Atlanta public media outlets turn to listeners as CPB funding disappears
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Atlanta public media stations big and small are asking listeners to fill budget holes after Congress rescinded $1.1 billion in Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) funding.
Why it matters: Public media outlets serve essential community newsgathering and emergency roles, but the Trump administration and others on the right have long accused them of left-leaning bias
Driving the news: WABE, Georgia Public Broadcasting and WCLK are among the public TV and radio outlets nationwide that use CPB funding to serve their communities, based on publicly available financial data collected by a former NPR staffer and shared with Axios.
- CPB grants made up about 10% of GPB's overall funding as of fiscal 2023, and roughly 3% of WABE's.
How it works: That's based on data manually collected from station websites by Alex Curley, a former NPR staffer who has been tracking public media financing on his blog, Semipublic.
Caveat: Public media stations can also receive other forms of federal grants, plus corporate sponsorships and donations from (ahem) viewers like you.
Yes, but: "CPB grants make up the majority of federal funding for most public media entities," Curley wrote.
Zoom in: WABE CEO Jennifer Dorian told the Georgia Recorder that the station raised half a million dollars during this past week's emergency funding drive to help fill a $1.9 million shortfall. That deficit is roughly 13% of the station's budget.
- GPB, which expected to receive more than $4.2 million, told Georgia Recorder the station had "conducted careful scenario planning in preparation for multiple outcomes."
The intrigue: Public radio stations that only play music, like Clark Atlanta University's Jazz 91.9 WCLK, were not spared.
- For the first time, the station is seeking grants from charitable foundations, according to the AJC.
What they're saying: "There have been cries to defund CPB for years, but I never thought it would happen," Wendy S. Williams, who's worked as the station's general manager since 1994, told the news outlet.
- "We've got to regroup and find ways to recoup the money on top of our regular fundraising initiatives."
The big picture: Losing federal funding also means not having to worry about federal funding, Dorian said.
- "This is not going to be a public-private partnership anymore. This is now going to be 100% community funded, which also makes us a 100% independent newsroom."