It’s not that being a PBS affiliate has suddenly become a gateway to riches. The nonprofit station has diversified its business to include an online virtual high school, online courses for teachers and unemployed workers and certified professional careers.
The station has also benefited financially from the never-ending War on Terror, landing Department of Homeland Security grants to build a regional emergency response support system.

While VegasPBS still relies on more traditional grants and donations made during pledge drives to help keep the station on the air, its diversification strategy is paying dividends.

“We have weathered the recession pretty well,” said Tom Axtell, general manager of KLVX-TV, Channel 10, which is branded as VegasPBS.

Operating revenue was $18.21 million in 2010. Operating expenses were $11.43 million, with the resulting surplus allowing the station to repay $6.38 million of the $18.1 million it borrowed from the school district to build its $70 million headquarters on East Flamingo Road in 2010. The final $1.5 million loan payment to the school district should be made by the end of fiscal 2012, he said. The majority of the construction was financed through a $40 million capital campaign before work began.

Axtell said the increase in the station’s assets is a direct result of capabilities that came with that new 112,000-square-foot building.

FOCUS ON EDUCATION

As television came into vogue in the 1940s, Congress reserved some broadcast frequencies for educational purposes, many of them licensed to colleges and large school districts that operated radio stations. In 1953, the University of Houston signed on the nation’s first noncommercial educational TV station.

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