takeover of WBAI in New York

The takeover of WBAI in New York: a view from KPFA in California


by Daniel Borgström
October 11, 2019

A few days ago (October 7), people from KPFA took part in a shut down of WBAI 99.5 FM, the Pacifica sister station in New York. This action was done in the name of Pacifica, which owns WBAI as well as KPFA and three other stations, but it was in complete violation of the Pacifica bylaws, and was planned in secret and kept from other board members. The takeover was temporarily halted by a TRO, but the studio was found in disorder, computers and other equipment were missing, though reportedly later recovered. Even pictures were taken from the walls. At a court hearing on October 10th a judge reversed most of the TRO, allowing the intruders to retain control of WBAI's airwaves and play piped in filler music and material from other Pacifica stations, some of which included a KPFA fund drive. So KPFA, a California station, held a fund drive in New York -- for the benefit of KPFA of course. (It will be interesting to see if they harvested anything more than ill will.)

The surprise raid was led by Pacifica's new interim Executive Director, John Vernile, and was assisted by persons from other Pacifica stations. Although people from KPFA do not appear to have been physically at the scene, KPFA's general manager Quincy McCoy was named as "Consulting Programmer of Pacifica Across America," a newly created position.

The idea behind that ham-handed action was supposedly to save the Pacifica network from financial disaster. The financial problems are real, nobody disputes that. None of the five Pacifica stations are doing really well. KPFA has lost a quarter of its membership during the past decade, and it continues to lose listeners; its cash flow shows a $433,000 short fall. Ironically, the only Pacifica station showing signs of improvement is WBAI; its listenership has increased. But whatever WBAI's potential for recovery may have been, it seems pretty well nipped in the bud. And however this turns out, it's going to cost money that Pacifica cannot afford, further dragging the network deeper into the hole.

Even if WBAI could somehow be magically disappeared from the network, a complex host of other problems would remain. Some of these are unique to Pacifica, and some are not. Most non-commercial stations are in trouble these days.

The various reasons seem to be complex. Here in this essay I want to talk about just one particular aspect which I've seen during my 15 years as an observer of KPFA and now a board member. Namely, that KPFA has for many years been living beyond its means. And there's a huge amount of denial about that; it's kind of like trying to tell the CEO of a petroleum company that oil and natural gas need to stay in the ground.

I might call this "Denial in Action." At times it has often looked to me as though this whole insane spending spree were driven by some deliberate force. Can some people really be that incompetent? I often wonder. Well, these are some of my observations going back to 2005. Hopefully this can serve as background to what we're seeing today. I am of course relating my experiences at KPFA, the Pacifica station where I live in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Warnings were sounded at least as far back as in 2005 when several board members expressed concern that there were "too many FTEs." It came up during one of the first board meetings I attended, and I remember asking the person next to me what an FTE was. "A full-time equivalent," I was told, and it was afterwards explained to me that the station was acquiring more paid staff than it could afford in the long run. That was detailed in the Local Station Board's Minority Report of September 17, 2005.

In those days the station was actually doing well financially. But according to several board members, LaVarn Williams, Max Blanchet and Marnie Tattersall (all with solid backgrounds in finance), the cost of so much paid staff was not sustainable. KPFA needed to slow down on the hiring, look ahead, and plan accordingly.

Nevertheless, year after year, the warnings were ignored, dismissed, disregarded. Persons expressing them were disparaged, even yelled at. The unsustainable budgets were promoted by "Save KPFA," the slate of board members who represented the station's power clique.

That group has used several names over the years, first it was "KPFA Forward," later "Concerned Listeners," then "SaveKPFA." (They currently use the name UIR, "United for Independent Radio.")

Although SaveKPFA refused to acknowledge publicly that their hiring policy was not sustainable, they seem to have been anticipating a crisis and were prepared to put the blame on others. An intriguing email from that same month of September 2005 turned up as sort of a one-email Wikileak. It's the email which infamously suggested "dismantling the LSB." An even more foreboding line in that same email read: "How do we make our enemies own the problems that are to come?" The author was Brian Edwards-Tiekert, who appeared to be SaveKPFA's chief strategist.

It wasn't just the bloated budgets at KPFA that caused the eventual crisis. There was also SaveKPFA's unholy alliance with JUC, the New York group which was then running WBAI into the ground, generating another financial drain on the Pacifica network. Interestingly, these two groups, SaveKPFA and JUC, seemed to thoroughly dislike each other. Their alliance appears to have been one of convenience, a mutual non-aggression pact, one of shielding each other from oversight. Mismanagement at both stations bled the network.

Several years passed in this irresponsible fashion until the recession of 2008. It hit Pacifica hard, and the inevitable financial crisis was no longer deniable. Even SaveKPFA's Brian Edwards-Tiekert expressed concern and called for layoffs throughout the network. These very necessary cutbacks were carried out at the rest of Pacifica's five stations, but not at KPFA.

It was always difficult, often impossible, to get accurate, detailed information from the SaveKPFA-dominated management. In 2005, board members LaVarn Williams and Richard Phelps spent over a year fighting SaveKPFA to get access to financial records of the foundation. They won that battle, but the war went on. In 2008 SaveKPFA's Dan Siegel illegally stopped an inspection. The power clique did not willingly allow access to information; board members outside the inner circle continued to be denied it.

For most of the decade up until 2009, the Pacifica National Board (PNB) was dominated by SaveKPFA and its allies, but in that year they were voted out and the new Executive Director and CFO were chosen from the opposition. SaveKPFA then launched a disinformation campaign against the Pacifica Foundation. On August 6, 2009, there was a front page article in the Berkeley Daily Planet accusing Pacifica of improperly taking $100K from KPFA. That news leak came from Brian Edwards-Tiekert, the treasurer. But on investigation it was found that no such "raid" on KPFA's money had occurred. The newspaper printed a retraction, but SaveKPFA continued to spread the story, despite its having been exposed as false. Then LSB chair Conn Hallinan, who certainly must have known better, wrote an email accusing Pacifica of "an old fashioned smash and grab" on KPFA's funds.

That was the beginning of a swiftboating campaign against Pacifica in which the SaveKPFA group worked to conjure up images of 1999, portraying Pacifica as the bad guy, the beast, the oppressor and exploiter of KPFA. It was at that time that the group took the name "SaveKPFA," stealing it from an opposition group of the early 1990s. Members of the original 1993 Save KPFA group were outraged and objected strenuously. But the new "SaveKPFA" continued to use its ill-gotten name.

At the end of 2009 it was discovered that a $375,000 check had been left in a drawer until after it expired. KPFA's then General Manager, Lemlem Rijio, took the fall for that and was fired. But it seems highly unlikely that she was the only one who knew about that "forgotten" check.

"How could anyone forget a six-figure check!" KPFA activists asked. Some suspected the "oversight" was intentional and that SaveKPFA folks were deliberately working to bankrupt Pacifica in order to acquire KPFA. Until then, few had openly expressed such suspicions. But after that "forgotten" check-in-the-drawer incident, many of us concluded that if SaveKPFA were not actually planning some such scenario, then it could only be surmised that they were destroying both KPFA and Pacifica out of sheer stupidity.

That was in 2010. Disaster was averted that year, though not without a huge fight. For now, let's fast-forward to 2015: SaveKPFA and its allies were back in charge of KPFA/Pacifica, again pushing the network towards financial extinction. We discovered that Dan Siegel and another prominent SaveKPFA member, Margy Wilkinson, had secretly created, filed and registered a corporation, complete with articles of incorporation, which they named the "KPFA Foundation." It appears that Siegel and Wilkinson created this clandestine "KPFA Foundation" for the purpose of privately taking over KPFA's radio license and real estate assets upon the dissolution of the Pacifica Foundation. In short, it was a plan to steal KPFA/Pacifica.

Strange things continued. In 2015 General Manager Quincy McCoy canceled the summer's fund drive when KPFA had received two large bequests, enabling the station to skip the drive. It seemed as though the station were suddenly awash in money. However, it turned out that $400,000 of the bequest money was specifically intended for the Pacifica National Office, and was improperly diverted to KPFA by members of SaveKPFA. That wrongful diversion of funds intensified the chaos in a system that was far from robust.

Meanwhile, there's the matter of the station's programming, which traditionally had been staunchly antiwar. However, the station has been moving towards the right, increasingly echoing neoliberal/neocon narratives of "humanitarian" intervention. Several programs have been taken off the air, most famously "Guns and Butter," which was disappeared along with its 17-year archive. "Counterspin," "Discrete Music," and "Twit Wit Radio" have also been taken down and replaced by greatly watered-down fare.

We've been waiting fearfully to see which radical KPFA program would be next on the chopping block. It turns out they were aiming for bigger game -- they went clear across the continent, all the way to New York, and shut down Pacifica sister station WBAI 99.5 FM.

DANIEL BORGSTRÖM
member of KPFA's Local Station Board,

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KPFA's ‘Rescue Pacifica’ candidates stand with WBAI against takeover
October 10, 2019

by Rescue Pacifica rescuepacifica.net

Statement by ‘Rescue Pacifica’ candidates for the KPFA Local Station Board in Support of WBAI

Rescue Pacifica vigorously condemns the shutdown of KPFA’s sister station WBAI in New York City. On Oct. 7, there was an attempt by Pacifica’s interim executive director (iED) to close the station and terminate all WBAI staff.

This surprise attack took place early in the morning in the middle of WBAI’s fall fund drive, as well as the voting period for the Local Station Board elections. It is completely at odds with what democratic, transparent and responsible governance should look like and contrary to Pacifica’s original grassroots mission.

Later that day a New York judge issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) preventing iED John Vernile from dismissing the staff and interfering with the station’s operations, pending a hearing to be held on Oct. 18.

On October 10, the iED and six Pacifica National Board members went to court and won an order to partially “vacate” the TRO, giving control of the station’s airwaves and website back to them. The judge also ruled that they still did not have the authority to summarily fire WBAI’s staff pending the October 18th hearing.

For long-time KPFA supporters, the attack on WBAI should bring back unhappy memories of the 1999 takeover attempt at KPFA. The cast of characters is different this time, but the objective appears to be the same – to replace local community-based hosts with shows piped-in from elsewhere, and perhaps to eventually sell the station’s valuable broadcast frequency.

The attack on WBAI is the latest in a series of recent undemocratic actions to happen recently at the network. A group calling itself “Restructure Pacifica” has been circulating a petition to replace the present bylaws with a system that would eliminate listener-elected Local Station Boards. There is also an attempt underway to remove KPFA board member Tom Voorhees from the Pacifica National Board, despite Tom’s unequaled knowledge of radio.

Rescue Pacifica‘s listener candidates are Tom Voorhees, Marilyn Langlois, Karina Stenquist, Christine Pepin, Mantra Plonsey, and Don Macleay. Our staff candidates are Ann Garrison and Steve Zeltzer.

There will be an emergency WBAI town hall meeting on Sunday, October 13, at the ATRIUM at 60 Wall Street, NYC, starting at 1 p.m.


for more info:

RESCUE PACIFICA rescuepacifica.net

PACIFICA IN EXILE pacificainexile.org



KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington, DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. There are also about 250 affiliate stations.








DISCLAIMER: This is not an official Pacifica Foundation website nor an official website of any of the five Pacifica Radio Stations (KPFA Radio, KPFK Radio, KPFT Radio, WBAI Radio, WPFW Radio). Opinions and facts alleged on this site belong to the author(s) of the website only and should NOT be assumed to be true or to reflect the editorial stance or policy of the Pacifica Foundation, or any of the five Pacifica Radio Stations (KPFA Radio, KPFK Radio, KPFT Radio, WBAI Radio, WPFW Radio), or the opinions of its management, Pacifica National Board, station staff or other listener members.

Daniel's recommendations for

Pacifica in the 1990s

The history we live with

Maria Gilardin began as a volunteer in the KPFA news department in 1982. She was co-founder of the women's department and became KPFA's promotion and development director. In 1993, as the hijacker regime began its seven-year-long takeover, Gilardin was banned by the Pacifica National Board from all Pacifica stations. After losing her voice on KPFA she founded TUC Radio, a weekly national radio program on globalization, local resistance, and Native Nations.

In this account, written 2001, Gilardin mentions a group then known as "Save KPFA." That name was later stolen and appropriated by the very ones who collaborated in the hijacking of the station. Although most of the persons in this article are no longer at Pacifica, a number of them are, and along with some more recent additions, they form the current gatekeeper clique, today's "SaveKPFA." This is the history we are still living with in 2016.



Pacifica in the 1990s

by Maria Gilardin
June 2001

Jeff Blankfort and I were the recipients in the annual San Francisco Bay Guardian "Best Of" awards of 1999. Thus ended - we thought - a several year long period in which the efforts of Save KPFA and Take Back KPFA were belittled by Pacifica managers and certain KPFA staff members as the work of just two people.

The story of the early history of resistance to the long drawn out execution of Pacifica's dream, mission and reality includes the over 200 listeners who met at Berkeley's Ashkenaz to prevent the dismissal of the community programmers on KPFA in January, 1993. That gathering followed a tension-filled meeting, held in the pouring rain, (in what then was the empty office next to the station which later became Pacifica's headquarters). That January night, attended by more than 150 people, staff members, backed by supporters from the community, stepped to the microphone to denounce the regime of then general manager Pat Scott and with that energy, saved the 7-8 pm weekday programs for just another three years, and left Salniker with no choice but to remove Scott from the job. But as we will see later, she would come back with a vengeance Even though the cancellation of Living on Indian time, the women's, labor and Pacific Islander's, gay-lesbian programs and many more was protested by an even larger group of listeners, and this time, by some members of staff, they were not rescinded after the purge of August, 1995. The dismissal of Mama O'Shea and of Bill Mandel, in May of that year, also led to large demonstrations - but to no avail. And some key members of the paid staff sided openly with the management's decisions.

The group of people who early on saw the systematic nature of the shift in Pacifica was always fairly small. In an ironic clash of Pacifica National rhetoric and reality the early opponents of Pacifica were almost all African-Americans.

When Pacifica held its Spring Board meeting in February 1993 at Berkeley's posh Claremont Hotel a huge delegation arrived from KPFK in Los Angeles. One contingent represented the "African Mental Liberation" program that brought African history by African scholars to the air. It had come under attack for alleged anti-semitic remarks. The other group, also African-Americans, included Ron Wilkins, a former National Board member and host of a "Continent to Continent," a program on KPFK that dealt with current African history and politics. They carried banners into the meeting room with slogans such as: "Liberation radio, Yes, Plantation Radio, No!"

At that board meeting representatives from the KPFK contingent, Jeff and I, and WBAI program director Samori Marksman met. The atmosphere was one of defiance. Pat Scott had made herself so unpopular with KPFA staff that it seemed just a matter of time that she would be forced to leave. Samori, as he continued to do until his death, would personally protect WBAI with his negotiating skills, courage and strong personal sense of direction. Even if there had been a method of pulling it off, there seemed no desire or need to come up with a "national" plan of resistance. We wished each other luck and promised to stay in touch. Little did we know that the first purges were to begin only three months later.

One of the things that made me unpopular with the Pacifica National Board (PNB) was my insistence on access to the books. A friend had helped me analyze the annual reports of the previous four years and we found a disturbing trend. Pacifica had begun building an ever expanding central office, using funds from stations to increase the pay of national officers by several thousands of dollars each, while claiming in union negotiations that there was no money to adequately pay station staff.

Legal and consultants' fees were going up. The 990 tax forms showed $145,000 in fund-raising expenses for KPFA that were not explained. What were those expenses for?, I asked in my three minute presentation at the February 1993 board meeting. And why did Pacifica National change their accounting procedure to disguise the rising cost of management?

Unexpectedly the controller, Sandra Rosas, jumped up from her seat at the board table and shouted: "Are you accusing me of fraud?" I had not used the words. So her response seemed an admission. And today, eight years later, we still have not seen the books and she has been in charge all that time.

At the February '93 board meeting I was told that I had to wait until the next board meeting for answers to my question. And so I submitted my list with all the other public comment contributions to the board's chair, Jack O'Dell.

I sensed that something unexpected would occur when I entered the board meeting in Los Angeles in June of 1993 to pick up my answers. I found my questions had been omitted from the minutes of the public comment section. At the board table Pat Scott started whispering to David Salniker. Chairman Jack O'Dell, who had promised both Jeff Blankfort and myself that we would have time to make personal statements (in addition to reading prepared statements from Take Back KPFA, and the staff, respectively) adjourned the meeting before I was allowed to speak on the issue of Pacifica's faulty financials.

My shouted protest was drowned out in the bustle of people leaving the room. Later Pat Scott and Marci Lockwood claimed that I had blocked the door and kicked a board member. Dozens of people knew that that was untrue. A video taken by a former KPFK volunteer was later shown at La Pena . I could be seen standing to the side of the door with an armful of papers pleading with people not to leave.

Three days later I received a letter signed by Jack O'Dell banning me from all Pacifica stations for threatening the board with violence. Five others, including Jeff, Sue Supriano, (a long-time KPFA programmer), and Jeff, were banned from speaking at future meetings of the board. A letter to Chairman Jack O'Dell, requesting a hearing and the due process that Pacifica ostensibly supported, was summarily rejected.

In hindsight that was the beginning of an era of bannings and selective claims of violence with which to discredit the critics and to spin stories for the media or the courts.

As of this writing over 300 people have been banned from the five Pacifica stations and the numbers rising weekly at WBAI. The purges at KPFA in 1995, when more than 60 programmers were fired, many of them community activists, brought out more than 400 angry listeners at two successive meetings at the No. Berkeley Senior Center. With very few exceptions, staff at KPFA did not support the fired unpaid staff. It is no secret that Philip Maldari was among those in favor of the dismissals - he said so on the air.

Subsequently, in a move that turned out to be a serious mistake, KPFA's paid staff voted to leave the United Electrical Workers and join another union, the Communication Workers of America. To the dismay of the UE union members at WBAI they then voted to exclude the unpaid staff from the union contract while WBAI workers fought up to the NLRB to keep union representation for unpaid staff.

Those two actions created a rift between paid and unpaid staff that exists to this day. The paid staff also relinquished the influence that the UE contract provided in terms of the management of the station (managers had to take pay cut before staff would be laid off) and voted for the first time in KPFA labor history to sign a no-strike clause.

All along Take Back KPFA and listeners who were aware of the changes in the union contract tried to influence staff and shop stewards to stay in unity with WBAI and to not abandon the unpaid staff - but again, it was to no avail. In a surreal episode of parallel universes, most of KPFA paid staff made an appearance at the Pacifica National Board meeting in Oakland in June of 1997.

We had a huge picket line outside the hotel, and packed the audience for the public comment session. KPFA staff filed in, wearing new CWA T-shirts, and then filed right out again after Kris Welch said a few words about their contract negotiations. We ran after them and pleaded with them to stay. That session was extremely important, Mary Frances Berry was chosen as Pat Scott's successor. Roberta Brooks claimed that the board had already voted to exclude the LAB [Local Advisory Board] representatives from the National Board. Jeff Blankfort had taped that preceding meeting and was able to prove that she was mistaken, if not lying. It would take Pacifica National two more years to remove the LAB members.

To recount all major events up to today with this level of detail would fill the pages of the Folio. The examples above are simply there to make a point - or two. The most sinister aspect is the intent, planning, and criminal energy expended on this by Pacifica National. The plan to execute Pacifica and the method by which to do it was first outlined in the Strategic Plan of 1992; preparations took at least four years. The Strategic Plan began under David Salniker with Dick Bunce, (a former editor of the Socialist Review!) as the co-author with now departed Gail Christian, continued under Pat Scott to Mary Frances Berry, Lynn Chadwick, Bessie Wash and their numerous helpers.

What is frightening is that The Plan survived a changing cast of characters and was expanded into a Five-Year Plan which was crafted in a series of board meetings that were described as "retreats.". They all operated in the same fashion: centralization of the organization and of money, destruction of programming and of unions, firing and banning of staff, suspension of free speech, use of armed force, and the replacement of listeners.

If all this were reported from a Central American Country, or an African country, we would recognize it immediately for what it is: the wholesale destruction of a society, colonialism, imperialism, or structural adjustment; and we might see a national movement of resistance to these policies and of support of the people of that country. Applied internally we might use some of the same words to define it. The colonizing of the voice of Pacifica. But we do have a more exact term to use: counter-intelligence. If COINTELPRO was used against the American Indian Movement, the Black Panthers, the Anti Apartheid Movement, Earth First - why would we expect Pacifica to be exempt?

The situation reminds me of the story of the burning books told by Bertolt Brecht in exile. Brecht, whose own books went up in flames, wrote about the anguish of a writer whose books were left unburned by the Nazis. "Was I not also telling the truth, did I not show courage in face of suppression?" he has that writer say. "Why do you discredit me by not burning my books?"

Pacifica was certainly challenging power and some voices still do at KPFA and WBAI. It was certainly a deserving target for a COINTELPRO action and remains that today. If not for the present reality of some of the programming, then at least for the dormant potential to really be a voice of the voiceless, as intended by the founders.

All these elements are finally clear to see and recognized by most listeners and even by a large number of programming staff. I'm using the word "even" not because I want to be unkind. The people most acted upon, most targeted, most made collaborators in their own demise are almost always the last to recognize the pattern and its systematic nature.

The listeners however, even without knowing many of the details that the gag rule and the acquiescence to the gag rule by so many staff members for so long concealed from them, became alarmed by the programming and format changes. They also wanted to know where their money went and became furious at the abuse of funds and the prospect that those bent on destroying Pacifica, which includes almost all members of the Pacifica's National "unit" were so handsomely paid for their work.

You may agree with the line of reasoning so far but still not be willing to take the next step. You may say that Pacifica indeed was deserving to be targeted by a COINTELPRO operation but, since the most serious onslaught came while the Democrats held state power, during the Clinton years, it could not have been a government program since Democrats don't do such things.

The flurry of recent efforts to personalize the Pacifica National Board members, to meet with them and talk, is an expression of that mind set. The assumption that they are just misguided persons who will see the light if spoken to reasonably is promoted by many. What is overlooked is that the effort to initiate these meetings is made in most cases by the other side and that they are making any such events into political hay.

After Dan Siegel, the lawyer for the LAB suit, talked KPFK LAB member David Adelson into coming to Washington to meet with John Murdock, and his boss Daly Temchine, Ken Ford, and Bessie Wash; Pacifica National violated a promise to keep this meeting confidential by issuing a press release that hit the Houston Board meeting like a bomb shell, claiming "substantive negotiations" had occurred.

Pacifica's lawyer, John Rappaport, used the meeting in the hearing before the judge to issue a temporary restraining order to keep Pacifica books from being moved from Los Angeles to Washington. He told the judge that substantive negotiations were occurring, and that there was no need to stop the transfer of records. The judge denied the temporary restraining order. The books are now in Washington in the hands of a person hired by Pacifica National. He claims they are in such bad order that he needs to fix them.

Philip Maldari's meeting, in February 2001, with Pat Scott, David Salniker, Roberta Brooks, Jack O'Dell, Ying Lee Kelly, and Judge Jenny Rhine falls into the same category. He called for it without consulting with staff or the LAB. Apparently nobody else participated in it. To this day we are not sure what exactly was discussed because Philip has not reported to anybody except for the bare essentials.

Many KPFA LAB members have resisted even discussing this meeting on the LABs agenda. Vociferous voices came out asserting that Philip has the right to freely assemble and that it would be something like an inquisition to ask him to report to the LAB. The idea was floated that two LAB members should see Philip and talk to him. My name came up as a candidate for that delegation. I resisted it because I do not see the need for a filter. The report should be made directly. The listeners have a right to hear the report as well, directly. How would Philip ever be fairly represented if he was not speaking directly?

My sense of urgency around the issues of those two meetings comes from personal conviction that we are at a very crucial point in the battle with Pacifica. After ten years of skirmishes - most of which we lost - we may see the end of it all - probably even before the end of this year. The lawsuits, especially the listener's suit, have defined the issues in a sharp and clear light: This Pacifica National Board is illegitimate with only three exceptions, and the listeners have standing to demand the return of "their" network. Legally, ethically, and based on Pacifica's mission, the outcome in the courts should be a victory. However we can't be sure of that. In the pro-corporate neo-liberal world Pacifica is a potential danger to the status quo. The suit might set a precedent for other anti corporate suits. The famous, long disused question: "Quo warranto? By what authority?" that is part of the essence of the listeners suit and that was once a rallying concept of the populist movement, may not be allowed into the public discourse again.

So, sadly enough, we need to be prepared not just for victory but for defeat, at least in the courts. Of course that does not have to be the end of it by any means. We can still protect Pacifica. But we need to come up with a common strategy among all five stations and we need to put the question to the staffs at all the stations whether they want to be on the side of Pacifica National or with the communities they are serving. We don't even have to spell out in great detail what serving the community might mean. A few programmers are already doing an excellent job of it. If we manage to have truly open, democratic structures that will work itself out.

The problem in doing this is compounded by the fact that WPFW in Washington DC, which censors Democracy Now on a regular basis, and KPFT in Houston are Pacifica in name and in legal ownership only, having long ago become largely music stations--jazz in DC and Country Western in Texas. And in Los Angeles, General Manager Mark Schubb, backed by Marc Cooper, rules the station like a petty dictator.

The simple question, that seems too hard to answer for many staff members at KPFA and WBAI, is: will they stand up to Pacifica National? Will they refuse to be gagged, will they support their fired colleagues, will they go on strike? Are they willing to defend more than their jobs? Are they willing to defend Pacifica even if it means that they lose their jobs? How many are willing to recognize that all these potential sacrifices are really very small compared to the prospect of finding the SOLD sign pinned to the door one day?

And I guess the argument returns again to the question of how serious all this really is and whether or not there are just a few misguided individuals on the National Board who can be talked into seeing their errors.

Take John Murdock for example. How reasonable he sounded in the interview with Juan Gonzales. Is he the same man who just re-wrote the bylaws, making it possible to sell with ease not just one, but at least two of the stations, pocket a hefty commission for his services and disburse the funds donated by listeners to another organization? This is the blueprint for the "legal" dissolution of Pacifica, the administrative execution, far worse than previous schemes developed by Mary Frances Berry. She simply suggested to sell KPFA or WBAI or both, and buy a string of radio stations in the South. Murdock's position enables the end of Pacifica as an institution.

Far from abandoning the bylaws that elicited an overwhelming amount of thoughtful and spirited negative comments, Murdock, at this very moment, is moving forward with a "process" by which the LABS and station managers are ordered to take part in a discussion. They are made complicit in the re-writing of the most precious asset, the old bylaws of Pacifica, butchered and amended but with the basic premise that Pacifica needs to survive as an institution still intact.

Murdock's process focuses on changes or amendments to his new bylaws. LABs should not become complicit in a process whose outcome is preordained. And, on the topic of complicity, this same Murdock offered to Dan Siegel power sharing of 15 LAB and 15 nationally appointed members in their recent meeting in Washington, (an offer that was refused).

Revisiting for a moment Philip Maldari's meeting. The little we know about it is that the idea of a local management agreement for KPFA came up. KPFA staff who spoke to Philip briefly thought that his intent was to find a way to rescue KPFA from a collapse of the Pacifica system. Since Pat Scott put the deed to the building in Pacifica's name a rental agreement would need to be entered into.

In terms of supervision and control of staff and programming, I was told that Philip wanted to find out if there might be a way of making KPFA independent from Pacifica. The same staff members who gave me this information expressed surprise that Philip appears so divorced from the analysis of and debate over the role of the current Pacifica leadership as well as the role of the very people he is now asking for help, to have taken that step.

First of all any local management agreement is still just another way of destroying Pacifica. To take the strongest station away from the others has the same effect as a sale. It just does not look as brutal. By now the majority of the people organizing to protect "their" station are clear on the concept that Pacifica National is the adversary and that the five-station federation needs to be saved. Secondly the fact that the meeting took place at all confirms that none of the old guard ever went away. After having set in motion the events that now bring Pacifica to the brink of destruction, they are still partners in this game: Roberta Brooks and Ying Lee Kelly represent the tie in to the Democratic party as staff people for Ron Dellums. Brooks initiated the removal of the LAB members from the PNB. Jack O'Dell, once a member of the Communist Party, was dropped by Martin Luther King from his staff after John Kennedy, acting on the advice of J Edgar Hoover, told him to get rid of him. Somewhere along the line he had become acceptable to State Power and presided, in defiance of all term limits, as Chair of the PNB only to resign in 1997 in favor of Mary Frances Berry.

David Salniker groomed Pat Scott, while she served for several years on the Local Advisory Board [LAB], to become his successor when he moved up to become the Pacifica Executive director. He talked the staff into accepting her as manager when she caught herself in contradictions in her interview with staff and listed among her credentials the fact that she had helped dissolve the Berkeley CO-OP. When the KPFA staff finally succeeded in getting rid of her as manager, Salniker created a job for her as a lobbyist in Washington from which he was to later move her into the position of Executive Director when he took over directorship of the Tides Foundation.

Scott herself, probably the most hated manager KPFA has had, disappeared into the Washington circuit for almost a year and created her bonds with the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB). She returned to become the most destructive Pacifica Executive Director ever: In 1994, on the CPB task force, she brought down the heavy hand of the market on all recipients of CPB funding. Purges began at WPFW that same year.

In 1995 she fired KPFK management, and seized control of the books. She hired consultants and retained the services of David Giovannoni who continues to advise to this day, that programming needs to be mainstreamed in order to comply with the funding guidelines she and Lynn Chadwick voted for on the CPB task force.

In 1995 Pat Scott began the successful campaign against the unions at KPFK and KPFA, hiring the American Consulting Group, a national union-busting firm. The WBAI union took a principled stand and escaped. To this day Pacifica is following ACG's advice: The ACG instructs employers to make claims that staff and union members are violent - even if those claims are false, and to threaten or bribe people of color into collaborating with management. These techniques are laid out in their training film.

Also in 1995, Pat Scott finally felt strong enough to request major purges of programmers and whole programming departments at KPFA. She closed all finance committee meeting on the PNB to the public - in direct violation of CPB funding rules, and she issued the famous: "My way or the highway memo" announcing vast changes in management of the foundation, advising LAB members who disagreed to resign.

When Pat Scott had members of the audience removed from Pacifica National Board meetings later that year, an investigator from the CPB's Inspector General's office, Brian McConnville, looked into Pacifica's possible violations of CPB guidelines. 17 days after beginning the investigation, and after Pacifica's lawyer called his boss, McConnville was fired. After failing to get any satisfaction from Chair Jack O'Dell, Take Back KPFA filed a formal complaint with the CPB. Over a year later, on the eve of recommending defunding of Pacifica for numerous violations of federal communications law and CPB regulations, as he told Jeff Blankfort, the Deputy-Inspector General Mike Donavan, was fired as well, and his office would give us no forwarding phone or address. When the next Inspector General finally managed to come out with a critical report even that was whitewashed by the CPB Board that brushed its critical aspects aside and expressed confidence in the job that Pat Scott and Jack O'Dell were doing.

When Scott announced her retirement, CPB President Robert Coonrod, who formerly headed both the Voice of America and Radio Marti, praised Scott for the transformation she had effected in Pacifica. That Scott, who also admitted to having been a member of the Communist Party, had received a commendation from such a source, rekindled suspicions of a COINTELPRO operation.

Add to this the curious fact that the presence of two former members of the US Communist Party at the head of Pacifica, O'Dell as well as Scott, elicited not a word of Red-baiting from Capitol Hill. To borrow a title from A. Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, it seems like a case of "The Dog That Didn't Bark in the Night."

Former PNN news director Dan Coughlin's recent talk at a fundraiser for investigative reporting added a chilling new dimension. He said Lynn Chadwick would call the President of the CPB , Robert Coonrod "Uncle Bob" and she claimed that now that KPFA was in trouble the CPB would shell out some money to see the matter through. The "trouble" of course being the occupation of the station by police and the arrest of staff. Dan was careful to note that he did not know if that money ever came through but in the light of the earlier firings of CPB inspectors it is a story that makes sense in an eerie way.

If after reading this far, you still do not agree with my theory that this really is a government operation, I hope you will at least entertain the thought that the difference of opinion and intent, between listeners and much of the staff on one side, and the PNB and Pacifica National on the other side, could not be larger. Many new people have recently joined the battle for the survival of Pacifica recently and this ought to be our best time ever.

We now have links from station to station; we have eloquent speakers and we have a new, wider appeal to the public-at-large. But with the influx of new people there will invariably be many who were not witnesses to the systematic, long term dismemberment of Pacifica; who think it is just a couple of people gone mad or astray. Those of us who know the history have a responsibility to pass it on.

MARIA GILARDIN
June 2001


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for updates, reports & essays on KPFA/Pacifica,
please visit these websites:

UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO

PACIFICA IN EXILE

ANN GARRISON, A KPFA REPORTER

LORDS & LADIES vs. the PEASANTS at KPFA


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KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network which are located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. There are also about 160 affiliate stations.



Vote for the UCR -- United for Community Radio

Questions from a KPFA member

about
United for Community Radio (UCR)


"I think now is an important time to say why NOT to dissolve Pacifica. I think even neutral folks are wondering about doing it." -- Virginia Browning, United for Community Radio (UCR)


In this essay Virginia responds to an email from a KPFA 94.1 FM listener-member who wonders about the course the station should take: Should KPFA accept underwriting? Should it break off from the Pacifica network?



Issues at KPFA & Pacifica

by Virginia Browning, United for Community Radio


Thank you for your email to UCR. I appreciate your thoughtful questions.

I'm "one of the UCR 9," Virginia Browning, running for the board. I happen to be answering the UCR's email, but the views below are only mine. I'll forward your email to the other candidates.

I started at a community radio station in Salt Lake City when I was young, when it was just beginning. It was very exciting. Opportunities were wide open to have quite radical viewpoints on the air in that somewhat conservative region. I interviewed Norman Solomon for example -- he had written about atomic testing, which was very relevant to Utahns.

In recent years, that station has started accepting underwriting. Like so many community stations across the country, KRCL, while it has a few progressive shows or parts of shows, is mostly music and not as progressive as it once was. Is this related to its now accepting underwriting? I don't know for sure.

If a small station starts to accept a nice steady significant amount of money from one entity, there is such a temptation to do the bidding of that entity in shaping the programming. Sometimes that can be informal, maybe only a comment or two. But there can be a huge temptation to simply cut out something that the donor doesn't like, especially if it seems kind of "marginal" (few people may care).

I know that there are differing points of view within the "United for Community Radio" group about underwriting. A number of us voted on this for a platform point. I didn't vote for this as a platform point, but more of us did than not. I have mixed feelings.

There are good people who think they can control how underwriting is handled. Maybe they can. The fact is, like so many wide-ranging conversations we could be having at KPFA, this one isn't encouraged to be had in a thoughtful, public way. Wouldn't that be great?

There are Pacifica affiliates, community stations across the country, who have presented a plan for Pacifica to be a kind of broker to find good "clean" underwriters and match them with the over 150 stations. I think very good people are behind this plan. However, the most recent version of this plan was but a sketch. It had almost no guidelines to ensure that the underwriting would not influence the viewpoints on the air. The Pacifica National Board voted not to accept this plan until details were developed. I agree with that decision.

I actually am interested to know how other stations handle this, especially ones who think they are doing it successfully. I believe one of the managers at KRCL where I started, is famous now across the country as a strong advocate for truly good, open, accessible, community radio. Last I looked, she just started managing a station in Moab Utah, which I noted DOES accept underwriting. I was going to write to her. I'd love to know more about the guidelines used by the stations to which you refer in your email.

As for breaking KPFA away from Pacifica: I'm not ready to go there. Indeed, Pacifica is in big trouble in many ways. Part of the reason however, is a hypocrisy of some of our local KPFA major players (some who have been on the national board for years) in advocating for draconian cuts at other stations and almost none at KPFA. Some of our opponents in this election at the same time were the ones who voted to saddle the New York station, WBAI, with a crippling contract for transmitting. New York to be sure has its own problems, but only when some allied with UCR were in power did New York finally get rid of some who were fairly actively destroying the station. There are still problems with the New York station, but I think there are other, even drastic, measures that could be taken before the ultimate drastic one of selling the New York license forever. Media is certainly changing -- radio is changing! But the potential for a radical network such as Pacifica could be is fairly unique. Internet? Sure! But who owns that, ultimately? I'm not ready to let go of the potential that Pacifica holds.

Some who want KPFA broken away have proven to me anyway that even if they had access to the millions of dollars they may think they would have with the sale of the New York license, that they would not use it to provide more equitable access to the air at KPFA to movements for change, but would probably hire more of their friends whom they think know radio better than anyone else.

Brian Edwards-Tiekert, for example, is an incredibly talented host and interviewer. Few can match his perhaps "innate" ability. However, I believe he has more radical perspectives on his show than he might otherwise because of movement from a community that he feels compelled to attend to. When the Occupy movement blossomed, he used his little power-spot for a sound-byte at Occupy Oakland of some facilitators saying "ok, now everyone stand up," and re-thinking something "ok everyone sit down." It was a soundbyte that signified nothing. But Brian, like 90-some percent of the national media at that juncture then opined "they sound like they don't know what they want." I attended some Occupy events. Friends who could attended even more. The stand-up/sit-down segment symbolized nothing except an opportunity for media to squelch a blossoming of hope. Many wonderful conversations occurred at Occupy events. Apex Express, a usually excellently-produced show run by volunteers at KPFA (who don't even get invited to regular KPFA staff meetings with Brian and his crew), produced another Occupy show that was a careful, artistic collage of many exciting times in the Occupy days.

Brian, for all his talent, would do well to use most of it to train other people. Otherwise, he and his group will use any excess money to hire paid staff and close out more community, unless pressured to do otherwise.

And the pressure is killing some of us -- it has NOT been easy to stand against these cronies, yet some members of our UCR group are still standing for more radical views than will likely be filtered in at a set pace designed by the other side if they get even more money to do their thing. I don't find this a winning formula for a better world.

Right now if you want to hear an alternative viewpoint about many of the countries in Africa which are being exploited at a terrifying rate, you will not hear them on the regular KPFA weekday news. You may hear them from Ann Garrison on the weekend news (unpaid staff), or by one of the hosts relegated to the 3pm or 3:30 weekday slot, or by Hardknock Radio or Flashpoints or Project Censored. KPFA pays for 2 corporate newswires and uses FSN news, an entity that brags about creating "Video News Releases" (VNRs) -- segments made to look like news but that are actually made by PR firms for corporate propaganda.

The above policy (the breakup of Pacifica) is the policy created by those who will benefit if Pacifica is broken up.

I agree about the fund drives. I know they could be much better. Again, a wide-ranging discussion by those who may have some great ideas could help with this. I'm sorry to bring Brian up so much, but he's a major player in the way it's done now, as you can probably hear because he's on a great deal of the time within each fund drive (and paid to do it).

Thank you for writing!

Again, remember, these are my views only. I'll forward your email to other candidates.

VIRGINIA BROWNING
November 2, 2015


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for updates, reports & essays on KPFA/Pacifica, please visit these websites:

UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO

PACIFICA IN EXILE

ANN GARRISON, A KPFA REPORTER

LORDS & LADIES vs. the PEASANTS at KPFA


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KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network which are located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. The Pacifica network also has about 160 affiliate stations.

United for Community Radio

What we stand for



United for Community Radio (UCR)

Platform for the KPFA Local Station Board (LSB) election-2016


KPFA and Pacifica are irreplaceable, strategic and transformative resources for amplifying the voices of millions who are overlooked, marginalized or silenced by corporate media in the face of police militarization, racism; and housing, health, water, economic, educational, and environmental depredation. We forge a vital radio station and network by balancing often difficult news reports with programming that heals and facilitates human connections.


as UCR members and LSB representatives we work to:

1. Insure Relevant Programming: through a listener and staff based program council with decision making power. Increase community-sourced, local, daily, prime-time programming and podcasts-addressing attacks on immigrants and people of color and discrimination based on race, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, age and disability. Assert a clear anti-war perspective.

2. Decrease pro-corporate perspective: Replace reading of mainstream media newsfeeds with attributed independent news sources including increased Pacifica network program sharing. Counter the influence of corporate political parties' monopoly on opinion.

3. Join the global media revolution:
- - - - Make KPFA radio segments searchable on the internet.
- - - - Provide current audio and video segments, podcasts and livestreaming on the KPFA website and social media resources.

4. Support all staff: Improve access to resources and training for unpaid staff and provide all staff, paid and unpaid, the right to unionize.

5. Responsible finances: Provide a transparent and sustainable budget that aligns spending with actual income: No corporate underwriting or advertising.

6. Strengthen the Pacifica Network: Participate in a network-wide accountability process to financially stabilize and democratize Pacifica and KPFA. We are committed to preserving the 5 stations, the national archives and our relationships with over 200 affiliates worldwide.


Here are the UCR (UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO) candidates. Please vote for all of them. And, for more information, please visit the websites at the bottom of this page.

(Voting begins in August)



Marilla Argüelles — former President of Home Care Workers' Chapter SEIU, Local 616, editor of "Extracts from Pelican Bay," former KPFA Labor Collective member.

T.M. Scruggs — Executive Producer at TheRealNews.com, ethnomusicologist, Professor Emeritus, University of Iowa, volunteer for community radio stations in U.S., Nicaragua and Venezuela.

Kris Stewart — independent journalist and videographer.

Akio Tanaka — Green Party activist, former Local Station Board member.

Ramsés Teón-Nichols — SEIU 1021 Vice-President, current Local Station Board member.

LaTasha Warmsley — playwright and career counselor.

Carol G Wolfley — KPFA Community Advisory Board member, mediator/facilitator, retired Berkeley teacher, member of Berkeley Post Office Defenders, Transition Berkeley. Open Circle and Occupy Oakland.

Tom Voorhees — early-on KPFA volunteer transmitter engineer, 2014 volunteer of the year, National Federation of Community Broadcasters.


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for updates, reports & essays on KPFA/Pacifica,
please visit these websites:

UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO

PACIFICA IN EXILE

ANN GARRISON, A KPFA REPORTER

LORDS & LADIES vs. the PEASANTS at KPFA


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KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network which are located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. There are also about 160 affiliate stations.



Vote for the UCR -- United for Community Radio

SaveKPFA'S scheme to hijack Pacifica

A scheme to hijack Pacifica's broadcast licenses & assets


Documents registered with the California Secretary of State for a private “foundation” called the “KPFA Foundation” seem to be part of a conspiracy by “SaveKPFA” insiders to gain total control of KPFA (under the guise of protecting KPFA) and to “capture” its license in the event of Pacifica’s dissolution. Further, it appears to be an attempt to privatize the Pacifica Foundation for the benefit of a few instead of the many. These documents were recently uncovered by Pacifica's National Board (PNB) Secretary Janet Kobren, a United for Community Radio (UCR) candidate and whistleblower.

Here’s what was revealed:

In September 2013, PNB director, former PNB chair/interim Executive Director (iED) Margy Wilkinson registered the above named shadow corporation with the California Secretary of State at the address of Siegel & Yee, the law firm of former PNB director and current Pacifica legal counsel Dan Siegel. They kept this information hidden from the KPFA listeners, the Local Station Board (LSB) and the Pacifica National Board (PNB) until its discovery only recently.

In addition to usurping Pacifica's trademarked "KPFA" call letters, this shadow corporation also adopted Pacifica’s Articles of Incorporation that includes its Mission Statement. When asked to explain, Siegel and Wilkinson admitted that they created this shadow corporation to acquire the licenses and assets of Pacifica (estimated to be worth more than $100 million) in case Pacifica went bankrupt and/or was taken over by creditors or the government.

The establishment of this covert “KPFA Foundation” raises the question of whether some of the decisions Wilkinson made when overseeing Pacifica‘s finances during her tenure as interim ED contributed to the current disastrous financial state of the Pacifica Foundation and its stations. What might be considered gross ineptitude was so systematic that it appears to be an intentional attempt to bankrupt Pacifica and its stations, in order to gain control of KPFA from Pacifica via the “KPFA Foundation” At the very least, this constitutes a severe conflict of interest and ethical violation by Wilkinson and Siegel.

How does this relate to the KPFA Local Station Board election?

As a KPFA member, you will shortly receive a ballot to elect members to the KPFA LSB. This board not only sets policy for KPFA, it also selects four of its members to sit on Pacifica’s National Board. Right now, the Siegel-Wilkinson “SaveKPFA” faction has a majority of KPFA’s seats on this board. This election can overturn the “Save KPFA” majority of seats on the board and enable the new local and national boards to block their plan to hijack Pacifica's licenses. “Save KPFA's” Brian Edwards-Tiekert’s recent motion to get the KPFA LSB to overstep its powers and ratify the creation of the secret “KPFA Foundation” was stopped by UCR LSB members. But it could still be approved if the LSB majority stays the same in this election.

The United for Community Radio (UCR) candidates are committed to doing everything in their power to block “Save KPFA” from dismantling KPFA and Pacifica and walking away with KPFA’s licenses and assets.

Help Pacifica remain intact. Rescue KPFA. Vote for the UCR 9.


These are the UCR (United for Community Radio) candidates. Please vote for all of them:


Scott Olsen -- Iraq Veterans Against the War board member, ex-Marine, survivor of police raid on Occupy, licensed radio operator.

Janet Kobren -- Incumbent LSB member, Pacifica National Board Director and Secretary, 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla passenger.

Virginia Browning -- current LSB member, Pacifica Governance and Programming Committees; health care researcher, downwinder, longtime KPFA activist.

Don Macleay -- 5 years working for the Sandinistas, 19-year school volunteer, Green Party activist, former union organizer and shop steward Oakland.

T.M. Scruggs -- Executive Producer at TheRealNews.com; ethnomusicologist, Professor Emeritus, University of Iowa; volunteer for community radio stations in U.S., Nicaragua and Venezuela.

Marilla Argüelles -- former President of home care workers' chapter SEIU, Local 616; editor of "Extracts from Pelican Bay," former KPFA Labor Collective member,

Jeremy Miller -- Idris Shelley Foundation program director, S.F. No-Taser Task Force, host of Heterotopia on Mutiny Radio, independent journalist with S.F. Bayview newspaper.

Sharon Adams -- Attorney, past vice-president of National Lawyers Guild, Bay Area; instrumental in protecting undocumented persons from civil ICE detentions in Berkeley jails.

G. Mario Fernandez -- recent SF State political psychology graduate, former Napa Community College Student Body President, former Occupy Oakland volunteer.


UCR also supports Listener candidates Tom Voorhees and Richard Hart:

Tom Voorhees -- early-on KPFA volunteer transmitter engineer; 2014 volunteer of the year, National Federation of Community Broadcasters.

Richard Hart -- former natural foods store owner, Berkeley progressive activist, longtime (Pacifica) WBAI supporter.


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for updates, reports & essays on KPFA/Pacifica, please visit these websites:

UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO

PACIFICA IN EXILE

ANN GARRISON, A KPFA REPORTER

SaveKPFA's GROVER NORQUIST SOLUTION at KPFA

LORDS & LADIES vs. the PEASANTS at KPFA


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KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network which are located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. The Pacifica network also has about 160 affiliate stations.

SaveKPFA‘s statements with UCR rebuttals

Statements & Rebuttals

UCR (United for Community Radio) comments on SaveKPFA‘s statement of principles:



SaveKPFA Statement:
Protect local control. In 2014, SaveKPFA led the effort that put KPFA back under the control of locally-hired management for the first time in 5 years — resulting in the recruitment of a talented General Manager, and a permanent Program Director hired by, and accountable to, KPFA’s elected local board.


UCR Rebuttal:
The Executive Director of Pacifica and sometimes the Pacifica National Board make the final decision on KPFA’s General Manager hires, out of a pool chosen by the Local Station Board. Pacifica is the parent organization of the 5 stations, holds the license and provides oversight. The paid staff, Save KPFA, and its previous incarnations like Concerned Listeners, have driven out most of KPFA’s General Managers for not agreeing with them 100%.



SaveKPFA Statement:
Ensure high-quality, progressive programming?. In 2010, Save KPFA campaigned to reverse Pacifica’s cancellation of KPFA’s most listened-to local program, The Morning Show; in 2012, we supported the launch of UpFront, restoring local programming to KPFA’s morning lineup.


UCR Rebuttal:
In 2010 Pacifica’s Executive Director had to step in because Concerned Listeners / Save KPFA were bankrupting the station by not cutting paid staff hours as all the 5 stations had been ordered to do 2-3 years before. Shortfalls in fundraising made these cuts necessary and obvious. Because most station expenses are fixed, wages are the only significant place to balance the budget. Morning Show staff were low on the seniority list and according to the union contract had to be laid off first. Save KPFA created a huge fuss on the airwaves, in e-mails and in complaints to the National Labor Relations Board. They lied to the listeners that the layoffs were politically motivated and talked hundreds of deceived listeners into hating Pacifica and opposing the layoffs.

When paid staff refused to replace the laid off Morning Show workers, volunteers stepped up to do the programming, creating the Morning Mix, much of it focused on local matters. Recently, the Save KPFA forces displaced these volunteers with their cronies.



SaveKPFA Statement:
Support staff and volunteers. SaveKPFA led the successful fight to reverse Pacifica’s 2011 hiring of the nation’s top union-busting law firm; SaveKPFA members have also raised money to update aging equipment in KPFA’s studios, and established a training fund for volunteer staff in KPFA’s budget.


UCR Rebuttal:
That firm was hired for its expertise dealing with a previous harassment lawsuit, not any labor issue. We run on listener support, not faction-related funding of their favorites. No one faction can claim credit for Fund Drive totals. Save KPFA does not value volunteers and trainees (unless they’re part of their faction), and pushes “professionalism” (paid staff). One of they most celebrated supporters, Larry Bensky, referred to volunteer programmers as “monkeys.” Years ago, this group destroyed union coverage for the unpaid staff by switching to CWA, a union which would not represent unpaid staff. The former union United Electrical Workers (UE) had covered unpaid staff as well for many years. They later attempted to destroy UPSO, the Unpaid Staff Organization, which the volunteer staff organized as a substitute. Most of KPFA’s programs and 70% or more of staff are unpaid volunteers.



SaveKPFA Statement:
Transparency and accountability from Pacifica?. SaveKPFA’s representatives on the Pacifica National Board are part of a new majority that has begun issuing regular financial statements for the first time in nearly three years, dramatically shrunk Pacifica’s deficit (from -$2.8 million in 2013 to a small surplus in the 12 months ending in June 2015), and rationalized (and lowered) the dues that stations like KPFA pay to Pacifica’s national office.


UCR Rebuttal:
This is an egregious lie. Save KPFA has proved incompetent at producing realistic income and expense figures for required yearly budgets and audits required by non-profit corporate law and CPB. Their gross incompetence seems a deliberate attempt to bankrupt KPFA and the Pacifica Network, as part of an attempt to grab the station for themselves. The “3 years” were 3 of their years in the majority on the KPFA board, with their incompetent financial officers and sabotage of the competent ones. Pacifica lost 2 million dollars in Corporation for Public funding because it did not keep up with required record keeping, among other things, and is being investigated by the state Attorney General for similar violations of non-profit requirements, possibly resulting in loss of non-profit status. Our auditors have refused to renew their contract with us KPFA.

Now we have discovered that members of the SaveKPFA faction have secretly set up a shadow corporation, the “KPFA Foundation”, which they say is to “catch” KPFA in case of bankruptcy – which they are seemingly trying to achieve in any way and as fast as possible!

This is why we urgently need you to vote them out now!



SaveKPFA Statement: Experiment with new shows; expand into new platforms. Under SaveKPFA leadership, KPFA budgeted for, and carried out, a re-design of its website that makes it more accessible on mobile devices–which is where more and more radio listeners are turning to get their favorite shows. KPFA has also started using its second signal, KPFB, to pilot 20 hours of programming per week from new, energetic producers.

UCR Rebuttal: The website was vastly neglected for years, under Save KPFA’s watch. Save KPFA disempowered the former democratically representative Program Council, which chose new programming and evaluated all programming. They choose new programs by hiring their cronies. They have spoken out against and even censored local, radical, youth, Black, and investigative programming, while claiming the Local Station Board has no role in in programming (but see the Bylaws, Section 7, Article 3, Item G - below). The new programming at KPFB was created by one staff member and the many apprentices and former apprentices who produce programming there.



SaveKPFA Statement: Reform Pacifica’s Byzantine Governance System. We believe Pacifica’s acrimonious boards have generated many of its problems. SaveKPFA participated in cross-factional dialogue talks this year, and now endorses the Pacifica Unity Pledge, which commits us to participating in a network-wide consensus-building process with the goal of making Pacifica’s governance system simpler, effective, smaller, and calmer.


UCR Rebuttal: The “acrimonious board” meetings are a result of Save KPFA’s blocking of any governance and positive change by the Local Station Boards. Their actions show they believe that boards have no right to govern, only the paid staff, as they have often said. The “acrimony” is the slim minority of United for Community Radio forces fighting to strengthen the station, network, and democratic governance. Democratic governance may be imperfect but it’s our only hope for real community programming and a range of left opinions on the air.

(Note: The Save KPFA faction has maintained that the Local Station Board’s main or even sole function is fund raising – which may be true of corporate boards of directors, but not that of a democratically run Pacifica.)

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Voting period: Oct. 15th - Dec.4th Vote online or by paper ballot

Local Station Board Election 2015

Please vote for all of these UCR (United for Community Radio) candidates:


Scott Olsen -- Iraq Veterans Against the War board member, ex-Marine, survivor of police raid on Occupy, licensed radio operator.

Virginia Browning -- current LSB member, Pacifica Governance and Programming Committees; health care researcher, down-winder, longtime KPFA activist.

Janet Kobren -- Incumbent LSB member, Pacifica National Board Director and Secretary, 2010 Gaza Freedom Flotilla passenger.

T.M. Scruggs -- Executive Producer at TheRealNews.com; ethnomusicologist, Professor Emeritus, University of Iowa; volunteer for community radio stations in U.S., Nicaragua and Venezuela.

Marilla Argüelles -- former President of home care workers' chapter SEIU, Local 616; editor of "Extracts from Pelican Bay," former KPFA Labor Collective member,

Jeremy Miller -- Idris Shelley Foundation program director, S.F. No-Taser Task Force, host of Heterotopia on Mutiny Radio, independent journalist with S.F. Bayview newspaper.

G. Mario Fernandez -- recent SF State political psychology graduate, former Napa Community College Student Body President, former Occupy Oakland volunteer.

Sharon Adams -- Attorney, past vice-president of National Lawyers Guild, Bay Area; instrumental in protecting undocumented persons from civil ICE detentions in Berkeley jails.

Don Macleay -- 5 years working for the Sandinistas, 19-year school volunteer, Green Party activist, former union organizer and shop steward Oakland.


UCR also supports Listener candidates Tom Voorhees and Richard Hart:

Tom Voorhees -- early-on KPFA volunteer transmitter engineer; 2014 volunteer of the year, National Federation of Community Broadcasters.

Richard Hart -- former natural foods store owner, Berkeley progressive activist, longtime (Pacifica) WBAI supporter.


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*** *** ***


for updates, reports & essays on KPFA/Pacifica, please visit these websites:

UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO

PACIFICA IN EXILE

ANN GARRISON, A KPFA REPORTER

LORDS & LADIES vs. the PEASANTS at KPFA


*** *** ***

KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network which are located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. There are also about 160 affiliate stations.

Virginia Browning

This was written ten years ago. While some of it is dated, it is still an interesting biography of Virginia Browning, now (in 2025) a member of KPFA's Local Station Board (LSB).


UCR Candidate for KPFA's governing board, the LSB in 2015

Community activist with a life-long love of radio

Note: fellow candidate Sharon Adams has asked UCR candidates to write something short to give voters a better idea who we are. I think this is a great idea, but must say “I would have made it shorter, but I didn’t have time.” She brilliantly turned my less-whittled draft into this article. I’ll try to improve this when I have time, but here are some elements from my life and experience, mostly concentrating on political parts (some but not all of these, and versus for example my struggling against my “by ear” tendency to learn music theory – over and over and over….”)


by: Virginia Browning

As a teenager, I participated in anti-war marches and groups and actively campaigned for Democratic Party politicians. Later I attended caucus meetings to elect delegates the year Fred Harris ran for president. It was fairly easy to support someone to the left of the lesser evil in those days, because the Republicans were sure to win the state of Utah anyway. Why not vote your conscience? In environmental groups such as The Utah Wilderness Association I worked hard against the building of several massive power plants, and against destruction of much public land in Utah, often successfully. When community radio KRCL, a welcome burst of beauty blooming in Salt Lake City was launched, I got the required license, learned to use the board, mics, and other equipment, and did field and studio recordings, news editing, interviewing, and other broadcasting. I produced a weekly environmental show for a time with interviews and segments from hearings I had recorded.

I joined a few activists and became Volunteer Coordinator in The MX Information Center in opposing the basing of nuclear MX missiles in Utah and Nevada. This became a very successful organization. I met with Downwinders in that group, former conservative Utahns, many of them, who, having been basically bombed and maimed, or as survivors of family members murdered by the U.S. government in the above-ground and underground but leaking nuclear explosions drifting across the state (and country and world), were not quite as willing to allow these nuclear missiles into their midst as the government had counted on their being. I realized that the mountains around Salt Lake City had retained some of the highest levels of pollution from these tests. Members of my own family became ill or died, possibly from exposure they received as children to these high levels of radiation. But the line “we are all downwinders” in this corporate plutocracy organized for profit at the expense of health, is a line I find to be important and true.

I met Utah Phillips when I was 15 and immediately fell madly in love with him. He taught me something of the value of a trusted adult not taking advantage of such a crush, but was always so wonderful with young people in my presence. All his life he was very important to me.

After Fred Harris lost, I quit working for the Democrats but worked for Barry Commoner and whoever came after that, always exercising my right to vote (why not? don’t NOT vote – vote for SOMEONE. In this I disagreed with dear eloquent enchanting Utah Phillips.)

I joined Marxist study groups; I saw up close the discipline of members of leftist parties who joined trade unions in order to have conversations and move things to the left. Unfortunately, too often the Democratic Party ended up moving each of these to the right instead. And some of those dedicated members were treated badly when they failed to go along with every single precept or notion. I saw dedicated activists treated very hurtfully, some who had traveled across the country, changed their lives to create change. I saw that actual democracy is not easy, and that the temptation to grab power is ever-present in all organizations. Difficult as it is though, it is important to persist and try to achieve understanding.

When I moved to Berkeley/Oakland/Berkeley, I became aware of KPFA. I had adored working at radio (and listening to it), and considered applying for a job as there were some openings listed shortly after I moved. But I needed the security of a steady paycheck, and I thought – how can a community station guarantee living wages and benefits for so many paid radio people? KPFA always seemed to be struggling. I had not had the most stable upbringing and needed a sense of stability. Furthermore, I had seen how much good came from volunteer reporters and broadcasters at the radio station in Salt Lake City. The picture of becoming a paid employee requiring a steady paycheck and benefits year after year didn’t fit with my notion of a community radio station free to report on even unpopular subjects. Who would pay if the subject was not quite sexy yet? I had seen how many years it took, for example, for the MX Information Center to grow from a group of 6 or 8 to a mailing list of several thousand. And then it had only one paid employee, and I knew that sustaining more than that would have been very hard.

In Oakland and Berkeley, I have worked on various projects, including as past co-chair and member of STAND — Standing Together for Accountable Neighborhood Development — an alliance of community groups, residents and merchants that formed in response to the surge of high-density condo development proposals for Temescal, Rockridge, and other North Oakland neighborhoods.

While STAND supports new development and recognizes the benefits of sustainable, equitable, and responsible growth, its mission is to provide a voice for the thousands of citizens alarmed by the number, size, density, and impacts of these projects and to hold the City of Oakland accountable in identifying the full range of project impacts. With that group I worked painstakingly reviewing zoning proposed for the city and helping to develop a set of recommendations.

A KPFA-related note here: as with the local Berkeley groups currently working on concerns similar to STAND’s, (and as with honest reports about Africa or Syria for that matter not framed by corporate newswires), the KPFA news reported little to nothing about the many community meetings STAND and other groups held, despite their almost always being of great interest to community members. They were usually well-attended, but through no help from the KPFA news department, access to which remains opaque to most listeners still. UCR, United for Community Radio, is working to improve this type of coverage.

There was a wonderful flowering of hope at the beginning of the Ron Dellums mayorship in Oakland during which hundreds of dedicated citizens participated in task forces on housing, transportation, economics, etc. etc. Creative solutions were developed and presented, and some even used. I was on several of those task forces.

In recent years most of my activism has centered around KPFA radio. In the 90s many listeners became alarmed at what seemed to be a winnowing out of radical voices, and a kind of “progressive” but not too progressive aura. There has continuously been tension between those who literally have no wide-signal megaphone such as KPFA available anywhere else, including many homeless and poor folks, and those who want to sort of titrate in a few radical views at a time but basically appeal to comfortable ex-leftists who now support the rather significant paid staff financially. You can read more about the so-called “Healthy Stations Project” which I and many others credit with having helped to kill much of the radical nature in stations across the country.

I’ll try to write more about this period when I have more time.

In October 2011, my heart was lifted by the activism of Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Oakland. I joined with others in general assemblies and events, and haven’t given up on the idea that an even better version of this can re-emerge. Some of the conversations encouraged in the “G.A.’s” (general assemblies) were very wonderful, very touching. Activists I met then have continued to open public conversations and to work for a better world, including in Oakland’s versions of “Black Lives Matter”.

Before my own candidacy for the KPFA board, I worked hard for fair elections at KPFA (there actually have not been any fair enough yet) and to help set up forums for listeners to know who they would be voting for in the KPFA elections.

While of course I strongly urge you to vote for UCR (United for Community Radio) members only, I feel now that no election alone will likely protect Pacifica. The current situation is so life-threatening to the whole topple-ready network that some from historically opposed factions at KPFA, while retaining importantly different visions, have joined a project to keep parts of the network from being swallowed by the six owners of 90% of U.S. media. I and some from diverse factions network-wide have begun to explore new bylaws and new culture.

There’s more to say, and no time now to say it. But for now I’ll say this: Beware of this platitude that does NOT apply: “the museum of ancient hurts,” which I have heard used by our opposition in this election. It is a distraction from learning from history. As Utah Phillips said – history is still here, it didn’t go anywhere. People often need to process betrayals and damage before moving on. We must start with being honest about who we are historically and what we have stood for, and try to show respect for each other’s history and values, express clear agreements and disagreements which can only become clear when we are open about how we do disagree. Then we may begin to learn how to work together in ways necessary to Pacifica’s survival.

The very name of our opposition in this election is a name I and many others of us used together in the 90s. Now this narrow group has grabbed a good name and confuses listeners into thinking the banner they post on their website is their banner and stands for their values. In fact, many in the original group who carried that banner have and had values diametrically opposite theirs. When someone recommends against learning history, raise a little red flag or two…and do your best to learn some. It may be important.

Thanks for reading this. I know it’s hard to know who to vote for. All you can do is do your best. Pacifica is still a treasure.

VIRGINIA BROWNING
September 2015


Virginia Browning was one of the nine UCR (United for Community Radio) candidates for KPFA's Local Station Board (LSB) in the 2015 election. The UCR candidates in that election were: Scott Olsen, Don Macleay, Marilla Arguelles, T.M. Scruggs, Janet Kobren, Jeremy Miller, G. Mario Fernandez, Sharon Adams, and Virginia Browning. For more on KPFA/Pacifica and the election, please see other articles at this website and also at UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO


KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network which are located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. There are also about 160 affiliate stations.

SaveKPFA's election fraud

Documents of the Cheating in KPFA's Board Elections


The Pacifica radio network, which includes KPFA 94.1 FM, is run by a listener democracy which was instituted after the thwarted "hijacking" of the 1990s. Local Station Boards (LSBs) are elected by listener-members. However, there has been cheating in every election at KPFA by a group now calling itself "SaveKPFA."

The articles below are reports and letters from the KPFA elections of 2007 and 2010.



The 2007 Election

Open Letter from the Committee on Fair Elections Bylaws & Rules Violated in KPFA Board Election of 2007

Dan Siegel at Pacifica Radio: excerpts from the elections report of 2007 by Casey Peters

Responding to Dan Siegel's intervention in the LSB election--letters from Virginia Browning and Steve Gilmartin

When Progressives Cheat --the KPFA election, 2007by Daniel Borgström



The 2010 Election

Pacifica Election Report 2010 by Renée Asteria Peñaloza

Documented violations & abuse of KPFA's air time

Disinformation & abuse of airwaves during the 2010 KPFA board elections by Felipe Messina

Bogus News Broadcasts by the bogus Save KPFA

Transcripts from September 30, 2010 For the Record by Felipe Messina


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for updates, reports & essays on KPFA/Pacifica, please visit these websites:

UNITED FOR COMMUNITY RADIO

PACIFICA IN EXILE

ANN GARRISON, A KPFA REPORTER

LORDS & LADIES vs. the PEASANTS at KPFA


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KPFA 94.1 FM is one of five stations of the Pacifica radio network which are located in major cities across the country. The other stations are WBAI 99.5 in New York, WPFW 89.3 in Washington DC, KPFT 90.1 in Houston, and KPFK 90.7 in Los Angeles. There are also about 160 affiliate stations.