Good
afternoon. My name is Brian Imus and I am the State Director with
Illinois PIRG, the Public Interest Research Group. We are a
non-partisan, non-profit citizen advocacy organization.
On
behalf of our more than 10,000 citizen members across the state, I want
to thank you for giving Chicago an opportunity to speak on this matter
of critical concern to all those who value an informed citizenry.
Illinois
PIRG works on a variety of public interest issues public health,
consumer rights, good government and campaign finance reform.
Regardless of the issue however, media ownership has an impact on the
public discourse and debate that occurs on all those issues.
When
corporate media decides to shy away from an issue that might affect
advertising revenue, the visibility of our crucial public interest
issues is diminished.
In
past years, we in the Chicagoland region have had access to more
independent outlets than most. But we too have seen consolidation among
the papers and electronic media.
In
preparing for this hearing, I heard story after story from people who
felt that local coverage and content had decreased in recent years.
I've experienced this in my own work. There are fewer reporters and
news sources covering state and local policy debates than in the past.
This is a direct result of consolidation.
The number of independent voices has been slowly but drastically reduced meaning fewer viewpoints.
Corporate
media has already proved that they will always look out for their
bottom line. In fact, I expect you'll hear from a few of them today who
will testify in an attempt to do just that. All we ask is for the FCC
to follow it's mandate and look out for the public interest.
Thank you
