Proposed Cuts to Public Broadcasting Budget
Last updated: June 24, 2005
We hope the following will answer your questions about public broadcasting funding:
What budget is at stake?
The most significant budget affected is that of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), the organization created by Congress to administer federal funds to help support public radio and television programming, stations, community service, educational projects and technology. Additionally, there is separate, smaller fund for public broadcasting technical projects administered through the Department of Commerce.
What has happened to date?
In early June, in an unanticipated move, a House of Representatives Appropriations subcommittee recommended cutting $190 million from CPB's budget for fiscal year 2006, which begins this coming October. This was subsequently approved by the full House Appropriations Committee.
On June 23, however, when the recommendation came to the floor vote before the full House of Representatives, an amendment to restore $90 million of the cut was introduced by David Obey (D-WI), Jim Leach (R-IA), and Nita Lowey (D-NY). This amendment was voted on and passed with strong bipartisan support: the vote of 284-140 included 87 Republicans and 197 Democrats.
What happens next - and what does this mean now for the public broadcasting budget?
This most recent vote was a major step forward, but restores only half the budget lost through the original subcommittee recommendation. The process to regain the full funding continues as the Senate begins its own review of the budget - commonly referred to as a "mark-up" - beginning July 12.
The Senate will finalize its recommendations in the coming weeks and hopefully will seek to restore the rest of the cuts. When this process is finished, leaders of the House and Senate will meet to negotiate the final budget.
Why is this happening now if the fiscal year 2006 budget was in place?
The Administration has put intense pressure on the Congress to deal with the federal deficit by reducing federal spending, although the House Appropriations Subcommittee and full Committee chose to go beyond the proposed Administration recommendations for public broadcasting cuts.
What does the public think about public broadcasting funding?
According to recent print and electronic media coverage of the CPB budget cut situation, there has been significant public opinion directed to members of Congress encouraging the restoration of full funding for public radio and television.
A 2003 poll taken by CPB showed that Americans strongly support public broadcasting and believe it is worth federal funding. The CPB report determined:
How would a major cut in CPB funding affect NPR and the NPR member stations?
The CPB budget and the potential cutback would impact radio and television differently. For radio, the biggest potential damage is to stations. NPR itself gets less than one percent of its budget from CPB. NPR member stations, however, receive an average of 15 percent of their budgets in grants from CPB that help support their local program production, program acquisition, community outreach and such day-to-day costs as paying the electric bill. If this funding were lost, it would certainly diminish the quality and depth of the stations' service to their communities.
Additionally, there are 221 stations in 43 states that specifically serve rural and minority communities; the latter includes numerous African-American, Native American, Latino and multicultural licensees. In many cases, they are the sole local broadcasting service available. These stations receive significantly higher funding from CPB - in some cases, as much as two-thirds of their budgets - since many of their listeners simply don't have the financial resources to provide support. If this funding is cut, there is a good chance they will not survive.
What can I do?
NPR encourages its listeners and other supporters to contact their local public radio stations for more information relevant to their communities. If your local station Web site does not provide additional information, please use the form on the right side of this page to contact NPR.
