"For The Record" ending...

As you may be aware, APT has decided to end "For The Record" and eliminate four staff positions, mine included, citing recent budget cuts by the state. I was called away last weekend to attend the New Jersey funeral of my last living Aunt. There was no way for APT's managers to inform me of the bad news other than by phone, and they were very apologetic about that. The last regular Week-in-Review FTR I'll host will be on Friday, January 30th, which will be an hour-long legislative preview program. Then, a special "Economy" FTR the following Tuesday, February 3rd at 8:00pm. And then? At this point, I don't know. During the past year I've been working on a documentary about the CSS Alabama and Capt. Raphael Semmes [there's a blog about the program], and I know enough about the subject at this point that I could go on a lecture tour, though that's not likely to be very profitable. The fate of the CSS Alabama project is uncertain. We were in the process of trying to raise funds for the travel to the D.C. area and England/France [she was built in England and sunk off the coast of France] when both my position and that of co-producer Bob Corley were eliminated on Thursday. I certainly would like to remain in Alabama, my adopted home these past 33 years. I have no interest in retiring...that's at least a decade off. So on Monday I'll start talking with potential employers. Even with the economy in rough shape, unless all of the TV stations go dark, there will be a need for personnel. There's also radio and a dozen or more affiliated positions like PR. I'll be OK. It is a shame that FTR will be no more. When I started as host in 1998, the half-hour program started with a day's newscast and then focused for 20 minutes on a single issue Monday-Thursday. You can watch many of those old shows online, like the 11/16/05 one in which we talked with New York Times chief art critic Michael Kimmelman, or the 4/11/06 FTR with an immigration debate. The Friday show was, as now, a week-in-review journalist panel. A couple of years ago the news segment was eliminated, along with the people who gathered that news. Then the show was reduced to Fridays only, though lengthened to an hour. FTR's airtime was changed several times. From 6:30 to 7:00 to 8:00 to 9:00. The number of panelists was cut from three to two. During the years in which we focused on topics, FTR provided a platform, sometimes the only platform, for hundreds of individuals and organizations. We never had a huge audience, nor was that a concern. The purpose of public broadcasting is to free its employees of the shackles imposed by advertising dollars. Publicasters can produce programs about anything, without fear of a sales department trying to block topics or guests. We strove to be fair in our presentations...all sides presented whenever possible. As my siblings and cousins went through my late Aunt's possessions this past week, we found hundreds of framed photos and documents throughout the place, including the first APT program guide when I started hosting FTR, a guide with my picture on the cover. She was proud of my work at APT. So am I. Stay tuned.