Trump cuts result in Tacoma PBS station, KBTC, losing 20% of budget
KBTC Public Television, Western Washington’s PBS station based in Tacoma, lost 20% of its funding after the House of Representatives approved President Donald Trump’s $1.1 billion cut to public broadcasting last week.
On Monday, KBTC executive director and general manager DeAnne Hamilton told The News Tribune the Tacoma PBS station will lose about $1 million in federal grants from the Corporation of Public Broadcasting, which is about 20% of its operating budget. Hamilton said there are currently a lot of unknowns, but the public television station doesn’t anticipate local news shows or profiles will be canceled. Some national programs may no longer be offered, but that will be determined by PBS, Hamilton said.
The White House has said the public media system is politically biased and public broadcasting is an unnecessary expense, as reported by the Associated Press. Hamilton said she disagrees, and is concerned the cuts come at a time when the public needs free, truthful and trustworthy news and programs more than ever.
The national PBS media team pointed The News Tribune to a statement made July 17 by PBS President and CEO Paula Kerger, who said the rescission package “goes against the will of the American people, the vast majority of whom trust PBS and believe we provide excellent value to their communities.”
“These cuts will significantly impact all of our stations, but will be especially devastating to smaller stations and those serving large rural areas. Many of our stations which provide access to free unique local programming and emergency alerts will now be forced to make hard decisions in the weeks and months ahead,” she wrote. “There is nothing more American than PBS. Despite today’s setback, we are determined to keep fighting to preserve the essential services we provide to the American public.”
‘We are important’
In a typical year KBTC’s budget is between $4 million and $5 million and about $2 million comes from individual donations, Hamilton said. KBTC serves not just the South Puget Sound region, but broadcasts its signal throughout Western Washington, nearly from Vancouver, Washington, to Vancouver, Canada, she said.
In addition to TV programming, KBTC had a CPB grant that funded its work providing educational services to families in youth, “but that funding was cut off back in May,” she said.
“We’re really fortunate [to] have a generous community and some of the funds for Ready to Learn, the education work that we’re doing, we were able to piece together from grants that we’ve received from local foundations,” Hamilton said. “We’re still working out how we come up with the other funding that we’ve lost. You know, it’s great to have that funding, because it does enable us to do the work we’re doing. We’re going to keep doing the work to the best of our ability with the resources that we have.”
KBTC works in partnership with the Tacoma Housing Authority to offer educational children’s programs and activities that’s often themed on the children’s TV programs PBS runs, Hamilton said. The organization also has a reading program in partnership with libraries in Pierce County, she said.
“We are important because we offer educational content, and the educational content that we actually put on the air and that we build our learning activities around is lifelong learning,” Hamilton said. “It’s free, so people don’t have to pay for a streaming service, they don’t have to pay for cable. They can get our content over the air [or online].”
Hamilton said the content KBTC broadcasts is “based in Washington educational curriculum standards” and national education standards. Some of their newest shows depict characters who are neurodivergent or autistic (like Carl the Collector, a raccoon who collects objects as a special interest). Many of the adult shows are about nature, history, local and national news, science and the environment. KBTC also broadcasts early warning alerts for severe weather or disasters.
“We try to reflect issues and concerns in our local communities by having public affairs shows or news shows. And certainly, public radio provides local reporting. And it’s trustworthy. It’s truth telling,” she said. “And we do it on behalf of the American people, and not on the behalf of a corporation that might want you to think a certain way or keep the complete truth away from you.”
Hamilton believes many Republicans have been “trying to defund public media” for 40 years.
“The balance of power in the House and the Senate favors the Republicans right now, and I think that that’s how it’s happened,” she said. “If it wasn’t a public vote, would it have been the same?”
Hamilton acknowledged the media landscape has changed dramatically with streaming services and PBS’s traditional way of fundraising no longer being sustainable.
“We may not ever rise to the top again. Or, you know, we may come back in a different way, in a different form. We don’t know that yet. That’s what’s yet to be determined,” she said. “We hear people talk about the midterm elections coming up. I don’t know how that’s going to turn out either. So there’s still all these unknowns.”
