ve felt a bit like a security guard at a private party. Just my presence – and fear of being named in a column – may help to keep folks working hard to live up to the ethics and journalism standards that NPR has established.”

NBC News reportedly plans to hire former NPR President Vivian Schiller to lead its digital division. “People familiar with the company say Schiller, who once ran the New York Times’ Web site, will report to NBC News chief Steve Capus,” Peter Kafka reports for All Things Digital.

After Bill Kling retires on July 1 from atop Minnesota Public Radio and American Public Media in St. Paul, he “plans to take his show on the road and use his influence to build up public radio stations across America,” according to the City Pages in Minneapolis. Kling reiterated to the paper his plans to raise $5 million a year for five years, to be used by four public radio stations (Chicago’s WBEZ, New York’s WYNC, and KPCC in southern California) to hire more reporters (Current, Oct. 18, 2010). Another $5 million per year will be donated to the greater public radio system.