Serving the Public Interest

Introduction

Broadcasters have a mandate to serve the public interest of the communities in which they operate. Given the diversity of communities in the United States, there is a multitude of needs which could be and are addressed over the public airwaves by broadcasters. Indeed, broadcasters are recognizably in a very unique position – every station in the country is a local station and very much a part of the community it is licensed to serve.

Public affairs activities are an integral part of broadcast stations' community involvement. Through public affairs activities, stations help increase awareness of issues that affect their audiences. Radio and television broadcasters invest both programming and non-programming time and efforts to educate and involve their communities. Programming activities include, but are not limited to, public service announcements wherein stations donate valuable commercial time for messages alerting the public about health threats and other issues. Stations also produce public affairs programs featuring in-depth discussions of problems and remedies. In addition to these programming efforts, broadcasters initiate or are involved in many activities and community groups aimed at educating and involving their communities.

While the ways in which broadcasters are involved in their communities may seem similar, every local broadcaster's efforts are different. Public service campaigns undertaken by stations nationwide integrate on-air and off-air efforts. Additionally, since each station cannot address every need of its given community as its top priority, stations each focus on different needs, thus addressing overall the diversity of issues within a community. In any given community, the local broadcasters' unique responses and approaches to the diversity of issues is also supplemented by major national efforts.

Our state association, in partnership with the National Association of Broadcasters, conducted a survey of television and radio stations in Alaska to determine the extent of station participation in public affairs activities. A variety of methodologies were employed to reach stations – with mail, fax, and Internet surveys sent out between January and April 2006. The response rate of Alaska broadcasters was 47%, as 4 of the 10 commercial television stations licensed to the state (40%) are represented in the data, as are 33 of the 69 radio stations (48%).

The census revealed that Alaska radio and television stations contributed approximately 44 million dollars worth of service to their communities during 2005. The data were collected, tabulated and analyzed by Public Opinion Strategies, an Alexandria, Virginia-based opinion research firm.

Donating Time, Raising Money, and
Responding to Community Needs

Using mean figures to derive a per-station total, responding Alaska TV stations report running approximately 418 PSAs per week, with radio stations running 149. These figures combine all PSA spot times – from ten seconds or less up to 60 second PSAs. Using the reported rate charged for each of these spot lengths, these PSAs translate into a mean cumulative amount of $2,089,649 a year per TV station responding, and $214,395 per radio station responding.

The cumulative statewide totals based on these data show the total PSA value for Alaska TV stations as $20,896,489 and $14,793,266 for radio stations.

More than two-thirds of responding TV stations (67%) and more than nine-in-ten responding radio stations (91%) say they help charities, charitable causes or needy individuals by fund-raising or offering some other support. The mean amount raised by these TV stations was $150,075, with responding radio stations reporting a mean of $26,397. The projected cumulative amounts for this charitable giving is $1,005,503 for TV stations and $1,657,468 for radio stations who conducted some fundraising during the time period examined.

All responding Alaska radio stations (100%) and Alaska TV stations (100%) were involved in either on-air campaigns – either through local news broadcasts, PSAs, or public affairs programming – or off-air activities to aid the victims of disasters. This is a sharp increase from the last survey, with considerable focus on this area by stations in light of the recent hurricanes in the southern United States and the tsunami relief efforts in Asia.

As one of the results of these efforts, TV broadcasters in the state reported raising $3,000,000 in direct contributions or pledges related to disaster relief during 2005, while radio broadcasters reported raising $1,902,675 for a projected cumulative amount of $4,902,675.

PSAs also focus largely on local issues. Among responding TV stations, respondents say that an average of 32% of PSA time is devoted to local issues; the percentage of PSAs devoted to local issues among responding radio stations was 56%.

Broadcasters Addressing Important Topics

The following table examines some specific issues and the response by responding stations. As in previous years, broadcasters continue to devote time and resources to addressing important and relevant topics.

Each respondent was asked to respond whether their station aired PSAs, locally produced public affairs programs/segments (not including news broadcasts), or news segments on each of the following topic areas. The numbers here are the percentages of all state TV and radio stations who say they have addressed a particular topic through one of those methods:

	TV			Radio
Issue	PSA	PA Program	News Segment	PSA	PA Program	News Segment
AIDS	50%	–	25%	70%	30%	48%
Alcohol abuse	100%	50%	25%	94%	67%	88%
Adult educ./literacy	75%	25%	25%	79%	64%	70%
Anti-crime	100%	25%	50%	97%	67%	70%
Anti-smoking	100%	25%	50%	91%	61%	61%
Anti-violence	100%	25%	50%	91%	79%	85%
Breast cancer/other women’s health	100%	50%	50%	100%	79%	85%
Children’s issues	100%	50%	50%	97%	73%	88%
Drinking during pregnancy	75%	–	50%	64%	24%	42%
Drunk driving	100%	50%	50%	94%	73%	91%
Drug use/abuse	100%	25%	50%	97%	73%	70%
Homeland security issues	100%	25%	50%	58%	36%	79%
Hunger/poverty/ homelessness	100%	25%	50%	79%	64%	58%
Fund raising drives	100%	75%	50%	97%	82%	85%

Promoting Participation

Fully two-thirds of responding radio stations (67%) and one of the four responding TV stations (25%) report airing public affairs programs of at least 30 minutes in length.

The leading topics of public service campaigns by Alaska broadcasters in 2005 included armed forces and military charities, disaster relief, fire prevention, national charities (such as Easter Seals, Goodwill, etc.), women’s health, alcoholism, and children’s charities (such as Boys & Girls Clubs, Ronald McDonald House, etc.).

Methodology Notes