Public Broadcasting Gets Stimulus Funding

Public broadcasting is to receive emergency funding in the $2 trillion coronavirus relief bill approved by the by Congress last week.

The bill includes $75 million for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting “to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus, including for fiscal stabilization grants to public telecommunications entities,” the bill says.

The bill directs CPB to use the funds to help “to maintain programming and services and preserve small and rural stations threatened by declines in non-Federal revenues.”

Patrick Butler, CEO of America’s Public Television Stations, said that corporate, foundation and individual giving to public television stations has “rapidly decreased in the wake of the economic downturn accompanying the contagion.”

Butler noted that many public television stations are “devoting their entire daytime schedules to age-appropriate educational programming and stations are also providing online services, learning games, teacher and parent guides, and other resources.”