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Clifford gets a reprieve
BY SARA DONNELLY
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On June 23, Maine’s congressional representatives Tom Allen and Michael Michaud voted to restore funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting in a bill which originally cut $100 million from the CPB budget starting on October 1 (see "Clifford in the Doghouse?," by Sara Donnelly, June 24). The US House of Representatives voted 284-140 in favor of restoring the funds, which subsidize the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), affiliates like the Maine Public Broadcasting Network (MPBN), and National Public Radio. The House then passed a broader $142.5 billion spending bill with the money for CPB attached. The bill must now clear the Senate to be ratified. If passed without any more tinkering, the legislation would still cut $23 million for educational programming subsidized by CPB. Federal funding from CPB accounts for about 15 percent of the public broadcasting industry’s total revenue. The remainder comes from grants, donations, state funds, and sales of program-related products like Elmo dolls and DVD copies of Are You Being Served: The Movie. Last week’s vote "is a victory for reason over ideology," Representative Allen wrote in a statement following the passage of the CPB amendment. "As a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, I will continue to urge congressional oversight of recent troubling reports of possible attempts to inject political influence into public broadcasting’s legally established independence." Allen’s concerns about public broadcasting’s independence may be well-founded. Advocates of CPB and PBS say ideology could threaten the corporation established by Congress in 1967 to shield public broadcasting from political winds: The new president and CEO of the CPB is former GOP official Patricia Harrison. Harrison and CPB chair, Republican appointee Ken Tomlinson, have publicly criticized PBS programming for allegedly being too liberal.
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