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Pinocchio’s Nose: Carole Travis at KPFA Local Board 2-27

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In this astounding clip from the 2-27 KPFA Local Station Board Meeting, SaveKPFA-affiliated board chair Carole Travis grows her nose by saying the KPFA Foundation shell corporation was set up *because* of complaints filed with the CA Attorney General to “scoop” things up in the event of government intervention. The papers were filed with the CA Secretary of State who stamped them received on September 24, 2013, six months *before* the initial complaint was filed with the CA Attorney General. Travis also says the KPFA Foundation is “dissolved” and then “collapsed”. It’s still listed as an active nonprofit organization with the CA Secretary of State *today*.

KPFA Foundation-Articles

Attorney General Complaint Non-Confidential

https://soundcloud.com/tracy-rosenberg/carole-travis-at-kpfa-loca-station-board

Audio

No More Listener Supported Radio

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In this action-packed snip from the 2-23 Pacifica national finance committee, WPFW’s general manager announces that his station is “on the precipice of major underwriting” and that WPFW has changed its motto from “listener-supported radio” to accommodate support from business organizations.

The upshot of the meeting appears to be a straw man confrontation engineered by the Siegel/Brazon board majority for either Pacifica to accept business underwriting after 67 years of eschewing it, or be driven into bankruptcy court with the assets parceled out to various board members.

In other news, CFO Agarwal says that he and volunteer ED Lydia Brazon have developed proposals in secret for alternate sources of funding besides listener support that have “legal ramifications”.

Agarwal also stated that the 2014 audit (after 17 months) was both “on-track” and “backlogged”, that there was no immediate prospect of CPB funding, and that Pacifica’s monthly income statements are neither reliable nor accurate.

In a funny exchange with nominal board chair Tony Norman, Agarwal complained that Norman’s station WPFW is not transparent with their financial info and refuses to allow him access to their bank account. Norman promised to get right on it if Agarwal would just cc: him the correspondence and Agarwal says that he has been cc:ing Norman all along and Norman is fully apprised.

Pacifica in Exile Newsletters

Fraud Is A Major Concern Of The Auditor

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Berkeley-While Pacifica waits and waits and waits for an audit of the 2014 fiscal year, which ended 17 months ago, new CFO Sam Agarwal informed the national finance committee that “fraud was a major concern of the auditor”, currently Armanino LLP.  In fact, he said it twice in a minute and a half.  Agarwal added that “we don’t know if all the donations have been accounted for” and that “it would be very easy for anyone to open up a bank account and deposit the donations and that would not be recorded in the Pacifica books”. You can hear his comments here. Continue reading Fraud Is A Major Concern Of The Auditor →

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Flip-Flopper

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In the February 9th, Pacifica National Board finance committee meeting, former Pacifica ED and board chair Lydia Brazon is heard insisting that “of course” members of Pacifica boards and committees get to stay on as voting members until they are replaced. The Pacifica National Board had its last two meetings disrupted because the Siegel/Brazon majority stripped voting rights from all the NY station representatives claiming neither the new ones nor the old ones could vote. If only Ms. Brazon had piped up with her statement at the national board meeting where her colleagues didn’t do what “we’ve been doing”. Twice. Continue reading Flip-Flopper →

Pacifica in Exile Newsletters

Who Needs A Vote?

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Berkeley-Mozart did not make an appearance at the second disrupted national board meeting in a week, but while the sounds were less than musical, the outcome was the same: meeting interuptus. Doubling down on their outrageous stripping of all national voting rights from NY station WBAI and the seating of two bogus affiliate directors from non-affiliated stations, the rump majority did not even keep their promise to allow WBAI’s 2015 directors to “participate, but not vote”. They didn’t send WBAI the meeting codes and hung up on them when they called in. In fact they hung up on everybody, including duly elected directors from other stations as KPFT director Bill Crosier stated: “I was repeatedly disconnected from the call. I have not been making any interruptions, but tried several times to raise a point of order and was never recognized, but my call was disconnected several times. This is highly improper. Whoever is controlling the conference call has no right to just disconnect anyone they don’t want to talk, even when making valid points of order”.

Crosier provided a Skype log documenting 5 disconnections. Continue reading Who Needs A Vote? →

Pacifica in Exile Newsletters

Mozart Meeting: Civil Disbedience

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dove

Berkeley–Thursday’s Pacifica National Board meeting turned into a Mozart sonata after the Siegel/Brazon faction insisted on preventing both the 2016 and 2015 directors from WBAI-FM from voting in the meeting. The music, which played for more than 40 minutes on the conference call line, was preceded by numerous objections to the board majority’s actions, which included trying to seat two affiliate directors self-nominated by stations without affiliate agreements to represent the 200 affiliated stations, refusing the seat four directors elected by NY’s delegate assembly on January 26th: staffer Shawn Rhodes and listener reps Bob Young, Alex Steinberg and Frank LeFever and refusing to allow the 2015 directors from WBAI to vote in their stead, leaving the NY station completely disenfranchised. A clip of some of the meeting can be heard here.
Continue reading Mozart Meeting: Civil Disbedience →

Pacifica in Exile Newsletters

Lockdown

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dove

Berkeley-Within days of the seating of the new KPFK local station board after the landslide victory of the Committee to Strengthen KPFK, GM Leslie Radford and roommate Adam Rice suggested to staff members the LA station was in “lockdown” after banning volunteer receptionist (and one of the Committee’s staffer candidates), Allan Coie from the station. Coie, a retired attorney, stated the reasons for his firing were that he gave out the number of the Pacifica National Office to a caller and gave program director Alan Minsky listener complaints that were called in about the substituion of Something’s Happening in the M-Th midnight to 3am hours. Coie said Radford told him the listener complaints were “personal to her”. Rice then fired him and told him he would no longer be admitted on station premises. Continue reading Lockdown →

Audio

The Only Call: Safe Harbor’s “Community Conversation

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Safe Harbor’s attempt at a community conversation went terribly awry when the only caller in the hour-long program, Denise, said the program was getting on her nerves, called the hosts kids in a candy store cursing because they could, and said she would never donate to KPFK again. Continue reading The Only Call: Safe Harbor’s “Community Conversation →

Articles

Petition To Restore Something’s Happening

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On_The_Air

Restore “Something’s Happening” Hours

Hosted by Roy Tuckman

 

We the signatories, are petitioning KPFK’s General Manager Leslie Radford, Interim Program Director Alan Minsky and the Local Station Board to fully restore “Something’s Happening” show hours hosted by Roy Tuckman.

The station has received many complaints and distressing calls and emails from its listeners and subscribers expressing their dissatisfaction about recent cuts to the show.

The show was originally broadcast from midnight to 6:00am Monday nights/Tuesday mornings through Thursday nights/Friday mornings but since January 11th, only from 3-6 am.  The show had the highest share from midnight to 1:00am , which is the percentage of radio listeners who are listening to the station. Roy’s program was the only post-midnight show in the entire 5-station Pacifica Network to raise a significant amount of support during fund drives , which no other Pacifica station has been able to do until this  day.

Roy Tuckman has been working on staff at KPFK for 44 years after volunteering for the previous 10 years. He has been a paid programmer for 39 years. He is a staunch supporter of democratic media at KPFK. The station had no all-night weeknight programmer for the first 18 years of broadcasting until Roy was asked to try out the position in 1977.

Roy’s prize-winning show exemplified the spirit of the Pacifica mission and should be fully restored.

Respectfully,

King Reilly M.D. KPFK listener and subscriber

Please sign the petition here to tell the KPFK GM and IPD to restore Something’s Happening’s show hours.