Earlier this week, the Trump administration sent a bill to Congress to eliminate funding for public broadcasting for the next two years.

Broadcasting professionals in Northeast Ohio say the public has not been properly informed about how the cuts would affect local communities.

“All of the narrative about defunding public media is so heavily focused on PBS and NPR, so it appears that the administration is focused on harming those entities, but not a lot is brought up about the system of local stations and how we serve our local communities,” said Natalie Pillsbury, president and CEO of PBS Western Reserve.

Pillsbury’s organization owns and operates the local PBS stations WNEO — serving Youngstown, the Mahoning Valley, and parts of Western Pennsylvania — and WEAO, serving Cleveland, Akron and Canton. PBS Western Reserve has the largest footprint of any of Ohio’s eight public broadcasting stations, covering an audience of 4.9 million viewers.

“A lot of PBS and NPR stations have local newsrooms,” she said. “I think if more people in our communities knew that it would be their local stations that are harmed, it would help clarify what the impact would be.”

NPR reports that the recissions bill would cut $8.3 billion in foreign aid and $1.1 billion for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which distributes the money to PBS and NPR stations nationwide. Congress already allocated that funding for 2026 and 2027 in a bill signed by President Donald Trump in March. Both houses of Congress must pass the bill within 45 days for it to take effect and claw back all that funding.

“What that means for PBS Western Reserve and all local public media organizations is that those dollars are directly allocated to stations for community service grants we receive each year for the work we do in the community,” she said.

The funding is distributed using a formula developed by the CPB, based on audience and local financial support, among other factors.

In fiscal year 2026, which begins July 1, PBS Western Reserve would lose $1.1 million to $1.2 million. Pillsbury said that represents 22% of the organization’s annual budget.

“That’s a pretty significant hit to our budget because we had been counting on that money for 2026 and 2027 and we’d lose that funding immediately,” she said.

PBS Western Reserve has a staff of 24 people and operates on a budget of about $5 million annually, Pillsbury said.

With the money it receives from CPB, the station produces local news and documentary content — stories about people, places and events in the communities they serve — and they partner with other local organizations to reach schools and teachers, families and children, to provide educational resources and outreach to help them understand the resources offered.

In the past six months, Pillsbury said WNEO and WEAO have hosted nearly 40 local events that include lessons with hands-on activities and a book giveaway. All the events are free and open to the public.

“It would not so much harm PBS and NPR directly, but it would have the most impact on local stations and providing resources to their communities. The organizations and people who would be harmed are those who rely on PBS Kids and educational services programs,” Pillsbury said.

The stations, like all their partners across the state, are tied into Ohio’s emergency notification system, to provide emergency updates in the event that the internet and phone service go out.

“Our stations are the backbone of that public safety communication tool,” she said.

Pillsbury said PBS Western Reserve has been financially fortunate in recent years.

“We’re fortunate that we’ve significantly grown our member base, ending the year with having exceeded our revenue goals, and the organization has been very responsibly managed by the board of directors, so we have an endowment,” she said.

But while the organization can dip into its coffers for a while, that is not a long-term solution. Her stations and others would be pushed to seek increased support from the local communities, in the form of foundation grants, individual gifts and expanding local membership — never an easy undertaking, she said.

For stations not as fortunate, the results may be devastating, she said.

“For some smaller rural stations, it could be 50% or 60% of their budget. For those stations, being the only media organization in their area, it really means they may have to close their doors,” Pillsbury said. “Those who can survive would have to significantly reduce their expenses to meet the budget, which results in fewer free and accessible resources for everyone in our communities.”

THE JOY OF PBS AND NPR

Paul Ditchey is a senior lecturer in the Department of Communication at Youngstown State University. Like Pillsbury, he spent time in public broadcasting when he attended Kent State University, working for the local NPR affiliate, WKSU on 87.5 FM.

Ditchey said he also has grown up on PBS programming and is still a regular and devoted consumer of NPR and PBS shows.

He remembers shows such as “Mr. Rogers Neighborhood” and “The Joy of Painting” with Bob Ross. Today, he said he’s an avid follower of political discussion programs, documentaries and shows focused on the arts and sciences.

What strikes Ditchey is the notion he says underlies much of the motivation for defunding public broadcasting — that it is biased.

Tuesday’s bill from the White House comes two months after U.S. Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, introduced a bill in the House of Representatives to defund CPB, supported by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, R-Ga.

“For decades, radical Democrats have funneled taxpayer dollars to NPR and PBS under the guise of ‘serving the public,’ despite both organizations abandoning their founding missions to provide non-biased content and instead promoting the same radical-left propaganda as any other fake news outlet,” Jackson said in a press release.

Ditchey says he doesn’t know what Jackson and some of his colleagues are talking about.

“If anybody thinks it’s biased, they probably don’t watch or listen to it,” he said. “It is considered the most unbiased news casting in America.”

In her time, Pillsbury worked at WKSU and as a program director at IdeaStream Public Broadcasting, which bought WKSU in 2021. She said the standards for objectivity remain some of the highest in the industry.

“”I know that those stations and PBS Western Reserve have journalists on their teams that take very seriously the obligation for journalism to be ethical and uphold very high editorial standards,” she said. “Our editorial ethics policy is posted clearly on our website, and we see it as our responsibility to cover all perspectives in our communities. I don’t see bias happening in the news operations of our local organizations and I know the national organizations take that very seriously as well.”

Ditchey said he can’t imagine where the perception of bias comes from.

“If you listen to political stories they do, they have Republicans, Democrats, everybody of every stripe,” he said. “How can these people have the nerve to say it’s biased when they’re on it and they’re being asked for their opinion?”

“Since they do get federal funding, they cannot have a demographic, they have to stay in the middle,” he said. “And they have to publicly let you know where the money is coming. They literally have to tell you who’s paying for that show.”

Ditchey notes that “Firing Line” originally ran from 1966 to 1999 and was hosted by William F. Buckley, a prominent voice in American conservative politics.

Now he appreciates the direct and unbiased approach Margaret Hoover takes.

“She just has a conversation for 30 minutes,” he said.

Programs like the science program NOVA, the genealogy show “Finding Your Roots,” “The Antiques Roadshow,” and syndicated episodes of “The Joy of Painting” all leave Ditchey wondering what anyone could find objectionable.

“It has a little bit of everything for everybody,” he said. “Trying to make that go away really bothers me also, because anything else you want to watch, there will be commercials.”

He said the stations also benefit institutions such as YSU and KSU.

“It just puts a good face on the university,” he said. “I don’t know how exactly people feel about it in Youngstown, but a lot of people listen to it (in Kent, where Ditchey lives). They hold a lot of folk festivals and people get more involved with the community.”

He said Republicans may find that the effort, if successful, does not yield the results they want.

“If they manage to cut off the funding, they’re not going to make NPR and PBS go away,” he said. “If anything, they may force the programming or reporting to the left, depending on who they get to fund them, so it may just blow up in their faces.”

Pillsbury said she does not want to find out what happens. But the federal recissions bill is not the only threat they face.

“We’ve learned this week that there’s also some reduction to public media funding in the state budget,” she said.

Pillsury said the budget includes a 13% reduction in operating subsidies and in the Multimedia Grant Project subject line for fiscal year 2026, and both items are set for a 27% reduction the following year.

That represents an additional $288,438 that could be cut from PBS Western Reserve’s budget.

Pillsbury said that includes funding her stations receive for educational technology.

“That technology is what our professionals use to provide professional development opportunities for educators around technology in the classroom, and in-person programming for children and families around using technology as part of education, and that line item was zeroed out,” she said. “So we’re facing cuts from multiple angles.

Right now, those cuts also are not official, and remain a mere proposal from the state senate. Pillsbury said those who appreciate the value of public broadcasting can make a difference in the fate of PBS Western Reserve and stations across Ohio and the country.

“The most important thing anyone can do is call their senators and congresspeople and ask them to oppose this legislation,” she said.

The organization’s website provides scripts and tools to identify who a resident’s state or federal legislator is and their contact information. That can be found at protectmypublicmedia.org.