KPFA Pacifica Bylaws Change, programming changes
Twenty years of Revolution and Counterrevolution at Pacifica Radio -- at KPFA in Berkeley, CA., and affecting the Five Station Network
And, will the Pacifica Bylaws Change mean significant Programming changes?
By Daniel Borgström with contributions from Virginia Browning
At KPFA's March 15th Local Station Board (LSB) meeting, the "Protectors"/"New Day" group announced a Bylaws change for KPFA/Pacifica. That's happening now -- a complete restructuring of the network, eliminating local control and oversight by members of KPFA and the other Pacifica stations.
The current Pacifica Bylaws were hashed out in many public sessions and adopted shortly after the 1999 mass demonstrations at KPFA. Those Bylaws provided for Radio democracy at KPFA/Pacifica -- a revolutionary concept, but some considered it revolting. Opponents included some of the station's staff, who had vigorously opposed democracy all along; and almost immediately, they launched a campaign of letters and petitions. "I do think the bylaws are a disaster," wrote one of them during the first board election in 2004.
Can governance by elected board members be a "disaster"? Well, it is often said that democracy is a horrible form of government, but that anything else is worse. And today at Pacifica we are indeed facing something worse -- the counterrevolution -- basically a return to the top down authoritarian system we threw out back in 1999 -- the one we called the "Hijacker Regime."
Why would anybody want such a thing back? Perhaps nobody really liked it, but it had offered careers to programmers willing to go along. If wanting a job is opportunistic than everybody is guilty. Some staff members and acolytes may have sincerely envisioned themselves as revolutionaries who might use their airtime to promote progressive causes.
But while KPFA (and much else in Pacifica) can "honestly" say they don't accept corporate funds, grants and large donations are hard to ignore. Wealthier entities and individuals tend to the right -- you know, the ones with the money, including more "go along" well-connected members of large corporate parties, and possibly compromised union bureaucracies.
There's also the question of access to somewhat risk-averse elected officials.
KPFA in particular, with the largest paid and well-benefited staff of many stations (all in Pacifica by far) finds it hard to give up this income.
Insiders have negotiated this tightrope for years, and some of us even feel Trump would not have been elected had Democratic Party insiders not had such a consolidated line of bull, often parroted even by well-meaning reporters. This is especially the case in the mixed-bag "news" headlines, many from the straight up spoon-fed corporate releases du jour.
Would more oversight (as by an elected board) and honest reporting have meant fewer jobs? Maybe not -- maybe more listener/readers in these times would've stepped up to support Pacifica as they have some online (private, thus less secure) sources where many seeking meaningful explanations of their experience have fled.
In 1995 there had been a mass purge of unpaid community show hosts, often the most radical edge of KPFA's programming. Few were ever brought back to the station even after the events of 1999.
In 1999 staff were glad to unite with the mass of listeners (10,000 in the streets of Berkeley) and throw out the top level managers, but a core group of them became the station's new gatekeepers. And in turn trained and hired their protegees, the folks who run the show there today.
The Old Regime's Legacy at KPFA
by Maria Gilardin
A lot of the programmers found themselves caught in the middle. They'd put much of their lives into something they liked and believed in, while accommodating as best they could to some untenable situations. As one of them put it, when you live in the river, it's wise to stay friends with the crocodile.
Considering the difficulties, it's really a wonder that KPFA does actually have some excellent shows and hosts. Among them are Hard Knock Radio, Economic Update, News & Letters, Project Censored, and Flashpoints, among others. Nevertheless, staff members often walk on tiptoes, and when they don't, they can find themselves in trouble. When KPFA Journalist Frank Sterling (while covering a story) attempted to remove an innocent person from being beaten, Frank himself was beaten and arrested by Antioch police. The "Protector" faction of the LSB refused to publicly support him. Some of them openly sided with the police. BTW that episode ended with Frank winning a large monetary settlement from the police.
Why didn't KPFA defend its journalist?
Framers of the Bylaws had thought the differences could be talked out. The Pacifica Mission Statement says: "to engage in any activity that shall contribute to a lasting understanding between nations and between the individuals of all nations . . . to promote the study of . . . the causes of religious, philosophical and racial antagonisms." The ironic reality is that while the station's power elite often express idealistic thoughts, in practice they've been downright nasty.
In 2005 the station's GM (General Manager) disagreed with the gatekeepers on the scheduling of programs. So the staff launched a campaign of falsely labeling the GM a sex predator. An investigation found the charges baseless, but the damage was done. Although that was about twenty years ago, it has ever since been hard (actually impossible) to find a GM who would not kowtow to the gatekeepers. So as a result the station has had a series of managers who do the bidding of the gatekeepers.
In this atmosphere, where differences may be resolved by ad hominem attacks, it can be difficult to deal with issues and problems that come up. The basic problem at KPFA goes back to where we tossed out the top level managers, but never really gained control of the station. The unsurprising result is dysfunction. Meanwhile the station's gatekeepers and the crew that represents them on the LSB look everywhere else for the source of the dysfunction.
THE SIZE OF BOARDS
A major ongoing criticism of the Pacifica Bylaws has been the size of the boards, the LSBs and PNB. Each LSB has 24 members; the PNB (Pacifica National Board) has 22. The argument states that the very size makes them awkward and dysfunction. Intuitively, that seems to make sense, but does it in reality?
From what I can see, the size of a governing board (or parliament) has little to do with functionality. For example, the U.S. House of Representatives has over 500 members and the Senate has 100. While congresspersons make a lot of noise over some issues, they work very well together on funding the Military Industrial Complex. Although some of what Congress does is unspeakably awful, it must be recognized that it does work harmoniously well in committing atrocious deeds -- despite the size.
The UK and other countries also have large parliaments, most of which manage to function. Ancient Athens had sessions of 10,000 or more citizens. The Roman senate had some 600 members which functioned as a republic of oligarchs for several centuries.
On the other hand, small groups can be totally dysfunctional. Many marriages end in divorce. There are also individuals who cannot even get along with themselves, and end their lives in suicide.
So let me suggest: Size has little to do with a group's ability to function. We need to look elsewhere for solution.
SABOTAGE
Nobody can deny that there's been crisis and huge dysfunction at KPFA/Pacifica. Why? Incompetence was a factor, but an even bigger factor has been sabotage. A faction has been dedicated to making it NOT work. They've gone under several names, "Protectors," "New Day," "Safety Net" . . .
Sabotage. Let me cite a few examples from KPFA's LSB.
The Bylaws require a yearly evaluation of the station's GM (General Manager) by the LSB. However, during the nearly six years I was on the LSB, there was not even one single GM evaluation. That was because the "Protectors" -- the majority faction -- blocked it. In January 2020 a whistleblower revealed that the GM had failed to notice that property taxes on KPFA's studio building had not been paid for six years -- which nearly caused the Alameda County tax office to auction off the building. Was the GM asleep at the wheel? "For six years? That's a long sleep!" the station's listeners were saying. Questions about that could've gone into the GM evaluation. However, the GM was their guy, he was in their pocket, so they protected him. At the LSB meeting of Nov 20, 2021, the "Protectors" passed a resolution canceling the GM evaluation.
The unpaid property taxes was the most famous incident, but not the only one.
There was also the time Federal Marshals seized $305,000 of KPFA's funds. The "Protectors" managed to blame everyone except themselves for that, and even used it in their campaigning for Bylaws change. Actually the loss of that money was the doing of several of their own LSB members and station management.
"How the Seizure of a Radio Station in New York led to the Seizure of $305,000 from KPFA"
Those are just a few of the many, many incidents which go back to the beginning. In almost every case -- and there were things coming up all the time -- the Protectors avoided accountability, and even managed to use it in their campaigning for Bylaws change.
Another example which might go under the heading of "sabotage" is the disrespect that the board majority, the "Protectors," show for board members who may disagree with them on issues. This went to an extreme at the Nov 16, 2024 "trial" in which KPFA's LSB purged two elected members. A transcript of that session , and an article by an LSB member present at that session, shows the "trial" to have been a travesty of injustice. Yet, the persons running that trial are the folks who are likely to be taking over and running Pacifica.
So I would certainly agree that there do need to be some changes at KPFA/Pacifica, but not the kind of changes that would simply hand the network over the very people who've been sabotaging it for the last twenty years.
What kind of change and oversight might help?
THREE QUESTIONS AND SOME GROPING ANSWERS:
1) Why should a "professionally-run" radio station need oversight?
2) Even if it should, what could grubby little know-nothing listeners possibly have to offer?
3) What are some visions for bylaws changes that might actually improve things?
1) For those who don't even listen to "radio:" 1) It is becoming clearer than ever that technocrat-owned private online sources are not secure. Pacifica is the last progressive national network on public airwaves. Of course internet is also the new way, and if the gatekeepers had engaged in dialog instead of voice-snuffing with minority board members' recommendations, this platform development could additionally have occurred long ago.
The particular tightrope-walking to attract more and more large funders -- curtailing, belittling, preventing listener oversight -- has resulted in "news" reports with such little resemblance to many folks' struggles they've fled to online sources. Doubtless large funders are needed, but broader inclusion should mean a more secure safety net.
An in-group of a privileged few by its nature sees others as "less-developed" and somehow "unworthy." Even if they deign to interview a few on the air, that's a far cry from an ongoing conversation about the running of things with a viewpoint firmly at the table other than that of the privileged group.
Dialog both ways, between washed and unwashed can be a huge challenge. Working to meet that challenge is the promise of Pacifica.
2) As many social commentators have said on KPFA's air, those with a boot on their necks often have much clearer motivation than others to develop a vision for how to get it off, even those who don't speak with the smooth flow of the luckier few. It's one thing to interview these folks for brief segments -- quite another to agree to extended dialog to work out the direction of the network. Getting a few managers off a few relatively privileged workers backs is not quite enough.
3) Gatekeepers have never wanted listener oversight and have, over the years, learned very effectively how to belittle the very idea of it and otherwise simply ignore it -- except to flood their well-funded insider political groups with disinformation promoting their views. Again, while many are known as "progressives" their sense of ends-justified-means demonstrates an arrogance and sense of entitlement that is the antithesis of the Pacifica mission. Not enough safeguards were contained in current bylaws to prevent this, though over the years some attempts were made to improve them. One year, a powerful addition required fairer elections - but that provision has been ignored and buried, possibly even lost since then.
We need strong provisions to encourage members to vote, and limits on how much outside private lying can be allowed. This needs further work, but completely giving up and calling all disagreements "infighting" is surely not the answer.
The proposed bylaws provisions calling for at least a small percentage of experts in law and accounting makes sense! This could be instituted through a much more open process involving members -- not through the proposed self-selecting being proposed now.
Daniel Borgström--Former member of KPFA's LSB
Virginia Browning--Member of KPFA's LSB
April 10, 2025
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RELATED ARTICLES
Nov 16, 2024 "trial" in which KPFA's LSB purged two elected members
Transcript of the Nov 16, 2024 LSB session
"How the Seizure of a Radio Station in New York led to the Seizure of $305,000 from KPFA"
KPFA Unpaid Property Tax Bill Hits $486,000; Alameda Tax Collector Schedules Public Auction, January 30, 2020
Three Members of KPFA's LSB Try To Give Pacifica's Assets to California Court.
Why didn't KPFA defend its journalist?
Is KPFA transitioning from Antiwar to Peacewashing?
Ian Masters arrives at KPFA
The Old Regime's Legacy at KPFA
by Maria Gilardin
KPFA's Programming: Criticisms, Thoughts, & Sugg
The Lords & Ladies vs. the Peasants at KPFA/Pacifica
To Be Punished for Protesting at KPFA?
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WEBSITES
RESCUE PACIFICA rescuepacifica.net
PACIFICA IN EXILE pacificainexile.org
Pacifica Fightback for Democracy
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.
