More cuts reported at WGBH

WGBH is instituting a one-week staff furlough, cuts in executive salaries and suspension of employee retirement matching funds in an attempt to ease a projected $3 million budget gap for fiscal 2009, according to the Boston Business Journal. CEO Jon Abbott announced the moves in a memo to employees Thursday. He's also asking members of the unions at the pubTV and radio stations, the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians and the Association of the Employees of Educational Foundation, to agree to a furlough; those savings would exceed $500,000. All all vice presidents are taking a 5 percent pay cut. Abbott also wants to cut discretionary budgets 4.5 percent over a four-month period, which may include more layoffs. WGBH dismissed 12 workers late last year, about 2 percent of its staff. Jeanne Hopkins, v.p. of communications and governmental relations, told Current that programming remains a priority for the station. "Right now we're really focused, and have been for quite some time, on keeping production costs as low as possible while delivering quality programs to stations," she said.