Administration-Sought CPB Cuts Won't Deter Funding Increase Ask

Key appropriators told us they don't plan to allow the federal government to decrease or cut off CPB funding this year. President Donald Trump's administration proposed reducing CPB's advance FY 2020 appropriation to $30 million from the $445 million allocated in the FY 2019 federal spending law. The FY 2020 funding and another $30 million in FY 2021 would be used to “conduct an orderly closeout” of federal funding for CPB (see 1903180063). The administration unsuccessfully sought similar cuts to CPB funding during the previous two budget cycles (see 1802120037).

This administration “has tried cutting out” CPB's funding before “but their budget proposal just lets your know where their values are,” said House Appropriations Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies Subcommittee Chairwoman Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., ahead of the full FY 2020 budget numbers' release. “That's not what the people of this country want.” She said she and other subcommittee Democrats fully intend to advance legislation to continue fully funding CPB at or above its current level. Ranking member Tom Cole, R-Okla., told us he also remains supportive of funding CPB.

Senate Appropriations Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies Subcommittee Chairman Roy Blunt, R-Mo., noted to us earlier his past support for maintaining CPB funding over the past two cycles.

The top Democrats on the House and Senate Appropriations committees opposed attempts to zero out CPB funding, in statements. House Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., “strongly” opposes cutting CPB funding and “will work to ensure this important American resource is protected” during the FY 2020 appropriations process. Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., “will again strongly oppose” any drawdown in CPB funding, a spokesperson emailed.

Similar Plan, New Cycle

White House efforts to strip CPB funding “have been going on for a while,” said Rhode Island PBS President David Piccerelli.

“We have been zeroed out before,” said Rick Johnson, general manager of PBS affiliate WGCU Fort Myers, Florida. Battling for funding every budget forces public TV stations to devote time to lobbying their local representatives on top of their work as broadcasters, Piccerelli told us. “We expected it,” Butler said.

The White House budget recommendation doesn’t affect plans to pursue a funding increase, Butler and public TV broadcasters said. Since funding has been the same for a decade, the purchasing power of public TV stations has decreased with inflation, CPB said in its FY 2020/2022 budget justification. CPB is funded two years in advance to insulate its content from being affected by political concerns, Butler said. “Ten years of level funding have seriously eroded the purchasing power of $445 million, and the inflation-adjusted funding level would today exceed $530 million,” said the budget request.

In pursuit of the funding increase, APTS and public TV groups will tell Congress the additional funds would allow public broadcasting to expand efforts to educate and to aid public safety, Butler said.

Inflation Adjustment

“It’s a modest and reasonable request,” said broadcast attorney Todd Gray, of Gray Miller. The increase would just restore to public stations the purchasing power they had 10 years ago, Johnson said.

Butler “activated” the public broadcasting grassroots organization Protect My Public Media Monday after the White House released the budget figures. Members sent emails to 750,000 members directing them to online forms to contact lawmakers, Butler said. “Your immediate action is vital,” the email said. Stations will also be in touch with their respective legislators, Piccerelli said.

If APTS and public TV don’t secure additional funding, their purchasing power will erode further, Butler said. “It just keeps constraining our ability to do work in our communities.” The White House budget request for CPB is seen very unlikely to make it to fruition. If it did, smaller, rural stations would be the most affected, Piccerelli said. “We’re very concerned as a system,” he said. “Without the federal investment, the entire public media system and the unique services and value provided to rural, small town and urban communities would be devastated,” said CPB President Pat Harrison. It didn't comment further.

Rural areas like those in New Mexico are already suffering from lack of connectivity, said Franz Joachim, general manager of PBS affiliate KNME-TV Albuquerque. His is the only TV station for some communities, and small stations in rural communities would be hardest hit by cuts in CPB funding, he said. Keeping funding level while inflation rises is tantamount to a decrease, Joachim said.

APTS will have a better idea of how the funding request will fare as the budget process continues, Butler said. The road will be easier if sequestration is avoided, he said. Sequestration would reduce the size of the available funding pie, Butler said. More details of the eventual shape of the budget will become clear as summer approaches, he said.

The White House's budget also proposes reducing funding for the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees Voice of America and other government-funded news and information broadcasts. The administration wants to reduce USAGM's budget to $623.5 million, from $798 million in FY 2019. The funding decrease would result in USAGM's staff being cut to 1,398 full-time equivalents from the current approximately 1,700.