MMMM # 215 -- Alabama Public Television

   Talk about reality TV!  
     Commissioners resigning, executives being fired and told to clear out their desks.
     Perhaps APT should set up cameras in the executive offices to record new, cutting edge programs!
      None of this started recently. There have been years of turmoil and funding cuts at the network.
      The Education Budget approved in the Regular 2012 Session cut APT by $1.3 Million, a reduction in funding of 22.55%. The reduction was more than Governor Bentley proposed, and followed years of previous budget cuts.

      APT closed the Montgomery production facility in 2011, eliminating the jobs of a dozen employees (including the job of the late Jon Beans, who's funeral is tomorrow in Montgomery, and his wife Sagusta.). Yet APT established a new production facility in Washington D.C., according to a listing with the Association of Public Television Stations (APTS), and was considering building a studio complex in Birmingham too.
      And then there's the apparent effort to have the network air a series of religious/political-right-wing videos 

     A story from The Associated Press quoted the Texas preacher who created the videos as saying President Obama is...

   "America's "most Biblically-hostile" president.""In fact, there have been numerous clearly documented times when his pro-Islam positions have been the cause of his anti-Biblical actions," Barton wrote of Obama in a piece posted in February.

     APT's Commission will be hiring new leadership in the coming weeks. In the meantime, they've appointed Don Boomershine as Interim Executive Director
     Don was head of The Better Business Bureau of Central Alabama for years, and was even a frequent guest on FTR.
     If there's anyplace that needs better business, he's in it now.


{Disclaimer: as many of you know, I was employed at APT for eleven years as host of For The Record.}


[The Monday Morning Media Memo is a regular feature of this website.]