PBS and politics

This isn’t the first time the Public Broadcasting System has been in trouble with Congress. Before, it’s always been with conservatives who saw liberal bias on the program schedule. Until now, it’s always been about ideology.

This time, the trouble is real — and big. The widening scandal regarding the selling or sharing of donor lists with Democrats has even previously supportive Republicans in fully justified outrage. The goodwill of just two years ago is evaporating. A federal funding increase that seemed a given just two weeks ago may turn into reductionif not elimination. Now, it’s about politics.

The trading of donor and customer lists is common wherever there is money to be raised or products to sell. It is particularly necessary for non-profit organizations, which must constantly try to expand their universe of potential contributors. Many public broadcasting stations engage in this practice but are careful to stay on the right side of the line prohibiting political advocacy. Some, like Maine PBS, protect the privacy of donors even further by using the lists only for its own fund-raising. But in persuading Congress to stop funding, as in all things, it only takes a few bad apples. In this case, about two dozen.

It all started when a Boston mother and her 4-year-old son sent $40 to WGBH to boost Barney. The boy started getting dunned by the Democrats and the mother started asking questions. WGBH admitted it had swapped its member list with the Democratic National Committee, but said it was a one-time goof committed by over-zealous new staffers. Pressed, WGBH then admitted it was a many-time goof committed several years running.

That opened the floodgate of confession, with more than 20 PBS affiliates spilling their guts (including the giants of the business, WNET in New York and WETA in Washington) about illicit trysts with the Democrats. This stupid, perhaps even illegal, act not only jeopardizes federal funding, it is a breach of trust that will make private-sector fund-raising even more difficult. The test now for Congress is whether it will act in haste and slash PBS funding, thus punishing the innocent as well as the guilty, or whether it can, in a calm and deliberative way, devise a funding package that includes sanctions against the specific transgressors.

This could hardly have happened at a worse time. When PBS started 30 years ago, half of its budget came from Congress. The federal share of operating and programming costs has steadily dropped, down to 14 percent today, about $250 million a year. Affiliates were expecting a substantial federal contribution toward the billion-dollar conversion to digital. The gradual and necessary shift from federal subsidy to corporate underwriting still is met with criticism from purists who say any alliance with business makes public and commercial broadcasting indistinguishable. Public broadcasting foes say the wealth of quality programs on cable and satellite makes public TV irrelevant.

Public TV is important. It’s important to the millions of Americans who can’t get or afford cable or satellite. The occasional controversy notwithstanding, it sets a standard of decency and intelligence by which commercial TV can be measured. The day may come when public TV can support itself wholly on voluntary contributions from the private sector, but this weaning should be gradual, orderly, planned. Twenty or so public broadcasting affiliates caused this problem by acting recklessly. Congress must not try to solve it by doing the same.