Want to help advocate for public media in your community? Take a stand and urge your lawmakers to protect federal funding for stations like Kansas City PBS and 90.9 The Bridge. One of the easiest ways to do this is to visit protectmypublicmedia.org. This blog post will share additional tips and resources for contacting your lawmakers to encourage them to protect federal funding for public media.
Who are my lawmakers in Congress? How do I get in touch with them?
When sending a letter to Congress, make sure you know who to send it to. Congress.gov is an excellent resource for this, or you can enter your address here to get a list of your representative. If you already know who your representatives are, you can click on their name below and find their direct contact information.
If you live in Kansas, your Congress members include:
1st District Rep. Tracey Mann (R)
2nd District Rep. Derek Schmidt (R)
3rd District Rep. Sharice Davids (D)
4th District Rep. Ron Estes (R)
If you live in Missouri, your Congress members include:
1st District Rep. Wesley Bell (D)
2nd District Rep. Ann Wagner (R)
3rd District Rep. Robert Onder (R)
4th District Rep. Mark Alford (R)
5th District Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D)
6th District Rep. Sam Graves (R)
7th District Rep. Eric Burlison (R)
8th District Rep. Jason Smith (R)
What should I say when I reach out?
Here is a template letter you can use when contacting Congress members about the potential cuts to federal funding.
[Your Name]
[Your Address]
[City, State, ZIP Code]
[Email Address]
[Date]
The Honorable [Representative/Senator Full Name]
[Address of Their Office]
[City, State, ZIP Code]
Dear [Representative/Senator Last Name],
As you consider the FY26 Appropriations bills and future government spending, I urge you to protect and fully fund public media. As a constituent, I experience firsthand how our public media stations strengthen our community. That's why I am deeply concerned about efforts to defund public media and other emerging threats, such as policy changes and funding decisions that could put our locally operated public media stations at risk.
Our local public radio and television stations are lifelines that provide:
- Timely local and national emergency alerts and warnings reach our cell phones and the airwaves.
- Families with educational resources and in-person learning experiences that are proven to help children succeed in school.
- Workforce training for community members.
- Content and experiences that preserve and celebrate our culture.
- Town halls and community forums to address local issues.
- Trusted local information and storytelling.
All of this costs just about $1.60 per person annually. Multiple studies confirm that losing public media funding would put essential community services at risk. Rural and tribal stations are at the highest risk of going off-air entirely, cutting off critical information, emergency alerts, and educational programming for those who need it most.
That's why I'm asking you to oppose efforts to devastate my local public media station by clawing back already approved funding, and instead support:
- $535 million for Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) in FY28: CPB distributes funding to more than 1,500 public radio and television stations, including my local station, so that they can serve our community with essential local public services and programming.
- $60 million for interconnection: Interconnection is the backbone of our nation's emergency alert systems and public media programming, ensuring life-saving information and content reaches every community, regardless of size or geography.
- $31 million for Ready to Learn: Ready to Learn supports the creation of research-based educational media content that over 100 studies have proven to help children make academic gains in literacy, science and math.
Eliminating or reducing this funding would threaten the very existence of many local public media stations and deprive the public of a valuable, non-commercial source of information, entertainment and community connection.
Please stand with your constituents and the millions of Americans who support public media by supporting continued, robust funding for the CPB.
Thank you for your time and your service.
Sincerely,
[Your Name]