Knowledge Network has long since fired its chairman and CEO, citing the need for the organization to “evolve” after this year’s audit found large gaps in the amount of production money offered to producers. color compared to whites.
The network confirmed Rudy Buttignol’s dismissal in a statement on Friday. The announcement did not directly mention the racial equity audit released in February, but said the board was looking to grow.
“The board has determined that now is the time for renewal as it considers the future and the best way to move the organization forward,” the network board’s message read.
“The board is looking for new opportunities to leverage the success of the Knowledge Network as the organization evolves and adapts to changes in the broadcasting industry and the changing needs of British Colombians.”
Buttignol’s departure will take effect on June 30. In an email to CBC on Friday, he said he would not comment on his dismissal.
This year’s audit found that Knowledge Network spent more than 98 percent of its pre-license funding (money set aside to start original programming in exchange for the first broadcast rights) on production companies. was described as “not diverse” owners. the previous seven years.
This left only 1.7 percent of the funding for production companies owned by people of color, and nothing for majority-owned indigenous companies.
A graph in the February report showed how pre-funding for the Knowledge Network license had been granted over the past seven years. (Knowledge Network)
The Knowledge Network, which has been BC’s free public broadcaster since 1981, is funded by an annual operating grant from the provincial government along with more than 40,000 individual donors. Its ad-free programming, which is available via cable and streaming, ranges from documentaries and dramas to children’s shows.
Buttignol told CBC in February that he had “great reservations” about the findings of the audit, but acknowledged the chain had “a lot of work to do.”
He said the goal of the network until last year was to look at diversity within the creative leaders of a project (directors and screenwriters, for example), not the corporate ownership of a production company.
Buttignol’s audit and response prompted an open letter and a request from several BC producers asking for his replacement.
“It’s a shame it went that way”
Nilesh Patel, documentary director and executive director of the Racial Equity Screen Office, said Buttignol’s departure was expected but “disappointing”.
“The council has clearly lost confidence in Rudy’s ability to take on this transformative change,” Patel, who was not a co-author of the open letter, said in an interview Friday.
“Rudy has so much experience and so many relationships in a truly insular industry in Canada and so much knowledge … If I could have done that job, it would have been very helpful to incorporate racial equity into this organization.
“It would have been the best of both worlds … it’s a shame it went that way.”
In response to the audit, the chain said it would commission 50 percent of its feature and short documentaries over the next three years from independent production companies, black and color, and more than 25 percent of these films. BC films- independent indigenous producing companies based.
Buttignol had been the network’s president and CEO for 15 years. The network said it would begin “a full national recruitment process” in July to find a replacement.
Patel said it’s not a small rent.
“They should really focus on looking at someone who has the qualifications for the racial equity mandate … along with the pragmatism of hiring a person who fits the role of CEO of a public broadcaster,” he said. .
“They should be more careful than just going to a bounty hunter.”