What potential funding cuts to NPR, PBS will mean in Pennsylvania

A House vote is all that stands in the way of President Trump’s effort to claw back more than $1 billion in funding to the public radio and television stations that serve Pennsylvania’s biggest cities and smallest rural communities.

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On Nov. 7, 1967, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Public Broadcasting Act into law, establishing the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and paving the way for public television and radio stations across the US, like the dozens of outlets that serve Pennsylvania’s biggest cities and most rural communities.

Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) stations like WVIA, which serves NEPA, National Public Radio (NPR) member stations like WHYY in Philadelphia, the flagship station for the Fresh Air program, and other public broadcasting outlets receive more than $500 million annually in federal funding from the CPB.

That financial support is now in jeopardy after the US Senate voted in favor of a rescission request by President Donald Trump to claw back nearly $1.1 billion from the CPB, which represents the full amount it’s due to receive during the next two budget years.

The measure, which also looks to cancel billions in foreign aid, now moves to the House. The bill must be signed into law by midnight Friday for the proposed rescissions to kick in. If it passes the House, the public broadcasting funding would end in October. If Congress doesn’t act by then, the spending stands.

In total, Trump’s request seeks to cut about $9 billion in federal spending cuts—a sliver of the federal budget. 

Critics of the measure feel the cuts aren’t about reining in federal spending at all, and that they’re rooted in the Trump administration’s stated belief that the public media system is politically biased and an unnecessary expense.

Terry O’Reilly, the president and CEO of Pittsburgh Community Broadcasting, which operates NPR affiliate WESA, told the Philadelphia Inquirer that he believes cuts were about “retribution.”

“We got sucked into a fight we’re not a part of,” O’Reilly told the Inquirer prior to the Senate vote. “Public media is one one-hundredth of 1% of the federal budget. It’s a rounding error.”

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, one of two Republicans who voted against the legislation, expressed concerns about the cuts to public broadcasting, saying they could affect important rural stations, like those in her state.

Murkowski said in a speech on the Senate floor Tuesday that the stations are “not just your news—it is your tsunami alert, it is your landslide alert, it is your volcano alert.”

Less than a day later, as the Senate debated the bill, a 7.3 magnitude earthquake struck off the remote Alaska Peninsula, triggering tsunami warnings on local public broadcasting stations that advised people to get to higher ground.

The situation is “a reminder that when we hear people rant about how public broadcasting is nothing more than this radical, liberal effort to pollute people’s minds, I think they need to look at what some of the basic services are to communities,” Murkowski said.

What does the loss of funding mean for public broadcasting in Pennsylvania?

The CPB distributes more than 70% of the money to more than 1,500 locally operated public television and radio stations, with much of the remainder assigned to NPR and PBS to support national programming.

Public broadcasting outlets in Pennsylvania’s two largest cities would likely be able to navigate funding cuts with minimal disruption. According to the Inquirer, government funding accounts for about 7% of WHYY’s annual operating budget, and about 9% of WESA’s budget.

The same cannot be said for those outlets in smaller towns, particularly those in rural stretches of the state, where public radio is usually the most reliable way to get news and emergency alerts. 

WPSU in State College serves 24 rural counties in central and northern Pennsylvania, and receives roughly 20% of its annual budget (about $1.4 million) from the CPB, according to the Inquirer. Isabel Reinert, WPSU’s executive director and general manager, told the Inquirer that losing that funding could lead to cuts in educational programming and hinder the station’s emergency broadcasting capabilities. This comes as the station is also facing a 20% funding cut (around $800,000) from Pennsylvania State University.

According to the Inquirer, federal funding accounts for about 20% of WVIA’s annual budget, and about 11% for WQED in Pittsburgh, the PBS station where the landmark children’s show “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” was developed and produced. 

In 1969, when then-President Richard Nixon was threatening to cut the nascent CPB’s budget by half—from $20 million to $10 million—Rogers testified before a Senate subcommittee, advocating for the continuation of funding, and the important service shows like “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” provided.

“I give an expression of care every day to each child, to help him realize that he is unique,” Rogers testified. “I end the program by saying, ‘You’ve made this day a special day, by just your being you. There’s no person in the whole world like you, and I like you, just the way you are.’ And I feel that if we in public television can only make it clear that feelings are mentionable and manageable, we will have done a great service for mental health.”

What can you do?

Ahead of the pending congressional vote, you can contact your US representative to share your opinions on the bill. Find your representative in Congress by using this search tool. 

You can also donate to your local NPR (find yours here) and/or PBS (find yours here) station.

Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.