Public Broadcasting System President Pat Mitchell is quietly pushing an audacious plan that would free public-TV stations from their annual federal allowance. But there's one very pricey condition: The government makes a one-time $5 billion payment to PBS. The profits from investing this ocean of money would largely replace the $300 million PBS gets yearly from the federal government, and fulfill a dream that supporters have held since the 1960s: getting PBS out from under the thumb of penny-pinching appropriators and censors on Capitol Hill. Mitchell, who became PBS's fifth president four years ago, faces huge hurdles in selling her idea to Congress―not to mention to skeptical public-TV stations. In Mitchell's vision, the $5 billion could be offset by proceeds from the early give-back of analog spectrum that the government is planning to auction in the next two to three years.
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