Opinion writer: Reform public radio to save local journalism - Entrepreneur Generations

Increasing layoffs in the journalism industry, which help lead to news deserts, are a plausible threat to democracy, Howard Husock writes for The Wall Street Journal. Husock is the vice president of conservative think-tank the Manhattan Institute and a member of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting board.

New Jersey is trying to bolster the industry by providing $5 million in grant funding for local journalism, but Husock doesn't think that dispensing those funds via a board of political appointees and university representatives isn't exactly independent journalism.

There’s a better way, Husock writes: Change the Public Broadcasting Act so that the $445 million federal subsidy for “public media” can be diverted to local public broadcasting radio and television stations.

“A shift toward local journalism would be in line with the path many of the best public broadcasters have already blazed. New York’s WNYC, Boston’s WBUR, Dallas’s KERA and San Francisco’s KQED have all transformed themselves into local news powerhouses thanks to local financial support. WBUR alone has a newsroom staff of more than 100, and WNYC’s ratings exceed those of its commercial competitors. These are serious, independent newsrooms,” Husock writes. “What’s more, any station that wants to survive will have no choice but to develop local content. National programs will increasingly be delivered directly to your smartphone or tablet, bypassing the cable box or FM dial. PBS Kids is already an app. So is NPR programming. Why would local stations want to send their federal funds to NPR and PBS, given this new distribution technology? Letting local stations keep their federal funds would help local citizens understand local issues. It would lead to more culturally and politically diverse offerings, some of which would make their way on to national outlets such as NPR and PBS.”

from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/2LtNQew Opinion writer: Reform public radio to save local journalism - Entrepreneur Generations

Posted by Entrepreneur Generations

Tweet