Local public media outlets are bracing for a potential $1.1 billion cut over two years for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which has earmarked more than $17 million for 16 Minnesota organizations, both large and small.
The St. Paul-based Minnesota Public Radio anticipates the cuts, which have already passed in the Senate, will earn enough votes in the House and dismantle the public media system as we know it, said Megan Ryan, communications director for MPR and its parent company American Public Media.
“We are looking at how we balance our strategic priorities and investments in the face of these cuts,” Ryan said. “Between state and federal funding sources, MPR is facing a loss of more than $6 million this fiscal year, about 6.5 percent of our budget. We have already begun a comprehensive review of our expense structure to find cost-saving solutions.”
The White House has said the public media system is politically biased and an unnecessary expense.
The package also cancels nearly $8 billion for a variety of foreign aid programs, many designed to help countries where drought, disease and political unrest endure.
Along with concerns for the programs targeted, opponents warned against allowing the executive branch to direct a party-line cancellation of investments that had been approved on a bipartisan basis, the Associated Press reported.
Big hit for community radio
Minneapolis jazz station KBEM, aka JAZZ88, was granted more than $122,000 from CPB in fiscal year 2024. Station manager Johnny Lee Walker said that’s about a tenth of the organization’s budget.
“Doesn’t sound like much, but it really is,” Walker said. “It would affect news (and) programming, in addition to the delivery and technical services for those programs and others. This would not shut down KBEM, but at a time of limited funding from other sources, this would make it very difficult to continue running KBEM at its current level as one of the strongest voices for jazz in the United States.”
The volunteer-based community radio station KFAI shared a similar outlook.
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“KFAI is a living expression of the Twin Cities — building bridges, deepening understanding and uplifting people across cultures, neighborhoods and generations,” said general manager and executive director Nora Doherty. “More than once in KFAI’s history, CPB support meant the ability to do this work. Now, CPB funding makes up just eight percent of KFAI’s budget, but its impact is catalytic. It allows us to leverage state and local dollars, helping community radio remain what it was intended to be: local, independent and representative of the interests of the people, not shareholders.”
Twin Cities Public Television, based in St. Paul, did not respond to a request for comment Thursday.
The Senate narrowly approved a $9 billion rescission bill that includes the CPB cuts early Thursday. The bill is now back at the House, which approved an earlier version. Lawmakers have a midnight Friday deadline to pass the bill.
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