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Don’t Let Congress Silence NPR and PBS
On the Chopping Block: State Budget Battles and the Future of Public Media
Features
On the Chopping Block: State Budget Battles and the Future of Public Media
Since 2008, budget battles at the state level have eroded funding for public broadcasters around the country. Free Press and SaveTheNews.org have completed the first inventory of state funding cuts and examined the impact these cuts have had on local stations.
Public Media and Political Independence
America is unique in its nearly complete reliance on commercial media to present comprehensive information about government and politics, to hold political and business elites to account through critical commentary and investigative reporting, and to provide a forum for a broad range of voices and viewpoints.
New Public Media: A Plan for Action
This new report presents a series of creative policies and proposes reforms to support quality news reporting in local communities and to build a world-class noncommercial media system in America. New Public Media: A Plan for Action urges the creation of a trust fund seeded with a substantial endowment to supplement annual congressional appropriations and ultimately to enable the system to be completely self-sufficient. The report details a number of ways to support such a trust, including spectrum fees, a spectrum auction, a small tax on advertising, changes to the way advertising is treated in the tax code, or a small assessment on consumer electronic devices.
Tell PBS and NPR to reject political ads!
A U.S. appeals court recently struck down a ban on political ads on public broadcasting. Tell PBS and NPR to reject political ads!
Don't Let Congress Attack Public Media
The Blog
New Attack Launched on Public Media
According to press reports, Sen. Jim DeMint and Rep. Doug Lamborn are circulating letters in the Senate and House to rally support for cutting all federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and its nearly 1,300 local stations. The letters argue that the $445 million CPB budget is an “enormous” cost to taxpayers.
The letters come just a month before the CPB is supposed to deliver a report to Congress outlining how it could operate without federal funding. This timing is particularly troubling in light of a recent federal appeals court decision that opened the door to political ads on NPR and PBS stations.
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly
There’s good news and bad news in the world of public media funding.
First, the good news.
Court OKs Political Ads on NPR and PBS
Sounds like an Onion headline, but it’s not. Yesterday a U.S. appeals court struck down a ban on political advertising on public TV and radio stations. That means your local NPR and PBS stations could start airing all those nasty attack ads that clog up the airwaves in an election year.