--- title: TIME100 Philanthropy: Tim Isgitt description: Find out who else is on the TIME100 Most Influential People in Philanthropy 2026 list. canonical: https://time.com/collection/time100-philanthropy/2026/tim-isgitt/ article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2026-05-14T12:02:13.393Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-14T12:02:13.529Z article:section: TIME100 og:title: TIME100 Philanthropy: Tim Isgitt og:description: Find out who else is on the TIME100 Most Influential People in Philanthropy 2026 list og:url: https://time.com/collection/time100-philanthropy/2026/tim-isgitt/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb770ae3b5bf0157/69fe465ec3d20e84884389d8/t100-philanthropy-Tim_Isgitt.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y15.16 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME100 Philanthropy: Tim Isgitt og:type: article twitter:card: summary twitter:title: TIME100 Philanthropy: Tim Isgitt twitter:description: Find out who else is on the TIME100 Most Influential People in Philanthropy 2026 list twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb770ae3b5bf0157/69fe465ec3d20e84884389d8/t100-philanthropy-Tim_Isgitt.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y15.16 --- May 14, 2026 # Tim Isgitt A lifeline for local news by Nandita Raghuram  Courtesy Public Media Company When Congress [slashed](https://www.npr.org/2025/07/18/nx-s1-5469912/npr-congress-rescission-funding-trump) $1.1 billion in public media funding in July 2025, Tim Isgitt, CEO of nonprofit media consultant Public Media Company, had already done the math. Of the 544 local public media stations that received federal dollars, 115 were at risk of closing within one year of losing that money, according to his calculations. These stations—many of which were in rural or underserved areas where there are very few other sources for news—served 43 million Americans. In August 2025, Isgitt helped launch the Public Media Bridge Fund with the goal of raising $100 million to help these at-risk stations survive. While Isgitt had originally pitched the idea to 25 grant makers, support has poured in from about 1,000 different donors, from large institutions such as the Ford and MacArthur foundations down to individuals writing $25 checks. To date, the fund has raised $73 million and awarded [$26 million](https://publicmedia.co/bridge-fund-awards-26-million/). In the time since, [very few stations](https://www.nytimes.com/2026/01/26/business/media/npr-pbs-stations-funding.html) have shuttered. Isgitt acknowledges the fund can provide only a fraction of what the now-shuttered Corporation for Public Broadcasting granted in its nearly 60-year history. That’s why the fund hopes to help stations not just survive in the short-term but figure out a new path to sustainability, though ultimately, he believes public media should be supported by public funding. "High-functioning democracies around the world make an investment of public funding into public media a priority. If we want our public media system to be as extraordinary in the future as it has been in the past, we need—as a society—to renew our commitment to public investment.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-philanthropy/2026/tim-isgitt/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-philanthropy/2026/tim-isgitt/"},"headline":"Tim Isgitt","datePublished":"2026-05-14T12:02:13.393Z","dateModified":"2026-05-14T12:02:13.529Z","description":"","url":"https://time.com/collection/time100-philanthropy/2026/tim-isgitt/","keywords":["list","franchise","Accolades","Magazine","Philanthropy 2026"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb770ae3b5bf0157/69fe465ec3d20e84884389d8/t100-philanthropy-Tim_Isgitt.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y15.16&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Nandita Raghuram"}],"creator":"Nandita Raghuram","articleSection":"TIME100","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltcb770ae3b5bf0157/69fe465ec3d20e84884389d8/t100-philanthropy-Tim_Isgitt.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675%2Coffset-x0.00%2Coffset-y15.16&height=675","width":1200,"height":675}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/time100/","name":"TIME100"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/collection/time100-philanthropy/2026/tim-isgitt/","name":"Tim Isgitt"}}]}] ```