DECREASING REVENUES : PUBLIC TV SUFFERS IN OIL, FARM STATES

Associated Press bureaus across the country surveyed the state of public television as a new fiscal year begins, and found some sharing the problems of the farms and the oil industry. Here is a report:

When the oil industry hurts, public television yells “Ouch!”

It’s not so much the national programming that has suffered, however, but the stations in states where oil was king.

The drop in world oil prices has cut into state revenues in Alaska, Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana, and many public TV stations will be living with tighter budgets in the new fiscal year which began Tuesday.

Farm problems have hurt stations in Idaho, Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas.

“We’re in the oil and gas business and we just didn’t know it,” said Terrell L. Cass, president and general manager of KEDT in Corpus Christi, Tex., where more than half the staff has been laid off since January.

Donations to KUHT in Houston fell $500,000 during the past fiscal year, or nearly 30%, and its budget is being cut 11% for the new year.

“We are reflecting what is happening in the oil industry, and it looks like it is going to be trouble,” said general manager James L. Bauer.

In Dallas, however, KERA will spend $12.5 million in the new fiscal year, compared with $9.9 million last year. More than half the increase is for production of national programming, including the fall series “The West of the Imagination,” and the new productions are fully underwritten by corporate and foundation grants, said Richard Meyer, the station’s president.

Nationally, Mobil is continuing to support “Masterpiece Theatre” and Chevron is not cutting its support for the National Geographic specials, but Exxon will phase out its support for “Great Performances.”

Exxon will contribute $3.6 million for “Great Performances” again this fiscal year, but that will fall to $1.2 million in the next year and nothing the year after. However, Exxon is committed to $1.2 million per year for “Live From Lincoln Center” through the 1989-90 fiscal year, said communications manager Ken Kansas.

“In three years, we’ll look at it again,” Kansas said.

“From all indications, it looks as though corporate funding has remained steady,” said Peggy Hubble, director of public relations for the Public Broadcasting Service. “Some of the stations are in very good shape, others are having problems.”

Among the major producers, WNET in New York has cut its budget and staff for the new year, but WGBH in Boston, KERA in Dallas, WTTW in Chicago, WQED in Pittsburgh and KCET in Los Angeles will be spending more than last year.

“I don’t think there is a general cutback in public broadcasting,” said Henry Becton, WGBH president and general manager. Being a major producer, he said, “brings with it swings in producing activity as projects come and go, and that happens here, too. Two years ago, our budget was $62 million.” Last year it was $57 million; this year it will be $60.5 million.

It’s a different story in the oil states.

Alaska’s public broadcasters get as much as 90% of their funds from the state, which in turn gets 85% of its money from North Slope oil revenues.

Every $1 drop in the price of a barrel of crude oil deprives the state of $150 million a year. With oil prices down nearly 50% since December, Alaska officials expect to cut more than $1.1 billion from operating and capital budgets by the end of fiscal 1987.

Public stations in Alaska have taken 13% cuts in their budgets.

“In Alaska, I’d estimate about 30 jobs will be lost in public radio and TV,” said Diane Kaplan, executive director of the Alaska Public Radio Network which serves four television and 15 radio stations.

Louisiana Public Broadcasting, which covers the state outside New Orleans, got a state appropriation of $3.3 million for the new year, compared with $4.2 million appropriated but never paid in full last year as the state began adjusting to falling oil revenues.

“It means that for the first time we’ll do a live, on-air drive in August,” said LPB director Beth Courtney. “I’m going to spend a lot of time looking for corporate and private grants . . . at a time when it is very difficult in Louisiana because of the economy.”

The budget for the Oklahoma Educational Television Authority was cut 16.5% for the new fiscal year.

KOOD, a 4-year-old station in Bunker Hill, Kan., is cutting $150,000 from its budget because of problems in oil and agriculture, and a recent factory closing in nearby Hays. The station will spend $660,000 this year and broadcast fewer hours, said general manager Ken Gardner.

However, KTWU in Topeka is increasing its budget by $37,640 to about $1.2 million, said general manager Dale Anderson.

The Nebraska Educational Television Network will eliminate 11 full-time positions, decrease its broadcast schedule and reduce the number of programs it buys from outside sources and programs it produces to meet a $640,000 cut in its operating budget.

In the fiscal year ending Monday, the state’s revenues fell $16 million below projections and expenditures were cut 3% across the board.

State support for the Idaho Educational-Public Broadcasting System was cut from $750,000 to $621,000 but federal funds are expected to increase by $220,000. Still, the system’s $2.5 million budget will be $50,000 smaller than last year’s and it will cut back on its purchases from PBS, said general manager Jerry Garber.

The budget for KDIN in Des Moines, Iowa, was cut from $6 million to $5.7 million. “Local viewers will notice a lot of repeats,” said program director Dan Miller. “But by repositioning those programs at different times, you’ll hit different audiences.”

In Rhode Island, WSBE faces reorganization after a cut of $500,000 in support from the state, which contributed $1.5 million of the station’s $2.5 million budget last year.

Boston’s WGBH has indicated it will file a proposal to take over WSBE.

Wyoming’s only PBS outlet, KCWC in Riverton, has a budget of $128,000 after a $20,000 shave--its share of $63 million in budget cuts sought by Gov. Ed Herschler because of falling state revenues. General manager Greg Ray said Saturday children’s programming has been axed and the broadcast day has been shortened an average of two hours.