By Adam Pagnucco.
Part One described a bill by Council Member Kate Stewart that would impose substantial governance requirements on the county’s main community media organization, Montgomery Community Media (MCM). Part Two looked at the funding structure between the county and MCM. Part Three reviewed trends in cable fee receipts and MCM’s finances.
Now let’s go back to Stewart’s bill. Is it justified?
I understand why MCM’s board dislikes the bill. If I were in their shoes, I would share their view. Bill provisions that require a racial equity policy along with compliance with the state Open Meetings Act and Maryland Public Information Act (MPIA) could impose substantial costs on the organization. MPIA compliance alone could require significant staff time to answer requests. Would MCM get a funding increase to help it comply with these requirements?
Another thing worth considering is that if MCM employees’ emails and records are subject to MPIA requests, could their interactions with sources be released to the public? I would never want to be a journalist working under such conditions as source confidentiality is central to the nature of that work.
The board’s biggest objection is to the bill’s requirement that one of its board members be appointed by the county executive and another be appointed by the county council. MCM Vice President Vernon Ricks testified that that proposal “structurally compromises our editorial freedom and turns a neutral community media center into an arm of county government.”
The board’s objection is undermined by the fact that Maryland Public Television’s entire board is appointed by the governor. Also relevant is that the board of the Public Access Corporation of the District of Columbia, which runs DCTV, contains 2 members nominated by the mayor and 2 others appointed by the council among its 13 members. Still, I understand why Ricks and MCM’s board would want to protect themselves from thin-skinned politicians who might wish to impact their coverage. I do question whether any organization that gets nearly 90% of its funding from county grants, as MCM does, is truly independent from the county.
That said, the bill is irrelevant to a much larger question: should the county fund MCM at all?
Let’s review how other media organizations sustain themselves. Many free sites, like Bethesda Today, WTOP and the MoCo Show, rely on a mix of ad revenue and/or public contributions. Nonprofit sites like Maryland Matters can receive grants along with reader contributions. Other sites, like the Washington Post and the Banner, rely on paywalls. The Banner also runs ads, holds events and raises contributions.
All of these funding sources are voluntary in nature. No one forces consumers to pay them. It’s a matter of consumer choice.
Most of MCM’s funding works differently. The county charges cable operators franchise fees of 5% of their gross revenues, which they are allowed to pass on to their customers. The fees accumulate in the county’s Cable Fund and a portion of them are paid out to MCM each year. So if you are a subscriber to cable service provided by Comcast of Potomac, LLC, Verizon Maryland, LLC, or Starpower Communications, LLC, you are a funder of MCM whether you use their content or not.
Is this an appropriate function of government?
Regardless of whether county leaders decide to continue this arrangement, it’s clearly under great financial distress. Part Three illustrated an all-out collapse in cable fee collections over the past decade, which has already hit MCM’s budget hard. MCM’s revenues from sources other than county grants (gifts from the public and contract earnings) have also declined in recent years.
The final nail is that the county is facing a serious fiscal crisis that – according to recent projections – could force it to cut funding for its agencies by a combined $134 million next year. MCPS and Montgomery College are partially protected by state mandates, so any cuts will disproportionately fall on public safety, parks, health and human services and other non-educational functions. Council President Natali Fani-Gonzalez, who has seen these budget pressures building, went so far as to propose eliminating MCM’s funding last spring. (The council did not adopt that proposal.) Nevertheless, MoCo’s practice of segregating cable fees to support cable access and government TV channels is unusual among local jurisdictions, most of whom use cable fees as general revenues. The county’s financial crisis definitely calls into question whether this arrangement should continue.
So what would happen if the county were to stop funding MCM? The organization has a nest egg. In the fiscal year ending 6/30/25, MCM had net assets of $3.5 million, up from $1.4 million in FY20. Its assets include $1.5 million in savings and temporary cash investments and another $1.4 million in investments in publicly traded securities. Those assets would help MCM navigate a gradual phaseout in county grants and transition to a model of ads, public contributions, events, private foundation grants, fees for services and other revenue sources commonly used by other media organizations and nonprofits. Even if the county does not act directly against MCM’s funding arrangement, continuing declines in cable fees will pressure MCM to diversify its revenues anyway.
So forget about board appointments, open meetings, public information requirements and the like. They are side issues compared to the big questions: should the county keep funding MCM, and how should MCM adapt to survive the consequences of cord cutting? Those conversations must begin soon, especially as the Doomsday Budget of FY28 approaches.