The future is precarious for one of the most−beloved television shows for countless American children and their parents: "Sesame Street."
This month, the Republican House majority introduced a budget proposal that decreases federal spending by billions of dollars. Included in the plan is the elimination of all federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which funds and supports programs like the Public Broadcasting System's (PBS) "Sesame Street" and "NewsHour," as well as National Public Radio's (NPR) "All Things Considered" and "Morning Edition," among others.
Congress founded the CPB in 1967 as a federally funded source of news and entertainment. Beyond PBS and NPR, more than 70 percent of the funding for the CPB goes to local stations around the United States, at times providing the only source of local news in poor and rural areas.
Nonetheless, Professor of Political Science Jeffrey Berry said that the budget−cut proposal may not have as large an impact as one would think.
"The proportion of the network's budget from federal dollars is relatively small at this point, so it wouldn't have a dramatic effect," Berry said.
Indeed, according to ABC News, NPR receives only about two percent of its funding from the federal government. For PBS, it is about 15 percent. But local NPR stations are more dependent on federal and state appropriations; on average, about 10 percent of their funding comes from the federal government. For many PBS stations, federal and state grants comprise as much as 40 to 50 percent of their budget.
Julie Dobrow, director of the Communications and Media Studies Program, expressed her worry over what detrimental effects the budget cuts could have.
"I am really concerned about further stripping away funding for public TV and radio. These entities provide quality programming and do not have the same kind of commercial base as other TV and radio in this country," Dobrow told the Daily in an e−mail. "Longer term, this could have devastating effects on the amount of original programming they produce and … will mean the closure of some [NPR and PBS] outlets."
Berry agreed that without federal funding, the quality of programming could be negatively affected.
"If it gets to the point where no federal money goes to the networks, what makes them public broadcasting would be questionable. They may just become other television stations that focus on news programming," he said.
According to a recent statement by NPR President and CEO Vivian Schiller, released on NPR.org, the budget cuts would "diminish stations' ability to bring high−quality local, national, and international news to their communities, as well as local arts, music, and cultural programming that other media don't present. Rural and economically distressed communities could lose access to this programming altogether if their stations go dark."
Dobrow said that educational programming for children would also be adversely affected.
"If you look at children's programming in particular, a huge amount of the truly educational TV shows that are based on research are produced here in Boston at WGBH and at the Sesame Workshop in New York," Dobrow said. "I worry that if funding is cut, that these last bastions of excellent programming will suffer."
This is not the first time that members of Congress have tried to eliminate funding for public broadcasting. Many conservatives believe that public broadcasting has a liberal bias; for decades, primarily Republican congressmen have attempted to cut funding. Most recently, in November 2010, House Republicans attempted to cut federal funding for NPR, after the organization fired commentator Juan Williams over controversial remarks he made about Muslims while appearing on Fox News. Also in 2010, the federal government provided about $420 million to the CPB, amounting to about one one−hundredth of one percent of the total budget.
According to Dobrow, the potential effects of the federal budget cuts for NPR and PBS should be a source of concern for the millions of Americans who benefit from the services provided by public broadcasting.
"In my personal opinion, public radio and television are national resources and should be supported and protected," she said.
