WASHINGTONPublic television and radio, only recently under withering attack from conservative budget-cutters in Congress, have emerged virtually intact from a process that had seemed ready to put Big Bird and Barney out of their government jobs.
July 26, 1995
The House Appropriations Committee has approved legislation that would trim the Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s annual budget by only 8 percent. That’s a mere surface wound in the context of ongoing budget battles that have gone for the jugular of federal support for cultural institutions such as CPB, the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Earlier this week, the House panel defeated an amendment that would have eliminated all funding for CPB. The agency, once derided by House Speaker Newt Gingrich as a little sandbox for the rich, subsidizes the Public Broadcasting Service, National Public Radio and other broadcasting outlets across the country.
The vote reflects the remarkable staying power of an operation that Republicans vowed to abolish in the heady days after the GOP seized control of Congress. But that was before lawmakers were hit by a blizzard of protest from local broadcasters, constituents and devotees of educational children’s television.
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There are too many children in America who grew up on Sesame Street, said Rep. John Porter, R-Ill., principal author of the appropriations bill that includes the CPB money. People feel this is the only real quality children’s programming.
It is too early to declare victory, but
see PBS, page 6
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