The Future of PBS, NPR? Tucson Leaders Come to SaddleBrooke
SBINSIDER REPORTING| December 7, 2025
The Carnegie Corporation of New York created the Carnegie Commission on Public Television in 1965. The commission’s 1967 report recommended the creation of a private, nonprofit corporation to support public television programming, which inspired the legislation. The thinking of the time and to some extent today, was that commercial media would not program shows that would likely be unprofitable simply for the “public benefit”. They were correct. PPB and later NPR would go on to create programming that no other for-profit would consider until the age of 500 cable channels and widespread broadband internet. So, today, consumers can get information, news, sports, education and opinions directly via internet connections to their computer, TV or phone-most of which free.
The logical question then became, was the original intent of the CPB act of 1967 still in effect? This year, Congress said no. After subsidizing CPB all those years, each GOP lead Congress had targeted PBS for extinction (mainly on perceptions of left-wing bias) and slowly unwound its funding. Finally, in March of 2025 the Congress is out of the broadcasting business-except for the FCC as a regulatory agency.
SaddleBrooke Visit by Arizona Public Media
This change of policy lead to Gays, Lesbians and Allies Club to invite the leadership of Tucson’s Arizona Public Media to Desert View Theater. The theater was about fifty percent filled and the presentation focused on moving forward as a non-government supported entity-except that the local CPB is housed on the campus of the University of Arizona for free and is getting a new building shortly. So, the State of Arizona via its funding for Higher Education is partly funding the Tucson shop. Arizona PBS used to get direct funding, but since the 2014 budget meltdown, that amount has been stepped down slowly to zero today.
Addressing the audience were AZPM CEO Jack Gibson; AZPM Radio Program Director Nicole Cox; Arizona Illustrated host Tom McNamara; AZPM classical music director and weekday morning announcer James Reel; and AZPM Chief Original Content Officer Bohdan Zachary. They relayed to the crowd that Tucson was at the top or near the top of listenership per capita for many years. This next year the budget has a $1.5 million deficit caused by Federal funding cuts, but leadership believes that tight accounting and members donations will fill the gap. Gibson also highlighted the phenomenal growth of podcasting and AZPM was doing its best to make sure they are reaching that listenership.
One of the key points they made was that the Arizona Public Media is focusing on what they believe are the marginalized and underserved communities by the commercial media.
They outlined their vision for Arizona Public Media as follows:
- Expanding its award-winning news team as other media outlets face downsizing
- Broadcasting trusted programming on NPR 89.1 along with expertly curated playlists on Classical 90.5 and 24/7 streaming on Jazz 89.1 HD2
- Featuring content from partners including PBS, BBC, American Public Television and others.
- Continuing to produce local originals such as Arizona Illustrated, Arizona Spotlight, Arizona Science, and Navigating Our Financial Times, plus a new series that celebrates creativity across public media, State of the Arts.
Audience members did relay that the signal for radio in either AM (1550) or FM (91.5) band was sketchy here and the response was related to the difficult terrain and power allowed by the transmitters.
