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Tampa public television station WEDU-Ch. 3 has learned it is eligible for a $500,000 challenge grant from the Michigan-based Kresge Foundation to help improve its digital TV transmission system.
But there is a slight catch: WEDU must raise another $2.14-million by October 2005 to receive the money, prompting the PBS affiliate to create fundraising committees targeting six area counties.
"It's an important tool for our fundraisers and for the people heading our capital campaign," WEDU president and CEO Dick Lobo said of the grant, which he hopes will help convince other area donors to contribute.
News of the grant was particularly welcome at WEDU, where officials in the past have complained about the financial pinch from federal requirements mandating a conversion to digital TV broadcasts costing $12.5-million. So far, WEDU has raised $9.86-million.
WEDU began broadcasting a digital TV signal last year, presenting a simulcast of their current programming, along with broadcasts of the Florida Knowledge Network, the Florida Channel, the PBS Kids channel and high-definition PBS programming. Viewers need TVs with special tuners or a converter to see digital television signals, which allow broadcasters to "multicast," or broadcast several channels of programming at once and can present a sharper picture.
But WEDU now needs equipment to present its locally produced shows, including Tampa Bay Week and A Gulf Coast Journal with Jack Perkins, in a digital format.
Founded in 1924 by chain-store owner Sebastian S. Kresge, the Kresge Foundation gave out $108-million in challenge grants last year. In 2003, the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center received an $800,000 challenge grant, while Ruth Eckerd Hall got a $1-million challenge grant in 2002.
Tampa's other PBS station, WUSF-Ch. 16, will begin broadcasting its digital television signal at about 10 a.m. today - more than a year after the May 2003 deadline set by federal officials for public television stations to begin offering a digital channel.
WUSF spent nearly $6-million on the equipment for its digital broadcasts, which will include a simulcast of their current signal along with the Annenberg/CPB Channel, PBS You and the Florida Knowledge Network. On July 7, Bright House Networks cable systems will begin carrying WUSF's digital signals.
"It's such an expensive undertaking ... the (Federal Communications Commission) has been pretty good about extending the deadlines," said WUSF general manager Jo Ann Urofsky.
Neither Urofsky nor Lobo could say how many of the Tampa Bay area's 1.6-million TV households might own digital TV tuners or converters.
Fans of MTV's The Real World: San Diego may see Tampa native Robin Hibbard finish out one of the show's most compelling storylines in the season finale at 10 tonight - facing a judge over misdemeanor battery charges stemming from a fight with a Marine.
Hibbard, 24, was arrested in September and served a night in jail after scratching a Marine in a fight outside a bar, according to the San Diego Union Tribune.
The Real World: San Diego is the 14th cycle of MTV's reality TV hit, which last year filmed seven strangers living together in a San Diego house for months. The show's cast had several brushes with the law, including another resident arrested for public drunkenness and allegations from a woman that she was sexually assaulted at the house, possibly by an acquaintance of a castmember.