Arts Action Alert!

The Institute for Education and the Arts is posting an arts action alert: contact your representative to help restore funding to public broadcasting and arts education programs.

Earlier today the Committee on Appropriations of the U.S. House of Representatives approved legislation that would slash funding for public broadcasting and arts education programs. Please visit Americans for the Arts E-Advocacy Center to urge your Representative to vote to restore the funding to these vital programs when the bill comes to the floor later this month.

Background:

Today's House Committee activity approved action taken last week by the House Subcommittee on Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations that cut $115 million from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), the primary agency for our nation's public television and radio broadcasting, and zeroed-out a $36 million funding pool for arts education programs through the U.S. Department of Education. Unfortunately, both of these cuts had also been requested in the President's FY 2007 budget.

Only one amendment to partially restore $20 million in funding back to CPB was adopted in full committee today, which would still leave the agency with a devastating cut.

We expect that when the full House debates the bill, it will consider a floor amendment to fully restore the public broadcasting funds. A similar scenario occurred last year, when thousands of calls and emails from grassroots advocates from around the country helped to convince the House to reverse the cuts. A bipartisan group of representatives led the fight last year, and we expect them to do so again this year, including Reps. David Obey (D-WI), Jim Leach (R-IA), and Nita Lowey (D-NY).

For the sixth straight year, the House Appropriations Committee has eliminated funding for the Department of Education's arts education programs. As in the past, we will likely have to rely on the Senate to fully restore funding for these important programs.

Next Steps

In the next few weeks the full House of Representatives will consider the Labor-HHS-Education spending bill on the floor. We hope you will make your voices heard! Please visit our E-Advocacy Center to send a message to your Members of Congress protesting the proposed funding cuts to public broadcasting and arts education.

Thank you again for your continued support of the arts!

This posting was originally emailed to the Institute for Education and the Arts' listserv. To subscribe to the listserv, please click here.