Knight Commission Report Presented to CPB Board

Charlie Firestone, Executive Director of the Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program, presented the report of the Knight Commission on the Information Needs of COmmunities in a democracy, Informing Communities: Sustaining Democracy in the Digital Age, to the Board of Directors of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting at their winter meeting in Minneapolis earlier today. The CPB board is holding a two day meeting to focus on the future of public media, a topic addressed in the Knight Commission report.

In addition to the closed-door executive sessions, the CPB Board will hold a public session with a discussion on the structure and activities of local public radio and public media generally, and the future of journalism and public media. It follows the Future of News Summit held in Minneapolis just prior to the CPB convening.

The Knight Commission released its Informing Communities report on October 2, 2009, with a public event at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. that included the participation of CPB Chairman Ernie Wilson, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski and Chief Information Officer of the United States, Aneesh Chopra. Wilson, Genachowski and Chopra each received a copy of the report from the Commission’s co-chairs, former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson and Google Vice President Marissa Mayer.

On the same day, CPB and the Knight Foundation announced a partnership with National Public Radio (NPR) to launch a new online local journalism venture that will develop in-depth local journalism on topics of critical interest to communities and the nation. Read the Knight Foundation press release and the NPR news release announcing the partnership.