NPR Chief Katherine Maher Makes Case for Public Radio in Late-show Interview.

Public radio’s future was in the spotlight last week when NPR President and CEO Katherine Maher told Late Show host Stephen Colbert that federal funding cuts may shutter a great number of local stations. “The current estimate on the radio side is somewhere between 70 to 80 [stations] will go out of business,” Maher told Colbert.

In July, Congress reduced the Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s budget by $1.1 billion. The CPB, which distributes funds to NPR and PBS, is slated to shut down in October, leaving public media outlets nationwide facing an uncertain future.

Maher emphasized that the closures would accelerate the decline of local journalism. “One in five Americans currently lives without access to local news in their community,” she said. “When you take away local public radio, you’re undercutting our ability to trust one another… and the very institution of democracy itself.”

Colbert noted that while NPR’s flagship national programs, Morning Edition and All Things Considered, receive only about 1% of their funding from Washington, local shows would suffer the greatest impact. He cited South Carolina’s Walter Edgar’s Journal, Vermont Public Radio’s children’s program But Why?, and Cincinnati Public Radio’s Backed Up, a plumbing show.

“What strikes me is that so many of the people who cut this funding keep on calling for a return to old-fashioned values,” Colbert remarked. “Those seem like old-fashioned values.”

Maher argued that public media strengthens civic life by fostering connections within communities. “If we in communities feel like we don’t have something in common with someone who lives down the road, it creates a space in which other people can come in and take advantage of us,” she said. “It is so important, especially in a country that is as diverse, heterogeneous as ours, that things like public media exist to help us connect across divides.”