by Ann Garrison

KPFA has only three staff candidates for three staff seats in the upcoming KPFA Local Station Board election: Anthony Fest, Tim Lynch, and Sabrina Jacobs. All three are running because other members of the staff asked them to run and all three are sure to be elected, or, one might more aptly say that they already have been. This is to ask that National Election Supervisor Joy Williams and Local Elections Supervisor Nelsie Bautista make a formal announcement to that effect.

I am asking because, as a KPFA programmer and elected member of the KPFA UPSO Council, I have written to Local Elections Supervisor (LES) Nelsie Bautista and National Elections Supervisor (NES) several times, and spoken to Nelsie on the phone, to try and get confirmation that no money will be wasted sending out ballots and/or organizing and tallying online polls for a KPFA staff election.

Strangely, I can’t even get that.  And, even more strangely, after several e-mail and voice conversations with Nelsie, she wrote back to me to say that National Elections Supervisor Joy Williams had told her that we won’t have to have an election, that we just need to make sure the whole staff votes online.

To that I of course replied, “An election is an election, whether you send out paper ballots or conduct it online.  Either way it’s going to waste money to produce a foregone conclusion.  With all five stations living beyond their means and unpaid bills on every General Manager’s desk, can’t we stop wasting time talking about this and make sure we don’t waste money as well? ”

I also shared this relevant section of California Corporations Code.

5522.  A corporation with 5,000 or more members may provide that, in any election of a director or directors by members of the corporation

. . .  (a. b, c)

   (d) If after the close of nominations the number of people nominated for the board is not more than the number of directors to be elected, the corporation may without further action declare that those nominated and qualified to be elected have been elected.

This is the most recent e-mail response I received from National Elections Supervisor Joy Williams, who says the Pacifica National Board is responsible for wasting this much of our time and possibly Pacifica’s money.

“I gave the board this exact language on this issue. I cannot act on this. The board would have to take action to seat the candidates and not move forward with the election.”

Now why would the Pacifica National Board be determined to make KPFA waste money on a staff election with a foregone conclusion?  Especially considering that the board majority never stops complaining about the cost of Pacifica’s governance structure?  And, after the same board majority has already indefinitely postponed the elections because, they say, the stations can’t afford them?  The only answer I can imagine is that they hope an unnecessary, wasteful staff election won’t make quorum and will therefore be invalidated. And/or that this is just another way of obstructing an election in which they might well lose their national board majority.

I’d rather not entertain either possibility, but after at least a dozen Kafkaesque exchanges, there’s not much choice. Can’t we just see this issue dispensed with posthaste, by an official confirmation that the three KPFA staff candidates will be seated without further time and money wasted on balloting or online polls?