A House subcommittee just approved legislation that would eliminate federal funding for public radio and television stations. Multiple studies confirm that ending federal funding would devastate, if not, destroy public media. Act now to save your local public media stations.
The House Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education (Labor-HHS-Education) Appropriations Subcommittees released its draft Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 appropriations legislation that proposed to zero out federal funding for public media.
The bill eliminates funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), public radio and television’s single largest source of funding, and Interconnection, public media’s distribution network that enables viewers and listeners to receive programs and emergency alerts.
Protect My Public Media, a coalition of grassroots advocates and public media stations and organizations, is coordinating outreach to Congress. To learn more about this effort and how you can help, visit www.protectmypublicmedia.org.
"These cuts would be extremely damaging to KVPR if they become law, and simply devastating to many smaller rural public radio stations," said KVPR General Manager Joe Moore.
KVPR is a participant in CPB's "Community Service Grant" program, which last year provided $142,435 in funding to support our service to the San Joaquin Valley. That amounted to about 7 percent of the station's total revenue. "If that funding goes away, we would have no choice but to cut programming and local content, from news to classical music," said Moore.
"The most important thing listeners can do is to call or email your representatives, and spread the word, telling your family and friends to do the same. If public media is important to you, let Congress know."