[rfu-automation] Re: PSA on the Sustainability fee referendum

[Mike Lehman]

I guess I'm still a little uncomfortable, even after rereading the text 
of the PSA. It does seem to indicate a position on the question, even if 
it's not an explicit call for action.

My bigger discomfort is the fact that putting something into automation 
means the whole station takes responsibility for it. If someone just 
wants to get the message out on their own show, then they take 
responsibility for it -- and I'd have no problem with it. This seems 
like an important distinction to me. Even if it's not actual legally a 
problem, the politics of seeming to take a position as the station on 
any electoral issue seems problematic to me, a can of worms that I'd 
just as soon stay out of.

Given it's just text, do we actually even have a way to produce this? I 
assume that most things that get sent as text PSA's don't get on the 
air? Or does someone print them up and take them into the studio? I 
assume that they aren't produced into sound files for the automation 
system anyway?
Mike Lehman

Barbara kessel wrote:
> What I remember from the original training I got from John Anderson is
> that you can offer people information as long as you don't say
> anything that is telling people what to do, such as "Go and vote for
> the $5 Sustainability fee." The text of the PSA seems to pass this
> test.
> Also I believe that a referenda is different than a campaign for an
> individual, in which the rule is that you can ask them to be on the
> radio but they cannot ask you. If they do that, you have to offer all
> the candidates equal time. Barbara Kessel
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