NPR Banks $17m in Grant Money--That's a Lot of Tote Bags

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National Public Radio today will announce $17 million in grants, the lion's share of which NPR will devote to financing a new Web and mobile platform, the New York Times reported today.

Roughly $10 million in grants will go toward creating, according to NPR, a "seamless local-national listening platform." Sources for the grant money include the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the John & James Knight Foundation, the Ford Foundation and the Wallace Foundation, the Times article noted.

Because the grants are for specific projects, they will not affect NPR's $6 million deficit that is expected to prompt a 10 percent staff reduction in 2014 (see "TUOL" post 9/13/13).

NPR Offering Buyouts; Hopes to Reduce Staff by 10 Percent

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In a closed board meeting yesterday, NPR tackled an anticipated $6.1 million operating deficit for the coming fiscal year by agreeing to offer buyouts in hopes of reducing its workforce by 10 percent.

The Washington Post reported today that 80 to 84 employees would be cut loose from NPR's 840-member staff if the buyouts work as intended. The NPR board also named former SEC attorney Paul G. Haaga, Jr., a member of NPR's board since 2011, its interim CEO, replacing Gary Knell, who is departing in November to take the helm of the National Geographic Society.

The 10 percent staff reduction is one of the largest in NPR's history, according to the Post article.  The astute "TUOL" staff suspected something was amiss when it noticed NPR's giveaway tote bags seemed smaller.

Perhaps the company can hit up its favorite philanthropist, Hugh R. Lisnerz, for some money.

NPR Looks to Here & Now; 'Talk''s Conan There & Then

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After 11 years of conducting provocative interviews and interacting with callers, host Neal Conan and his Talk of the Nation ("TOTN") are out at National Public Radio, replaced by Boston-based WBUR's Here and Now hosted by Robin Young.

According to Web site posts on Poynter.org and RadioInk.com, Talk reached 3.5 million listeners on 407 stations nationwide, but NPR wanted to move away from its opinionated call-in format in favor of Here and Now's story-telling news format. Conan confirmed to Poynter the decision to end Talk of the Nation was not his.

The 21-year-old TOTN comes to an end on July 1.

Al Gore Sells to Al-Jazeera

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The financially-strapped, viewer-deprived Current TV cable network founded by former Vice President Al Gore this week announced it will be purchased by Al-Jazeera.

According to articles by NPR.org and The Huffington Post, the Qatari government-funded network plans to operate Al-Jazeera America from New York-based headquarters. The Arab-language news operation, based in Qatar, already offers Al-Jazeera English, which is available in Washington, D.C. and New York City, but scarcely accessible in the U.S.

Buoyed by its acquisition of Current TV, which reaches approximately 60 million homes through cable or satellite service, Al-Jazeera America plans to bolster its staff to 300 and open bureaus nationwide to join its current operations in New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Miami and Los Angeles, according to the NPR report.

Although Al-Jazeera English will provide some programming, more than half of the network's shows will be produced in the U.S. The transition, however, may not be as smooth as the Qatari news operation may have hoped. The Huffington Post reported today that Time Warner Cable ("TWC"), which has carried the ratings-starved Current TV to roughly 12 million homes, will not make Al-Jazeera America available to its subscribers. The TWC decision was condemned as politically motivated and an act of cowardice by the founding director of the Knight Center for Digital Media Entrepreneurship at Arizona State University.

However, according to a tweet by a New York Times reporter, Al-Jazeera America is likely to benefit from Current TV's arrangement with other carriers, including Comcast, DirecTV, Verizon, A T&T and Dish.

Dems Defeat Defund NPR Bill Advanced by GOP

Image by wstera2 via FlickrAging '60s rockers and folkies eager to perform at fundraiser retrospectives and those in the market for a new tote bag are breathing easier today as House Democrats beat back a measure to eliminate government funding of NPR by a vote of 239-171, according to the Web site The Wrap (www.thewrap.com).

Fueled by NPR's recent dismissal of conservative commentator Juan Williams, GOP Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R.-Va.) introduced the bill to halt federal funding of NPR, which drew unanimous GOP support and three Democrats.  NPR, a nonprofit news organization, reacted to the vote, praising the House's "good judgment" for quashing the effort "to assert government control over the content of news."

But, All Things Considered, NPR may not be out of the woods yet.  The bipartisan National Commission for Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, charged with recommending ways to slash the federal budget, has suggested shutting off the federal spigot to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting--NPR and PBS, that is.

With Bristol Palin still hoofing her away into the hearts of Americans, the NPR vote has not been the Talk of the Nation.

NPR Down Juan Senior News Analyst

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NPR has cut lose senior news analyst Juan Williams, 56, following the commentators remarks about Muslims on Fox's The O'Reilly Factor.


Discussing the firestorm generated  by O'Reilly's comments on The View holding Muslims accountable for the 9/11 attacks, Williams said that when he boards a plane and sees passengers in Muslim garb, he gets "worried" and "nervous."  In terminating the contract of  Williams, who spent 24 years at The Washington Post, NPR said his remarks undermined his credibility as a news analyst and ran afoul of NPR's editorial standards and practices.  That Williams has also been a long-time commentator for Fox News has always been a sore spot with NPR.

WHPC to Fox: Your Seat's in the Front Row

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The presidential press conference game of Musical Chairs set in motion by 89-year-old Helen Thomas' resignation and vacating of her front-row, center seat [see "TUOL" post 6/17/10] has ended with the White House Correspondents Association ("WHCA") Board's unanimous selection of Fox News to occupy a hallowed position in the front row.

The WHCA cited Fox's commitment to the White House press tv pool and its length of service as the basis for rewarding the news organization with the prime real estate, but "TUOL" suspects  White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs wanted Fox News to sit in the first row to discourage its correspondents from  making faces or throwing spitballs at Obama Administration officials.

Fox News may have made it to the front row, but Thomas' center seat will go to The Associated Press, which traditionally poses the initial question at presidential press conferences. Good luck to AP trying to remove the "old person" smell from Thomas' long-time perch.

So that you can tell the players without a scorecard:  Bloomberg News gets to stay in the second row, NPR moves from the third row into Fox News' old second row slot, and The Financial Times gets its very own chair.  On the downside, financially-fading U.S. News & World Report lost its seat and The Washington Times got kicked from the third row to the fourth row.

Unless and until President Obama holds another press conference, the Fourth Estate's White House branch will just stand around and report on Lindsay Lohan and Mel Gibson, like the rest of their news media colleagues.

Daniel Schorr (1916-2010)

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Daniel Schorr died today at age 93.  An NPR commentator the past two decades, Schorr was brought into the CBS fold by famed correspondent Edward R. Murrow, and prospered at the Eye Network for 23 years. His journalistic achievements, ranging from his coverage of Moscow as a CBS correspondent to his reporting on the U.S. intelligence community, are too numerous to recount here. He always considered his greatest achievement to be earning a hallowed place on President Nixon's "Enemies List."

In this disturbing age of fragmented partisan journalism and around-the-clock coverage of celebrity meltdowns, Schorr's loss is that much more profound.