To Current's home pageOriginally published in Current, Sept. 19, 1994
By Jacqueline Conciatore
Drawing up a blueprint for its new global news program, Public Radio International has been meeting in intensive brainstorming sessions with star producers and radio managers from around the country and overseas.
PRI President Stephen Salyer and Marketplace Executive Producer Jim Russell, who is coordinating the program's start-up, have had numerous meetings with public and commercial broadcasters, including a March planning meeting that included producers from CBS News, ABC News, and Nightline.
In late August, PRI summoned a weekend conference in Minneapolis that staffers informally call the ''best minds'' meeting. It gathered about 20 people--independent producers from public television and radio, commercial broadcasters, print journalists, and others. A few participants flew in from distant countries to participate in the weekend session, including Santi Maseka of South African Broadcasting Corp., and journalists from London, the Philippines and Colombia.
Participants say the meeting was exhilarating in its creativity and remarkably fruitful. ''There were more ideas than one could get to in the course of two or three years,'' said Jim Farley, g.m. of ABC radio news. ''The creative juices were really flowing.''
By the time the thinkers emerged from the marathon discussion, they had affirmed the program's original lynchpin concept: that A New World would provide global perspectives on events and give significant air time to the voices of ''real'' people. The program would use non-reporters as storytellers, said participant Vic Sussman, who covers cyberspace for U.S. News. ''The last thing I want [in listening to coverage of the Cuban refugee movement] is a white man in a trench coat standing on a beach telling me what's going on behind him. I would much rather hear from a Cuban about to get into a raft.''
PRI has said it will announce more specifics about World at the Public Radio Program Directors (PRPD) conference in Seattle Sept. 21-24. The network is expected to announce the program's new executive director and the selection of WGBH, Boston, as domestic production site.
With a $6 million dollar annual budget, World is scheduled for spring launch. It will be a joint operation of PRI, BBC and the domestic site, and will have at least two hosts--one in the U.S. and the other broadcasting from spots around the world. Salyer has said it will air at 4 p.m. Eastern.
The scale of the project, and the fact that it will be pitted against one of public radio's surest audience draws, All Things Considered, has left some in the public radio world skeptical about the show's chances for ultimate success.
One participant in the August meeting worries that the stakes--not only the investment, but also PRI's reputation--are so high,the network will fall short of its goal to create a revolutionary program. ''PRI is putting all their eggs into one basket, and the problem with that is, they'll be afraid to take the necessary risks to make it something really special. To succeed, it has to be totally different from All Things Considered and when you're putting everything into one show, it's hard to take that step.''
Some at the August meeting urged PRI to go for a radical change and rely almost entirely on native non-journalists--''peasants and poets''--to fill up the hour. Others felt the program should present a half-and-half mix of analytical reporting and ''authentic voices.'' World may ultimately offer one long feature per program in the voice of a native nonjournalist.
To find these voices, PRI may set up hubs in locations around the world, where stringers would have a cadre of sources they could reach to talk about events as they unfold. ''If [PRI] really wanted to have its ear to the ground'' said participant Deanna Kamiel, an independent public television producer, it will put ''serious money'' into sending out reporter/producers who would have to report, but who would also find local reporter/producers to train area inhabitants in radio.
Other specifics pertaining to World's news approach weren't available, although people at the meeting tossed around such ideas as shelving top-of-the-hour newscasts and opening with features, or developing the equivalent of ''context'' and ''serendipity'' desks. These ''desks'' would operate in lieu of a foreign desk and would ensure that pieces present news in full context and make connections to events happening in other locales. A story about Cuban refugees, for example, would explore immigration movements in other parts of the world, such as Mexico. Beyond that, participants seemed to agree World will present listeners a range of fare. Said Kamiel: ''It will have a whole hour imbued with a wide-ranging, intelligent, literate, acerbic, sort of deadpan look at the world, that would include all kinds of genres of reporting.'' Independent producer David Isay said the program will take the best from the best: ''It will take a little of this show, a little of that show, some of Harper's magazine, The New Yorker ... and mix it all together in a new format.'' Isay was asked to play his ''Ghetto Life 101''--in which two teenagers recorded a diary of their lives on Chicago's South Side--as an example of the type of approach World might take to stories.
PRI has said it will announce World's executive producer at the PRPD conference. Sources say there are two candidates. ABC's Jim Farley has been mentioned as one; he would say only that he and Salyer ''have had discussions.'' Other broadcast veterans who participated in the August weekend session include Ron Nessen, former network newsman, press secretary to Gerald Ford and public affairs v.p. at Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association; and Marita Rivera, manager of WGBH-FM, the probable production site.
Salyer has been encouraged by some in the industry to reconsider the announced 4 p.m. start time for World. Bill Drummond, former NPR journalist who serves as a consultant to World, has said stations do not want to have to choose between ATC and World, and has suggested a noon or 7 p.m. start for the program. Another producer believes PRI may have trouble winning funding from CPB's 1995 Radio Program Fund if it takes on ATC, the recipient of direct CPB support for 15 years, 1971-86.
NPR is also asking the CPB fund to support ATC's move to 4 p.m., which will coincide with a half-hour expansion of the show.
In their respective funding proposals to CPB, NPR and PRI will ''have to make a case'' for seeking money to provide programming that serves the same audience served at 4 p.m. by Fresh Air and Monitor Radio, says Rick Madden, head of the CPB Radio Program Fund. ''It's perfectly reasonable for PRI and NPR to produce, or CPB to fund, multiple programs that may be available at 4 p.m., because there are lots of different audiences to be served at this hour--it's radio primetime,'' he said. ''[But] is there as solid a rationale for funding multiple programs that have essentially the same appeal?''
In response, Russell said PRI intends to offer four World rollovers per day, giving stations plenty of choice about when to air it. He added: ''For any network to declare it owns large blocks of time, or even seeks to own large blocks of time--that's completely opposite the public broadcasting philosophy that stations own the time. The networks do not own the time.''