Three members of the fundraising Alabama Educational Television Foundation Authority have quit in protest of the terminations Tuesday of Alabama Public Television Executive Director Allan Pizzato and Pauline Howland, deputy director and c.f.o., by the Alabama Educational Television Commission.
Foundation Authority Chair Joseph B. Mays Jr., a Birmingham attorney; Vanzetta Penn McPherson of Montgomery, a retired U.S. Magistrate Judge; and Allyson Edwards of Leeds, a Honda executive, have resigned.
UPDATE, 6 p.m. Friday: Foundation Authority member Robert E. Nesbitt of Birmingham has also resigned.
Mays told Current that after speaking privately with several commission members, “I thought it best that I resign.” He declined to provide details of those conversations.
“I have the highest regard for Allan Pizzato and Pauline Howland,” Mays said. “They are both consummate professionals. First-rate, top-flight people.”
The authority is a public nonprofit corporation comprising five Foundation members as well as the seven members of the Alabama Educational Television Commission. Foundation members are appointed by the Commission and serve four-year terms.
Mays has served on the board for longer than 12 years.
The Foundation receives, invests, and spends donations “related to the promotion, development, and growth of educational and public broadcasting and television in Alabama,” according to the Code of Alabama.
UPDATE: For Current's full story on the Alabama Public Television situation, posted June 24, click here.
Observing all of this, I really, really wish that the people resigning would start telling us the details of those conversations with commission members
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