Nathan Baring

To the editor: The U.S. Senate may soon deal a devastating blow to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), which funds public broadcasting across the country. On July 18, 2025, the Senate window will close to either approve or reject a rescission measure that will claw back $1.1 billion in previously appropriated funds for CPB, eliminating the entirety of its federal funding. The U.S. House has already narrowly passed the measure.

As Alaskans, we are on the front lines of climate and adaptation. Nearly every community across the state has felt its impacts — from salmon declines to disappearing glaciers to the displacement of entire communities. In light of the pressing challenges climate change presents, we were honored to join The Nature Conservancy in Alaska, or TNC, at two recent events in the Alaska Climate Talks series.

By the time we’re in our 50s, the Arctic will see ice-free summers. We may be seeing our kids off to college, settled into our careers, beginning to need reading glasses for the first time. And the climate in which we live will be vastly different than the climate lived in by our parents, grandparents and our ancestors. Climate change isn’t some hypothetical boogeyman to us — it’s our future and, as we see increasingly intense wildfire seasons, ocean acidification, and warming winters, our present.