Tuesday, June 21, 2005

goodbye public broadcasting?

i'm afraid.

when i have children, i can't imagine not being able to sit down and watch sesame street with them. i can't imagine not being able to listen to morning edition or all things considered on my way to and from work. i can't imagine not being able to have a nice cup o' joe while listening to wait wait don't tell me and this american life every saturday morning. i can't imagine my wife not being able to watch eastenders...

it's hard to visualize what impact budget cuts to the corporation for public broadcasting (cpb) and the public telecommunications facilities program (ptfp) would be on our local public radio and tv stations... no worry, it's been done for us. here's how spindale's wncw would be affected:

Total cuts could exceed $110,000. Based on prior year funding, WNCW estimates it could lose up to $73,000 in Community Service Grants. In addition, the Digital Conversion Grant program has been an important source of capital funding for equipment needed to prepare WNCW's transmitter for digital HD Radio broadcasting. This year, WNCW received $37,500 in grants from the Digital Conversion Fund with another $37,500 due from CPB next year so WNCW can complete the project.

These cuts would severely impact local programming production and broadcast operations, as WNCW would be forced to reallocate funds and potentially eliminate staff positions and services to the public.

and asheville's own wcqs:
CPB funding provides operating and program acquisition funds to WCQS. PTFP funding is our “venture capital” - which allows us to acquire broadcast equipment. WCQS currently has $360,000 in PTFP applications pending: one to move and rebuild our Mars Hill transmitter - a critical step in getting our new station up and running, and one to build our Bryson City translator. Both of these projects are in jeopardy if PTFP funding is eliminated
and, last but not least, unc-tv
If the full Congress approves this action it will reduce UNC-TV's general operating budget by a minimum of $750,000 next year, and will also eliminate $60,000 that funds UNC-TV's Ready to Learn program activities. This will result in a significant reduction in UNC-TV's programs and services for the people of North Carolina, including key services for teachers and children.
that's a estimated grand total of $1,280,000.

pertinent contact information can be found on sen. dole's, sen. burr's and rep. taylor's websites. you know what to do.

in the meantime, please consider making a donation to the public broadcaster of your choice...

5 comments:

Gordon Smith said...

Done.

George Peterson said...

thanks for the link!

arratik said...

well, it looks like they've decided to restore the $100M in funding to the appropriations legislation, but congress is still cutting $23M from the "ready to learn" program. oh, and the cpb named the former gop co-chair ad president/ceo.

here's a cnn story about it.

this battle was won, albiet with significant collateral damage, and the wingnut's war on public broadcasting (presumably, if i can paraphrase grover norquist, to shrink it down small enough so it can be drowned in a bathtub) has only begun.

arratik said...

btw, i'm guessing that there's something wacky in the "#main" attribute in the internal stylesheet, which is what's causing everything after the first blog entry to actually start underneath the "float:right" div, but for the life of me i can't figure out what it is... i know it's not a browser-specific thing - it does it in firefox, ie, opera and netscape... ::shrug::

Anonymous said...

im gonna try to reset up the blog this weekend to take care of it.

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