NPR Replies to Our Statement that It Is “State-Owned”
            The Vice President for Communications of National Public Radio, Andi Sporkin, has responded again to our statement that NPR is “state owned.” We print in full Ms. Sporkin’s newest letter which is responding to our story of last Thursday, May 18.
To the Editor:
            While you’re certainly free to voice your opinions about NPR, you should base them on fact.   
            NPR and PBS are entirely separate companies.  They share nothing:  not budget, not management, not organization, not programming, not bylaws, not ownership.  PBS is not  NPR’s parent corporation, nor vice versa.   Go to the PBS, NPR or Corporation for Public Broadcasting websites and research for yourself.  While I have no knowledge of PBS’ federal funding or its structure, the charges you made about NPR are inaccurate and insulting. 
            Your original comment about NPR being “state-owned” was also inaccurate, which was the purpose of my initial brief note.  “State-owned” has specific meaning:  that a broadcaster is fully funded by a government and that its programming is also controlled to promote that government’s agenda.  That is the role of Voice of America. 
            NPR is not state-owned:  it is an independent, self-supporting media organization, with the majority of its revenue coming from membership dues and sponsorship of our programs from private foundations and corporations.  As I explained before, a very small percentage of our support – around one percent – comes from competitive grants we seek from federally funded organizations.
            I certainly hope you honor your offer to print this in its entirety.
Andi Sporkin

Original Story of May 18 NPR Asks for a Correction on May 9 Story             We have received an official notice from National Public Radio that we made a serious mistake on May 9 which needs a “correction.”             The official notice came from the Vice President for Communications, Andi Sporkin, who wrote:             “Your May 9 column about Fox News referred to NPR as ‘state-owned. It is not:  NPR is a privately-supported non-profit membership organization.  It gets less than one percent of its program budget from federal funding – and that funding comes only through competitive grants.  I’d appreciate the correction.”             Our response to Vice President Sporkin was:             Are You Serious?             We appreciate your “correction.” However, our May 9 statement was NOT incorrect. Even your notice to us says that you get money from “federal funding.” But more important is the sad truth that neither we nor anyone else can dig through all the intricate layers that the lawyers at PBS have established around itself in order to confound the citizens who pay for this assault upon our free speech. As you must know, your parent corporation, PBS, received $368 million in tax dollars in 2005             P.S. If you wish to respond, we will print it in full without any response from us.

Our Response to NPR’s Newest Epistle Is that Some NPR Stations Receive Up to Two-Thirds of Budget from Corporation for Public Broadcasting
            If Ms. Sporkin will look at the following from the NPR website, she will discover that the NPR budget is underwritten by the Corporation for Public Broadcaster to the tune of 1%...HOWEVER, many of the stations receive a significant amount of their money from CPB, in some cases, up to 2/3rds their budget.  In addition, NPR corporate receives half of its revenue from those tax-payer funded NPR stations.
            We print the following in full from the NPR website so that Ms. Sporkin can study it carefully.
“How would a major cut in CPB funding affect NPR and the NPR member stations?
            “The CPB budget and the potential cutback would impact radio and television differently. For radio, the biggest potential damage is to stations. NPR itself gets less than one percent of its budget from CPB. NPR member stations, however, receive an average of 15 percent of their budgets in grants from CPB that help support their local program production, program acquisition, community outreach and such day-to-day costs as paying the electric bill. If this funding were lost, it would certainly diminish the quality and depth of the stations' service to their communities.
              “Additionally, there are 221 stations in 43 states that specifically serve rural and minority communities; the latter includes numerous African-American, Native American, Latino and multicultural licensees. In many cases, they are the sole local broadcasting service available. These stations receive significantly higher funding from CPB - in some cases, as much as two-thirds of their budgets - since many of their listeners simply don't have the financial resources to provide support. If this funding is cut, there is a good chance they will not survive.”
              If we thought it necessary we would have to hire a Philadelphia lawyer to unscramble all the machinations of our “state-owned” radio and television.