Originally posted June 3, 2014

Berkeley-The first suspension has happened at Berkeley’s KPFA, with the rogue board majority and their supporters hitting 20-year volunteer news anchor Anthony Fest with a month-long suspension from the Sunday night news program, which he hosts.

The suspension was due to a brief announcement Fest read on the Sunday evening news of the Memorial Day rally. The memo, dated May 29th and written by news co-directors Aileen Alfandary and Mark Mericle, cites a 2002 “news guidelines” document which states: “KPFA News does not abide by a gag rule that would prohibit reporting of newsworthy developments at KPFA or Pacifica. While the KPFA News will keep management informed about its coverage of internal matters, KPFA News will make the decisions concerning such coverage independent of management direction.”

Alfandary and Mericle are members of the CWA bargaining unit at KPFA. It is not clear whether KPFA management was consulted or acquiesced in the month-long banning of Fest.

The temporary restraining order that ended an 8-week national office occupation on May 12th (only to be followed by a broadcast studio takeover a mere two weeks later) was extended into a preliminary injunction on June 3rd, uncontested by Executive Director Summer Reese, who clearly has no plans to re-occupy the company’s headquarters after her unjust and illegitimate dismissal in March.  The cross-complaint, originally filed against the 100+ listener-sponsors who participated in the 8-week sit-in, was limited by the court only to Reese, and will continue through the duration of the PDGG vs Pacifica lawsuit, which next moves to a motion to disqualify the law firm of Siegel and Yee from continuing to represent Pacifica due to numerous conflicts of interest.

Attorney Siegel, who is one of about a dozen candidates for Oakland’s mayor in the November election, and whose law partner Alan Yee continues to serve as campaign treasurer for mayor of Oakland Jean Quan in her re-election campaign, has vocally threatened his former colleagues on the board with dire personal financial consequences if they do not withdraw the request for disqualification. Siegel last threatened his board colleagues in January 2012 during a board closed session in Los Angeles, if they continued to pursue whether Siegel’s stint as Quan’s legal adviser constituted a violation of Pacifica’s prohibition against public officials on the board of directors. Siegel’s work as Quan’s legal adviser included denying public records requests from news outlets like the Oakland Tribune.

The national board next meets on Thursday June 5 at 8:30 EST on the phone, where it will be in session with auditor Armanino McKenna. The first meeting of the new board’s finance committee on May 28th can be heard here and the first meeting of the new board’s audit committee on May 27th here.  Neither meeting provided any financial information.

Private work agreements for IED Duncan and CFO Salavador have been negotiated by board chair Wilkinson without board ratification and as of press date, inquiries by board members to see those signed documents have not been granted. Given the Alameda County Court’s declarations that offer letters and employment contracts not ratified by the full board of directors and signed only by the board’s officers are ipso facto invalid, it is not clear whether either is actually employed by the Pacifica Foundation. The ratification of employment agreements has not appeared on any board meeting agenda to date.

The fund drive numbers used to justify the obliteration of the Morning Mix local AM programming strip at KPFA continue to reveal significant anomolies. While hard data from Northern California continues to be unavailable: new data from LA station KPFK about the last week of the May fund drive point to short-term orchestration. A head-to-head comparison with Margaret Prescod’s Sojourner Truth program which airs from 7am to 8am in LA (the drive time slot directly preceding Uprising) reveals the following numbers:

Sojourner Truth – May 1-18 – 179 pledges totaling $40,182 – average pledge of $224
Sojourner Truth – May 19-23 – 87 pledges totaling $19,935 – average pledge of $229
***
Uprising – May 1-18 – 141 pledges totaling $20,510 – average pledge of $145
Uprising – May 19-23 – 38 pledges totaling $29,557 – average pledge of $778 (a quintupling of the average pledge per donor).

The bizarre numbers suddenly began 3 days before the program change was announced.

The uproar about the replacement of KPFA’s local community morning strip of programming, the Morning Mix, continues to smolder. Three consecutive demonstrations last week drew 100+ protestors to the station’s doors in Berkeley. Hear “The Uprising” broadcast on Memorial Day here for a taste of what the protestors are thinking and saying. Watch a video of the May 31st rally here.  Two petitions have popped up objecting to the changes.  Sign on here and here.  KPFA’s receptionist has reported an overwhelming number of calls to the station’s front desk objecting to the supplanting of the Morning Mix with the Los Angeles-based show and demanding its return to the 8 am slot.  Listeners have also written to Sonali Kolhatkar, the host of the LA show and posted to her blog.

Upcoming public events include Morning Mix visits to Oakland’s First Fridays on June 6th, the Grand Lake Farmer’s Market on June 7th, KPFA’s next local station board meeting on June 14th at the North Berkeley Senior Center (public comment at 11:00am), and a community programming celebration onJune 22nd at Grassroots House 2022 Blake Street in Berkeley. Community forums are expected to follow in Richmond, Oakland and San Francisco later this month.