Cascade PBS Lays Off News Staff, Citing Federal Cuts

https://publicola.com/2025/09/22/cascade-pbs-lays-off-news-staff-citing-federal-cuts/

Cascade PBS Lays Off News Staff, Citing Federal Cuts

Sept 22, 2025
Erica C. Barnett

Cascade Public Media, the Seattle-based PBS affiliate that owns the long-running website Crosscut, is laying off most of its newsroom staff, eliminating 19 local news positions—16 of them filled— just months after finalizing a union contract with newsroom staff.

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Dunlop blamed the layoffs on federal funding cuts in July that slashed $3.5 million of the station’s funding, or about 10 percent of its budget 10 . “While we had prepared for this possibility, it is still a significant blow to our organization and to public media nationwide,” he wrote.

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Last year, according to Cascade’s IRS filing, Dunlop had total compensation of more than $550,000. In all, Cascade’s nine executive staff made a total of more than $2.2 million.

Wilcox said there are no plans to cut compensation for executive-level staff. “We still need to attract and retain talent to support the success of the operation,” he said.

Courtney Scott, executive officer of the newspaper guild, said the union is “deeply disappointed that Cascade PBS is choosing to eliminate its newsroom and lay off of its reporters at a time when we need good, thoughtful journalism more than ever. We do not yet fully understand why this decision was made and we will be meeting in Cascade PBS executives and management in the coming days to discuss the impact on our union members and the reasoning behinds these decisions.”

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(Mendacious puffery from executives while trying to kill the union.)