I support CPB, but you need a new tag line

Hello:

I absolutely support the mission and the role of CPB. I am a longtime contributor to public broadcasting and have NO problem with my taxes going to CPB.

That said, as a retired communications person, I find your long-time tagline laughable: "A Private Corporation Funded by the American People” is an oxymoron. If it is funded by the American people, it is by definition, NOT a private company. A private company is funded by shareholders. Or customers. Or donors. Or benefactors. Or trusts. Or venture capital. Or private equity. You are funded by the public. And NOT by volunteers but by taxpayers, whether they like it or not.

As I said, I like it and support it.

But in a time where alternative facts have run of the rhetorical landscape, your attempt to have it both ways comes off as naïve at best and downright dishonest at worst.

Bill Baker

Received: 
Connecticut
Workbench Page Type: 
Feedback
Email: 
wbaker@bakercg.com
Month and Year: 
July, 2021
Comment: 
Thank you for contacting the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). Congress created CPB through the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967. Sec. 396. [47 U.S.C. 396] states that "a private corporation should be created to facilitate the development of public telecommunications and to afford maximum protection from extraneous interference and control. There is authorized to be established a nonprofit corporation, to be known as the "Corporation for Public Broadcasting," which will not be an agency or establishment of the United States Government."