Don’t let Pacifica national mine OUR listeners with a Fund Drive directly to them over OUR airwaves!
Beware of strategic planning and retreats, AKA brainwashing sessions!
They have taken power at the ‘top’, don’t go for their too expensive Get-rich-quick bright ideas! There’s no free lunch.
They don’t count these until the night of the election, after the networks have called the election. Please vote in person-it’s a one-shot against voter suppression. Trump is in power and is sabotaging the other kinds of votes.
From: Brad Friedman <Brad@BradBlog.com>
To: ‘Clifford Burton’ <nimaste@verizon.net>
Sent: Tue, Aug 18, 2020 3:53 pm
Subject: RE: Mail-in votes
While Pacifica voters overall voted 66% against disbanding the local boards and other de-democratizing measures, KPFA voters voted overwhelmingly in favor of the de-democratizing measures. What does that tell you about the corruption between KPFA and Pacifica National?
While obviously biased, Pacifica Watch has lots of info on Pacifica:
https://pacificaradiowatch.home.blog/2020/08/02/shortly-posts-will-be-made-of-completed-june-july-drafts-not-least-about-a-dish-best-served-cold-pacifica-suing-john-carlo-vernile-former-ed/ 
A good-bye toast with KPFK staff and progs and from Pacifica Radio Archives
movie in KPFK’s parking lot
Excerpt: “…ch a diminution (by-law Article 17, Section 1(B)(3)(v)). Yes, that again. The right affected is that of voting, by making it more difficult to vote on a by-laws amendment brought by just one of the three possible routes, a members’ petition: the threshold has been raised from 1% of members to 5% (so today, from ~435 to ~2 175). How difficult is this? At the last LSB voting round, Aug-Oct2019, a provisional 6 085 voted; given this, it can be said the effective threshold has been raised to something like 35%, a third of typical voters, so beyond the clouds, from 7.1% to 35.7% (435 ÷ 6085, & 2175 ÷ 6085). (The 6 085 is provisional because National Elections Supervisor Renee Penaloza, presumably breaching her contract, still fails to submit her final report!) Silly question I know, but before voting on Th25June did the PNB inform themselves by getting an estimate of the cost of litigation? https://kpftx.org/archives/pnb/pnb200625/pnb200625_6541_minutes.pdf (pages 9-11)
on a matter that no-one would deem trivial, & is indeed a test of morality, why were all the directors silent, even those from KPFA? And what about Margy Wilkinson’s dad, & the forgotten Smith Act?
(A post will not be made on the unsavory attempt to remove PNB Chair Alex Steinberg (WBAI listener-delegate) & PNB Secretary Grace Aaron (KPFK listener-delegate) from their positions, Th2 & 9July. Pacifica boards are nasty. Toxic. The dynamic brings out the worst in people. It’s as if they enjoy their symptom. Here, yet again, the observing ethnographers were able to record a typically sly manoeuvre by Chris ‘Cowardly’ Cory (KPFA listener-delegate). This time it was a sorry-I-couldn’t-get-the-motion-to-you-in-time-for-the-proposed-agenda-as-I-was-still-writing-it (8:56, https://kpftx.org/archives/pnb/pnb200702/pnb200702a.mp3 & https://kpftx.org/archives/pnb/pnb200702/pnb200702_6464_minutes.pdf). There’s a pattern here. His most disingenuous was when he was Chair of the PNB Finance Cttee the day after the WBAI coup, faking amnesia (what-day-is-it?), feigning ignorance, then largely faking empathy, laced with guilt, wrapping his arms around R Paul, WBAI’s treasurer, “I-I-I I can’t express how much grief I have over this-this last-uh few days […] I don’t have words for it […] if it were my place to apologise I would” (0:01, 5:40, 20:37 & 27:46 https://kpftx.org/archives/pnb/finance/191008/finance191008a.mp3, & 1:05:41 https://kpftx.org/archives/pnb/finance/191008/finance191008b.mp3). Self-denigration is a sorry spectacle. And as mom must have told him, no-one likes a liar.)
why are directors choosing to omit a lil detail in their latest reports to their local station board, that the PNB has rejected an offer to buy WBAI’s broadcasting licence? (Note, this was not a proposed signal swap.) …”
https://pacificaradiowatch.home.blog/2020/08/02/shortly-posts-will-be-made-of-completed-june-july-drafts-not-least-about-a-dish-best-served-cold-pacifica-suing-john-carlo-vernile-former-ed/
Excerpt- “On 2Apr2018, Executive Director Tom Livingston committed Pacifica to the biggest debt in its history, signing the $3.7m loan from the Foundation for the Jewish Community, known in the wider world as FJC.
Pacifica was proud of the new form it had pushed its debt into. It issued a press statement, still on the websites of KPFK & WBAI: https://www.kpfk.org/blogs/kpfk-and-pacifica-news/post/pacifica-announces-settlement-with-empire-state-building-and-empire-state-realty-trust/ & https://www.wbai.org/articles.php?article=3570.
So proud, the statement to the world included this from the then PNB Chair, Nancy Sorden (who’s still a director & WPFW listener-delegate): “
One year ago the FJC loan documents were leaked – respect to those responsible
The stations got a windfall when the Bushes were in office, and they did too much hiring. Always happens when Repubs. are in office, and in the ’60s.
But KPFA is in ‘hippie heaven’, and always makes plenty of money. ‘Frisco area is about the most lefty place in the country, one of the most in the world, they support their lefty radio station.
When they have had money problems it’s because overextension and/or mismanagement.
It has had to subsidize the other stations (and Pacifica Radio Archives and National Office) most of its life, except for sometimes KPFK.
KPFT does many things with tech, and spends less on staff. They are wise enough not to program too Lefty in high listening times,, and live within their means mostly.
We need KPFA but they are too willing to spend money as they see fit, because they somewhat subsidize the rest of us.
Why do they do things? Because they can.
KPFA never needs to downsize probably, but KPFK and the others do. The CPB requires 5 full time equivalents at each station.
In programming, stations need a mix of paid staff and volunteers. Some of KPFK’s paid staff well pay for themselves in fundraising, some don’t.
Managers in the past let some paid staff go. IMHO K needs to go back to using some volunteer board-ops and newsies and other tasks.
When I hired on, everyone was a Department Head, with only volunteers for Department workers. We had only 5 full time equivalents. We made $2000 a day, on a good day. Of course that was in 1985, now it would be $4766. We were in the midst of a bad disaster, which showed in the programming.
I lived without a refrigerator, I know how to downsize.
While Pacifica Radio Archives is in KPFK”S building, it should share their expenses. It should fix its website so that it would make money, not drain it off, like WBAI. BAI is in terrible shape. They have bad smug attitude problems.
Pac. should deal with its bad smug and elitist attitudes.
Some shows stay on because they are such a community service, even tho they don’t make much in fundraising, including news. Judge one case at a time.
Put the National Office back in KPFK’s building, have them share the costs, make it harder for KPFA and National to bypass due process to spend network money.When I hired on, National and the archives together had about 5 FTEs. S.
Pacifica. stations: They have to face the facts of our new age of internet on line media and blogs etc., and downsize.
https://pacificaradiowatch.home.blog/2020/06/05/within-the-hour-facebook-inexplicably-deleted-the-post-about-the-pnb-zombies-and-karen/
https://pacificaradiowatch.home.blog/2020/06/05/within-the-hour-facebook-inexplicably-deleted-the-post-about-the-pnb-zombies-and-karen/
How did Brazon get back in charge?
Your station stands for your views, not some faraway centralized government. Give your support money to your local workers whom you know and hear from frequently. Of course you don’t agree with all of them, but the station is always trying to find the best dependable workers with the right skills and information and culture.
S.
” Highlights, the changes in only nine weeks:
There are just no quick and easy fixes for Pacifica radio or stations. All the great ideas are labor and overhead intensive and killer on the staff. Don’t assume that a big change, like changing the by-laws, will be better instead of worse.
If we all just did our jobs well, and elected good local board members (that we knew by social media), and stop putting too much energy into the internal fighting, all would be well ‘in the garden’.
The fight between the more and more Leftyish and the more cultural and more full stream will always be there, as it should be. But all of us left-of-center are part of ‘The Struggle’. And should pull together. (Those nearer the center often pay for the rest of us.)
https://www.laprogressive.com/hostile-takeover-of-pacifica-radio/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=490232e1-f5fb-491d-a1b8-dd99e11e233c
kpftx.org
https://pacificainexile.org/archives/3000
https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2019/09/16/18826331.php
Excerpt: “I ask you to let the 2016 presidential campaign be a cautionary tale. The actions on the Left were unwilling to coalesce when it really mattered. You don’t need me to recite all the consequences of that failure and if the memory of the 2016 campaign doesn’t scare you, nothing will. “
A vote yes is to vote for the so-called elites to dictate to the people, or even sell off the stations. But a big infusion of cash from that would just go right away for their pet projects or into their pockets. These are the folks responsible for the possible loss of KPFA’s building. Disenfranchises the 200+ affiliate stations.
YOUR BALLOT must be received by 11:59 p.m. EST on March 19. If you didn’t get a ballot, or misplaced it, request another ballot
h t t p s : / / r e s c u e p a c i f i c a . n e t
” rescuepacifica.net “
” https://pacificaradiowatch.home.blog/2020/02/17/ed-brazon-spreads-the-calm/ ”
Excerpt: “…Pacifica Foundation, Inc. has engaged two specialty firms helping us with the tax lien for KPFA and the transmitter property as well. Both firms have clearly made this a priority. The law firm helping us with the tax exemption has great expertise in this particular area and the lawyers and [sic] communicated with someone with the authority to grant us some status relief, pending the submission of our exemption application by Friday, February 14. Relief regarding the lien is not guaranteed, but I think we can be cautiously hopeful. KPFA produced the final financial documents needed for both properties on Thursday, February 14 [sic: the 13th].
However, it is also the case that the Organizational Clearance Certificate I sent them which we’ve always used, and which grants the Pacifica Foundation, the property tax exemption status as a non-profit entity, must be reapplied for. It turns out such a Certificate had to be applied for when the name was changed in 2013 and again when we changed it back in early 2015 to Pacifica Foundation, Inc.. That further complicated the application attempted by KPFA during that same period. KPFA already had a reduced tax amount as a result of previous tax exemptions applied for, but the subsequent one was intended to render the properties totally exempt from taxation. The lawyers also believe all of Pacifica’s properties should qualify for full exemption status….”
“…As the situation progresses toward resolution, I will update your PNB directors [sic].
Than [sic] you,
Lydia Brazon
Interim Executive Director
Pacifica Foundation…”
I didn’t know that she was in charge again!
Better read the 31!. They make me sick.
“FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:January 26, 2020
It’s Up To You Now
Berkeley – On January 23, an Alameda County, California courtroom decided to allow 600 members to force their late-submitted anti-democratic bylaws proposal to a referendum vote immediately at the expense of Pacifica’s membership. The January 23 decision pauses the results of the last delegate election, which 6,085 members participated in. It delays the seating of national board reps selected by newly-elected delegates and keeps the outgoing national board unwillingly frozen into place for another seven weeks. Each Pacifica member faces a bill of approximately $1.50 each for what will be the third nationwide election in little more than a year. Ballots are expected to go out in mid-February.
This publication had previously suggested that Pacifica members would be well-advised to simply ignore these bylaws ballots should they receive them. But we are now changing that advice. On further review of this ill-advised proposal, we strongly recommend a loud and decisive “NO” vote. We will talk a bit about why below.
For those who want to climb into the weeds, (and pretty much everyone now has too), Pacifica in Exile has prepared a detailed guide called 31 Things About The New Bylaws Proposal. You can find it here. Please distribute widely.
Below we will highlight a few general points about the Pacifica Restructuring Project proposal that you should keep in mind.
1. The referendum the Court forced despite the lateness of the original proposal is NOT a referendum on the current bylaws, but on this specific proposal. This proposal was drafted in secret by less than a dozen people and never vetted beyond this tiny group before being foisted upon the network. Acceptance would impose a permanently un-elected national board majority. The proponents generally argue on the basis that the current bylaws have problems, which is a position most would agree with. But instead of putting their proposal up for broad discussion as one possible alternative among many, they have short-circuited dialogue and proposed an ultimatum: their way or the highway. These are not the values a community-based membership organization should espouse.
2. The new bylaws proposal installs immediately, 6 particular people, who would compose a permanently un-elected majority on an 11-person board. Those 6 seats would be filled by other national board members into infinity and this group would be free to operate the Foundation more or less as they please, since they have an absolute majority and can establish the board quorum of 6 entirely by themselves. The installed directors require no consent for any board action d by the pro forma member-elected portion of the board (5 seats – 1 from each station signal area). In other words, in this model you get a vote, but it is only symbolic.
The original proposal, which was sent to 47,000 Pacifica members and signed on to by less than a thousand of us, named 6 individuals and 3 alternates. Of those 9 individuals, two have dropped out since the proposal was floated in September. Of the 7 remaining, only 2 have media experience. The most heavily represented constituency is civil rights lawyers, who compose 3 of the remaining 7. 2 are based in the San Francisco Bay Area, 2 in Texas (the smallest Pacifica signal area) and 2 in the Midwest, a region which does not have a Pacifica-owned station. None are located on the Eastern seaboard where Pacifica maintains WBAI-FM in New York and WPFW-FM in Washington DC. None of the 7 people asking you to install them has made a single public comment about what they will do if placed on the board of directors.
3. We encourage you to read the full 31 Things About the New Bylaws article. Here is a quick touch on a few of the salient changes:
* While your vote drops in value from 4 seats on the national board to 1 minority seat, the cost of that vote doubles to $50/yr from the current $25/year.
* There is no residency requirement for a sole elected station representative on the national board.
* Quorum drops to 5% for future changes to the bylaws including station license sales.
* Station unpaid and paid staff are prohibited on the national board. Pacifica affiliated stations no longer have seats for their representatives on the national board.
* While there are nominally 5 member-elected directors (1 from each station), they are not only a permanent minority, they are prohibited from serving as the board chair or board treasurer. Only the self-appointed directors can chair the board or serve as the treasurer.
* Conflict of interest rules for board members are loosened so that any claim that a director has a “personal interest” in a board decision can keep them from voting. This explicitly allows the prevention of directors from voting as happened with the exclusion of WBAI’s representatives from voting on the raid of their station. That action was thrown out by NY’s Supreme Court as “trumped-up” based on the current bylaws. It wouldn’t be in the future.
What Will Happen If These New Bylaws Are Adopted
It doesn’t take a crystal ball. After 7 weeks of bylaws election, then Pacifica will have to have 5 more elections, one at each station, to select a new sole station director. After that is all over, this new board will finally sit down and realize they have a loan principle payment of $3.2 million due in less than a year. The new board will panic, examine their assets, and immediately call yet another election seeking member permission to sell a station license. What else can they possibly do? What we are looking at is just another pathway to the unnecessary break-up of Pacifica. The people’s media assets, which are held in trust by the Pacifica Foundation, deserve better.
We know there are other answers. $1.9 million dollars was given to this organization in one calendar year in 2019 in windfall gifts. Loan obligations can be met, if we want them to be. Bylaws don’t replace the will to survive and putting the public interest first.
Vote to keep your membership rights and vote NO on the break-up bylaws.
If you value being kept up to speed on Pacifica Radio news via this newsletter, you can make a little contribution to keep Pacifica in Exile publishing . Donations are
secure, but not tax-deductible”
That’s the bane of Pacifica’s existence: gaining power by means other than coming up thru experience and the ranks. Then making ill-informed changes, weakening the inner democracy and without due process. Due process and ‘bureaucracy’ are part of what’s necessary for fairness and intelligent change or refinement. ‘The end justifies the means’ is how to make stupid changes. “Don’t get bogged down in Bureaucracy” is a very destructive creedo, by those who want unhampered power and rise to power.
Do you have a radio production worthy of national broadcast?
Feature it on Sprouts: Radio from the Grassroots!
Sprouts: Radio From the Grassroots is a 29-minute weekly program coordinated out of the Pacifica Affiliates office, dedicated to showcasing radio content produced at community radio stations and independent production groups. Sprouts celebrates grassroots voices and is renowned for bringing diverse topics to national and international audiences. It is an open door for grassroots radio producers who wish to easily get widespread attention for a particular production, story, or issue.
Participating producers are provided with Sprouts Production Instructions, including the introduction and closing script and music, as well as assistance, if needed. A variety of topics and styles are acceptable, from mini-documentaries, to cultural themes, to breaking issues of national importance. Radio producers are encouraged to send us local stories that have national relevance and are presented in a way that a national audience can appreciate.
Sprouts is distributed by Pacifica Radio and is free of charge to all radio stations. It is aired regularly by 40-50 radio station in the United States, Canada, and Europe. The program is also aired by many other stations on an irregular basis, depending upon the topic.
Contributing a production to Sprouts is an excellent way to bring a worthwhile production piece to a wider audience and to let people know about great production and reporting in grassroots radio. It is an excellent way to get an important story or issue to a wide audience.
Episodes of Sprouts can be heard below, through the SoundCloud audio widget.
For more information, contact Ursula Ruedenberg / Ursula@pacifica.org / 510-812-7989
PacificaKPFK2014History.com 