Pacifica’s tradition of unhampered access to the airwaves has allowed our network to play a uniquely focal role in American media. We have broken pivotal news stories and brought issues and artists to the spotlight that may have been overlooked.
We broadcast via satellite and Internet and have one of the most extensive and important sound archives in the world. With a network of approximately 200 affiliate stations, we are energizing independent community radio through collaboration, interactivity and program exchange throughout the network.
Pacifica Foundation established the concept of community radio in the United States when it created KPFA in 1949 in Berkeley, California. Today, Pacifica owns WBAI in New York City, WPFW in Washington DC, KPFT in Houston Texas, KPFK in Los Angeles, and KPFA in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Pacifica Announces Settlement With Empire State Building and Empire State Realty Trust
“- 04/06/2018
For Immediate Release
Contact: Tom Livingston Tel: (510) 316-9783 Email: ed@pacifica.org
Pacifica Announces Settlement With Empire State Building and Empire State Realty Trust
(New York) – The Pacifica Foundation announced today the settlement on a series of agreements that release WBAI, the organization’s New York radio station, from a court judgment as well as the last two years of its lease at the Empire State Building as of May 31, 2018. The Foundation is also in the final stages of completing an agreement to relocate its transmission facility to a new site nearby. The agreements and move will preserve Pacifica’s service to millions of people in the New York Metro area.
The settlement, announced by the Pacifica National Board, relieves Pacifica of a $1.8 million 2017 judgment for Empire State Realty Trust (the organization that operates the Empire State Building) and against WBAI and Pacifica, additional rent and penalties accrued since the judgment was issued, and any remaining obligations that would have incurred after May 31, 2018.
Funding for the settlement was provided through a loan from the non-profit lender FJC, which includes a reserve amount that frees Pacifica from maki . . . “
“About Pacifica
Started in 1946 by conscientious objector Lew Hill, Pacifica’s storied history includes impounded program tapes for a 1954 on-air discussion of marijuana, broadcasting the Seymour Hersh revelations of the My Lai massacre, bombings by the Ku Klux Klan, going to jail rather than turning over the Patty Hearst tapes to the FBI, and Supreme Court cases. Those cases include the 1984 decision that noncommercial broadcasters have the constitutional right to editorialize, and the Seven Dirty Words ruling following George Carlin’s incendiary performances on WBAI.
The Pacifica Foundation operates noncommercial radio stations in five major metropolitan areas, operates the Pacifica Radio Archives with decades of historical audio, and syndicates content to over 300 affiliate stations. Pacifica invented listener-sponsored radio.
About Public Media Company
Public Media Company is a nonprofit strategic consulting firm that fosters innovative and sustainable local media in communities across the U.S. Over the past 17 years, Public Media Company has worked with more than 300 public media organizations in 49 states, facilitating more than $338 million in public media station acquisitions and impacting 80 million people, or 1-in-5 Americans. Public Media Company worked with a number of public television stations on the spectrum auction and launched and managed the innovative content-sharing and discovery platforms Channel X and VuHaus. The Public Media Venture Group is Public Media Company’s latest entrepreneurial effort that seeks to strengthen local public media stations and the communities they serve.
About FJC
FJC, A Foundation of Philanthropic Funds, is a 501c(3) public charity whose mission is advancing donors’ charitable goals and financial planning through creative and pioneering solutions including its non-profit Agency Loan Fund (ALF). FJC offers the ALF as an investment option to donor advised funds and to qualified tax exempt not-for-profit organizations. ALF loans have helped finance projects for public radio and television stations, the establishment of group homes for the disabled, classes for special needs children, programs at community centers for the aged, adult literacy programs, cultural institutions, and arts programs. “
PacificaKPFK2014History.com 