Vivian Schiller decided to resign as NPR president after receiving “a late-night ultimatum” from Board Chair Dave Edwards, according to the Washington Post. Reporter Paul Farhi quotes “one person involved in the decision” who said: “The idea was to placate the Hill” and “They needed a human sacrifice.” Mark Vogelzang of Buffalo’s WBFO, a former NPR board member, told the New York Times, “Frankly, the management of NPR shouldn’t be in the press….When personnel issues are handled poorly at a national level, it reflects poorly on our member stations in our communities.” Today’s Politico reports on reactions to the NPR turmoil on Capitol Hill.

The Senate today (March 9) rejected the Republican Continuing Resolution proposal, which would end funding for CPB. Broadcasting & Cable noted that the move was expected.

The NPR video sting and subsequent resignation of its president Vivian Schiller prompted little reaction from listeners at two Washington state NPR affiliates. The Seattle Times reports that “the news was greeted in Seattle with a collective shrug: two e-mails and one phone call” to KUOW-FM. Station President Wayne Roth said that “unlike the Juan Williams affair, that got a lot of response from both listeners and nonlisteners, this seems relatively quiet.” At KPLU in Tacoma, two e-mails arrived. “They just wanted to know what happened,” said Paul Stankavich, g.m. “It was a good conversation.” Has your station heard from viewers or listeners?

The Association for Public Television Stations and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting today (March 9) issued statements regarding the undercover video sting of NPR executives Ron Schiller and Betsy Liley, and today’s resignation of NPR President Vivian Schiller. From APTS President Patrick Butler: Since assuming the presidency of NPR two years ago, Vivian Schiller has led her organization to new heights of news coverage, audience growth and financial strength, and her friends and admirers in public broadcasting wish her well in the next chapter of her remarkable career. The comments of former NPR executive Ron Schiller are indefensible and reprehensible, and in no way do they reflect the philosophy of the thousands of people in public broadcasting who are committed to providing a civil forum for in-depth, objective reporting and discussions of public issues at the local, national and international levels.

KLRU’s Austin City Limits has created a new position, general manager, and hired former Arista Records exec Tom Gimbel. Bill Stotesbery, station c.e.o. and g.m., said the growth of the franchise over the past several years (Current, July 20, 2009) created the need for the post. Gimbel’s background also includes founding Clatterhead, a social media advertising and marketing company, and High Wire Music, an independent management, label services, and music distribution company for more than 20 artists. Gimbel will oversee business development, production and digital strategies for the longtime hit pubcasting show.

Michael Maness is the new vice president of the Knight Foundation’s Journalism and Media Innovation program. Maness joins Knight after more than three years as vice president of innovation and design at Gannett. He succeeds Eric Newton, who becomes senior adviser to Knight Foundation President Alberto Ibargüen (a former PBS Board chairman). During the last five years, the Knight Foundation has invested more than $100 million in its Journalism and Media Innovation Initiative, which includes work on national media policy, technology innovation, public media transformation and the evolution of the World Wide Web. Part of the initiative is the popular Knight News Challenge, now in its fifth year, which competitively awards up to $5 million a year to develop platforms, tools and services to inform and transform community news, conversations and information distribution.

The Continuing Resolution, with its elimination of CPB funding, probably won’t be passed by the new deadline of March 18, House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) told a breakfast meeting for reporters today (March 9). He said Congress will probably pass another temporary measure to avoid a federal government shutdown.

The White House today (March 9) signaled that it still supports taxpayer funding for NPR, despite news of the video sting and NPR President Vivian Schiller’s resignation. The Associated Press is reporting that White House spokesman Jay Carney said that both Democratic and Republican presidents have supported such funding in the past and that there remains a need to support public broadcasting.

PBS tells the Associated Press that it was contacted by the same fake Muslim group that arranged a meeting with an NPR executive and secretly videotaped him calling the tea party racist. PBS spokeswoman Anne Bentley said today (March 9) that the network had an initial conversation with the Muslim Education Action Center but had concerns about the group. She says a PBS executive was contacted, but when PBS couldn’t confirm the organization’s credentials, they halted discussions.

Alicia Shepard, NPR ombudsman, took questions in a live online chat at WashingtonPost.com at 1:30 p.m. Eastern today (March 9). The chat is archived. Shepard said that Betsy Liley, NPR’s senior director of institutional giving, who was also caught in the sting video, is now on administrative leave. “I’m not sure how she could continue effectively for NPR,” Shepard said. Shepard also referred participants to her blog posting on NPR President Vivian Schiller’s resignation.

One day after denouncing her top fundraiser and nine weeks after asking her news chief to resign, NPR President Vivian Schiller stepped down today at the request of the NPR Board. She fell victim to a series of executive mistakes and mishaps that muddied NPR’s reputation in a poisonously partisan runup to key federal budget votes affecting public broadcasting. Schiller, who made extraordinary progress in crafting a digital service strategy for NPR and its local stations since arriving in January 2009, ultimately took the fall for her management team’s political errors during an unaccustomed moment of scrutiny. After the controversial firing of former news analyst Juan Williams last fall, Schiller seemed to recover from the missteps that put public radio in the crosshairs of Republicans who went on to take the House majority in November.

The Aspen Institute has issued a statement that Ron Schiller, at the center of NPR’s video sting, has decided not to join its staff. “Ron Schiller has informed us that, in light of the controversy surrounding his recent statements, he does not feel that it’s in the best interests of the Aspen Institute for him to come work here,” the institute said in a statement Wednesday (March 9). Schiller was set to start work with the institute on April 1 as director of its Arts and Harman-Eisner Artist-in-Residence programs.

Josh Silver, president of the Free Press media reform organization, is stepping down to become founding c.e.o. of the Democracy Fund, a foundation that will “challenge the influence of corporate lobbyists over government policymaking,” Free Press said in a statement Tuesday (March 9). Silver was a co-founder, with media scholar Robert W. McChesney, of Free Press in 2002, and will remain on its board of directors. The organization has been a strong supporter of public broadcasting and has fought for government funding increases (Current, May 10, 2010). Stepping into the leadership role at Free Press will be Craig Aaron, currently managing director.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Senate Democratic leaders are proposing broadening budget cuts into the “more politically volatile terrain” of subsidies and entitlement programs to break an impasse over Republican proposals. Recommendations from the two parties on the fiscal 2011 Continuing Resolution are $50 billion apart. Reductions in the GOP version include zeroing out CPB’s $460 million appropriation (Current, March 7, 2011). The paper notes that this change in Democratic strategy could mark a major shift in the budget battle. Up until now, debate has focused strictly on discretionary programs controlled by annual appropriations, a tiny amount of total federal spending.

Vivian Schiller has resigned as NPR president, the news organization has just announced. Her departure, effective immediately, follows yesterday’s release of a video sting involving NPR fundraising chief Ron Schiller, who exited late yesterday. In a statement posted on NPR’s own news blog, NPR Chair Dave Edwards said the NPR Board accepted Vivian Schiller’s resignation with “understanding, genuine regret, and great respect for her leadership of NPR these past two years.” “Vivian brought vision and energy to this organization. She led NPR back from the enormous economic challenges of the previous two years. She was passionately committed to NPR’s mission, and to stations and NPR working collaboratively as a local-national news network.”