— Jeff Ward, Lehigh Valley News Briefs
PBS 39’s search for relevance rolls on, and few care.
The Lehigh Valley’s public media outlet has been adrift, but being adrift with an $80 million pile of federal money beats being adrift on your own dime.
Now, it has embarked on a “transformation.” I have an idea of what is next, but I will wait for the next self-laudatory press release from the 60-year-old public outlet before speculating on that.
The board of directors of PBS 39 (it goes by other names, mainly Lehigh Valley Public Media) met Monday. To the organization’s credit, it met well compared to the July session, but holding good meetings does not justify its existence.
I listened to the July meeting on Zoom. It was like having an out-of-body experience. Financial woes, missed forecasts and a staff needing to be reminded of its goals. Top management was out and the board was running things. A mess, in short. The minutes don’t quite reflect the tone of the meeting.
The Sept. 30 meeting was a little better, but the big question remains: does this organization have a purpose beyond continuing to exist?
PBS 39 received $82 million in federal money in 2017 from an auction of airwaves. It found ways to spend that money.
In 2018, it started something called Reporter Corps, announced grandiosely as “one of the most significant journalistic hirings in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania in decades.”
As noted before, it wasn’t. Also as noted before, self-praise is no recommendation. Reporter Corps was a television news program that was going to tell The Real Story. It disappeared in 2020 without even a pompous release to note its demise.
The same crew responsible for the Reporter Corps debacle remained entrenched, looking for the next pet project.
In 2022, PBS 39 started a digital news outlet, competing with private media for attention and employees at a time when private media was on the rocks. PBS 39’s media outlet is government-funded media: it wouldn’t exist without that airwave money.
In fiscal 2023, after the new media outlet was started, PBS 39 spent $15.15 million and took in $6.49 million for an annual deficit of a remarkable $8.66 million, or almost $1,000 per hour for an entire year.
At some point, the board started to notice. It put restrictions on tapping the endowment and the then-chairman even deemed such results “unacceptable.”
Back to the Monday meeting, there was a 20-minute presentation on the state of media. I didn’t get much from it but I wasn’t the target audience.
The board also voted to pay off a line of credit, it sounded as if $2.8 million would be needed for that. What that money was used for was not mentioned.
Cutting marketing spending was discussed, and after the public part of the meeting (I was the only member of the public to ask a question) there was a private session for staff to discuss concerns about the “transformation.”
Board Chairman Mike Keim of Univest Bank said of PBS 39, “We continue to make progress as an organization.”
Former chief executive Tim Fallon did not speak. Fallon was paid $308,000 to preside over fiscal 2023, the Year of Spending Recklessly. He is now CEO Emeritus, and at the July meeting he discussed ways to get more public money to burn.
Not a word on Monday, though. In July, Fallon said he was talking with Pennsylvania Rep. Josh Siegel, D-Allentown, about getting public money. I’ve sent messages to Siegel about this and not heard back. If you know Siegel, ask him not to send your tax dollars into the Channel 39 furnace.
Another member said PBS 39 has a separate board to “help us determine what does the community wants from us.” Good question, particularly with many in the community not aware that the organization exists.
There was discussion of tapping the endowment, leading to talk about how selling investments now means less growth in the future. Accurate, but obvious.
The endowment is now just over $80 million.
“We are so fortunate to have this big endowment,” board member Susan Yee said. Yet seven years after receiving $82 million, PBS 39’s endowment is just over $80 million.
I don’t know what their endowment strategy or benchmark is, but on Jan. 1, 2018, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was 24,809. On Monday, it was 42,330, up 71% from the start of 2018.
The PBS 39 endowment has declined by a couple percent over the same period.
How much money has been wasted on pet projects? Has the board done its job? Who was in charge, the board or management?
The board did abolish its own transformation committee. There was jargon — PBS 39 is imbued with jargon — about “cross-platform content” and the new strategy.
Beware of jargon.
There was the concession that the staff, while “engaged and overall energized” also has some anxiety about the future and the new strategy. That strategy was not explained but “a lot of amazing things” are happening.
We’ve heard that before.
PBS 39’s headcount stood at 57 on Monday, based on its website. At one time, it was close to 80.
And please, if you haven’t asked the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to seek an operations audit of PBS 39, aka wlvt.org, do so now.
Send email to oigemail@cpb.org and ask for them to look into what’s going on in South Bethlehem.
And remember, “a lot of amazing things” are happening.
Lehigh Valley News Briefs 