Programs/Content

Two public TV networks decline to air POV documentary After Tiller

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At least two public television networks opted not to air this week the POV documentary After Tiller, which profiles four late-term abortion providers and prompted a campaign among anti-abortion organizations. POV’s plans to air the film’s national broadcast premiere at 10 p.m. Sept. 1 spurred an Aug. 27 online statement from Judie Brown, president of the American Life League, who called the documentary “nothing short of pure propaganda intended to demonize the entire pro-life movement and drum up support for late-term abortion.” Several other anti-abortion websites urged visitors to contact PBS headquarters or PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler to protest stations airing the film. South Carolina ETV in Columbia and Mississippi Public Broadcasting in Jackson declined to air After Tiller.

People

SABEW honors biz news, Michiganers land MAB awards, and more recognition for pubcasters

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SOCIETY OF AMERICAN BUSINESS EDITORS AND WRITERS
Pubcasters honored with SABEW Best in Business awards. NPR’s coverage of the “Health Care Website Launch” was named best radio/TV segment or interview, citing reporter Elise Hu and editors Uri Berliner and Neal Carruth. NPR’s Planet Money won in the innovation category for its episode “Planet Money Makes a T-Shirt.” WAMU 88.5 News’s Patrick Madden, Julie Patel and Meymo Lyons won for best radio/TV or investigative report for “Deals for Developers.” “Lots of ground covered, great interviews with lots of players and lots of tough questions asked,” said SABEW. “This is local accountability journalism at its best.”

ProPublica received three awards in the digital arena. ProPublica’s Jesse Eisinger won for digital commentary for “The Trade,” which addressed the banking and financial industries; T. Christian Miller and Jeff Gerth were cited in the digital explanatory division for “Overdose,” a series investigating the dangers of acetaminophen; and A.C. Thompson and Jonathan Jones won for the digital feature “Assisted Living.”

The digital investigative prize went to Chris Hamby of The Center for Public Integrity for “Breathless and Burdened: Dying from Black Lung, Buried by Law and Medicine.” (“Breathless and Burdened” also won the Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting presented by the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government for CPI’s Hamby, Ronnie Greene, Jim Morris and Chris Zubak-Skees plus Matthew Mosk, Brian Ross and Rhonda Schwartz of ABC News; it was presented March 5 in Boston.)

The 19th annual BiB awards will be presented March 29 at the SABEW conference in Phoenix.

Quick Takes

SoCon drops deals with four public TV stations for game coverage

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The Southern Conference has cut short a three-year deal with four public television stations to air college athletic events. SoCon, a Division I college athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association, announced the deals last year with South Carolina ETV, UNC-TV, Georgia Public Broadcasting and WTCI in Chattanooga, Tenn. (Current, Dec. 12, 2011). But SoCon wanted its games televised statewide in all five states within the league, which also included Alabama.

Idaho Public Television

Phase-out of state aid proposed in R.I., Oklahoma

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Pubcasting networks continue to deal with the uncertainties of state funding in economically and politically precarious times, closing offices, facing possible cuts and bracing for the consequences. Rhode Island: Gov. Lincoln Chafee’s latest budget, unveiled Jan. 31, proposes eliminating state funding to Rhode Island PBS by fiscal year 2014. Support would fall from around $933,000, about a third of the station’s budget, to $425,000 next fiscal year, then zero out. “He’s basically given us until Dec.