Public media reconciles its past with the present

When public media makes the news these days, it’s usually in the form of a negative headline. Accusations of liberal bias have made organizations like PBS and NPR the target of right-wing efforts to defund the entire system. And reports of audience and revenue decline have left newsroom leaders “fried and frozen,” a phrase coined by Colorado News Collaborative executive director Laura Frank.

But it wasn’t always so. In the sixties, as the country experienced a divisive series of cascading political and social crises (sound familiar?), a group of luminaries, like novelist Ralph Ellison, teamed with scientists, academic leaders, and others to consider how a changing media landscape — driven by the arrival of television — could “deepen a sense of community in local life” and “help us look at our achievements and difficulties, at our conflicts and agreements.”

The Carnegie Commission, the formal name given to this team of information architects, was full of big thinkers. Together, they envisioned a vast network of local television stations that would lean into their viewers’ educational and civic needs, entertaining them along the way. Politicians rallied to their cause and passed the Public Broadcasting Act, which led to the creation of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and, later, NPR.

The infrastructure they designed gave us Mr. Rogers, Sesame Street, Nova, and Fresh Air with Terry Gross, among many others. Millions of Americans were enriched by programming that dropped them into creative worlds, connecting them to new ideas.

You know what happened next. Cable TV. Then streaming. YouTube. Mix in the social media platforms and instead of peeking into new worlds, we’re fortifying the walls of our own. Hidden algorithms tailor our experiences to reinforce beliefs and biases. All this while public media’s audiences are aging and public norms erode.

The Carnegie Commission didn’t see it coming. How could they? They still had to get up off the couch to change the channel. But here we are. And something has to give. Because while public broadcasting’s means of production and delivery have changed, the ideals still hold. There has never been a more urgent time in our history to connect us back to our communities and open ourselves to fresh perspectives.

I know it’s easier said than done. Reading the Carnegie Commission’s 1967 report is like being airdropped onto the set of “The West Wing” — an idealized version of public discourse. It’s hard to imagine that people with diverse backgrounds could come together to conjure a new public good.

But there are modern examples. Take the Highline in New York City. A rusty and abandoned railway was transformed by residents into a dynamic public space serving modern community needs. It connects different neighborhoods, attracts tourists, and honors the city’s past, while forging a new future.

My prediction prescription for 2025 is that civic leaders, educators, artists, and scientists of all political stripes can convene the modern-day equivalent of the Carnegie Commission to reimagine and redesign a new, networked media space, accessible to all, to serve the informational and educational needs of both individuals and communities.

Preserving public broadcasting in its current form is not an option. So let’s hold hands together and leap.