Minutes for the regular National Finance Committee meeting July 27, 2010.<br />
<br />
Meeting convened by the Secretary at 8:48 PM (ET) a quorum being present,<br />
the Chair being absent and the Secretary being present.<br />
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br />
Attending: Alonzo Brown, Alberto Luera, R. Paul Martin, Simon Pius, Summer<br />
Reece, Tracy Rosenberg, John Wenger, Lavarn Williams, Bruce Wolf.<br />
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Agenda:<br />
<br />
1. CFO Report<br />
<br />
2. John Wenger issues <br />
<br />
A.  Do any other stations have the Assistant GM position?  Ours might be<br />
called Assistant to the GM, but whatever.<br />
<br />
B.  Since I am the new kid on the block, I would love to look at the draft<br />
budgets from the other stations.  I may have them in my email, but I don't<br />
recall any other than Houston's.<br />
<br />
C.  I am particularly interested in News Departments.   LA's has shrunk to<br />
one person.  How many are their in each of the news depts around the<br />
network?<br />
<br />
D.  Arbitron Ratings.  Does each station get them?  I propose to share<br />
ours with the rest of you to enable comparative analysis.  LA needs to<br />
increase listenership, and I would like to know how each of you obtains<br />
most of your listeners, so that we might consider importing your best<br />
practices to LA. <br />
<br />
E.  Our LSB voted last year to increase our Arbitrons to the highest level<br />
of granularity to support analyses.  I believe we pay for, and get, quarter<br />
hour numbers for every hour of the week.  I say "believe" because our<br />
Interim GM has refused to provide them to our LSB when we passed a motion<br />
asking him to provide us with accounts at My.Arbitron.Com so that we can<br />
see all of our data.  How can the NFC help us get our own Arbitrons from<br />
our uncooperative GM?  Arlene, would you please "ask" him to cooperate<br />
with out LSB.  If that fails, would you please order him to work with our<br />
LSB?<br />
<br />
F.  Metrics of Management Fatness?  I would like us to develop metrics of<br />
the Management Fraction of payrolls, station by station, and department by<br />
department.  These would support interstation comparisons, and might prove<br />
illuminating, particularly toward the goal of identifying best practices.<br />
<br />
	G. What is the NFC process for dealing with unbudgeted hires?<br />
<br />
3. Allowing non-LSB members to participate in LSB Finance Committee<br />
executive session meetings<br />
4. Question of whether stations are being double billed for sending<br />
Directors to PNB meetings.<br />
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br />
<br />
The Secretary convened the meeting at 8:48 PM (ET), and noted that the<br />
Chair was absent. The Secretary asked if anyone would act as Chair pro<br />
tem. Alberto Luera volunteered to chair the meeting. There was no<br />
objection and Alberto Luera took the chair at 8:50 PM (ET).<br />
<br />
The Chair pro tem announced that the people from KPFK were not available<br />
at this meeting and that the CFO had suggested that the committee meet<br />
next week to deal with the KPFK budget.<br />
<br />
Motion: (Alberto Luera) "To adopt the agenda." (Passed without objection)<br />
<br />
CFO Report 9:02 PM (ET)<br />
<br />
CFO Lavarn Williams reported that we are now in the fourth quarter of<br />
FY10, and that this was always a time of pressures on cash flow in<br />
Pacifica. She noted that stations were holding shorter on-air fund raisers<br />
in August. She said that KPFK would hold its Fall fund raiser in September<br />
and that the other stations would hold theirs in October. She noted that<br />
WBAI and WPFW had the worst cash flow problems and couldn't meet some<br />
expenses. Each station is devoting some part of a day to raising money for<br />
the Pacifica Radio Archives. She reported that Executive Director Arlene<br />
Engleheart wants a freeze on all hiring, and wants to cut back on<br />
consultants and those providing outside services, and she wants to look at<br />
discretionary funding. Each station needs a reserve. We have to pay past<br />
due major invoices. With WBAI that includes rent. There are serious cash<br />
flow issues, and we need to conserve. We need to think about the mission.<br />
The CFO said that she wanted the committee's buy-in.<br />
<br />
Summer Reece took the chair at 9:11 PM (ET)<br />
<br />
In response to a question the CFO said that WBAI had not yet paid it's<br />
tower rent for July and had not yet paid the rent on its studios for June<br />
and July. She noted that WBAI also owed the National Office for health<br />
benefits and that the station's postal meter had had to be paid on Monday<br />
so that invoices could be sent out. WBAI owes about $130,000 all together.<br />
<br />
The CFO said she'd send the list of payables to the committee.<br />
<br />
The CFO said that the Executive Director would send out a memo about<br />
hires, that General Managers would be hired, but all hires would have to<br />
be approved by the Executive Director.<br />
<br />
The committee discussed the possibility that some hires had been made<br />
despite the hiring freeze.<br />
<br />
The committee discussed stations pitching on each others' air and how KFCF<br />
is credited with pledges.<br />
<br />
John Wenger issues 9:31 PM (ET)<br />
<br />
A.  Do any other stations have the Assistant GM position?  Ours might be<br />
called Assistant to the GM, but whatever.<br />
<br />
The answer was that some stations do, others don't and some have people<br />
doing more than one job and those people might be considered Assistant<br />
General Managers.<br />
<br />
B.  Since I am the new kid on the block, I would love to look at the draft<br />
budgets from the other stations.  I may have them in my email, but I don't<br />
recall any other than Houston's.<br />
<br />
It was pointed out that so far only KPFT and the Pacifica Radio Archives<br />
had submitted draft budgets. Others are being worked on. The CFO said<br />
she'd send out personnel information, and reminded the committee that such<br />
information was confidential.<br />
<br />
C.  I am particularly interested in News Departments.   LA's has shrunk to<br />
one person.  How many are their in each of the news depts around the<br />
network?<br />
<br />
Committee members related what they knew of the News Departments at their<br />
stations. Some issues would have to be discussed in executive session.<br />
<br />
D.  Arbitron Ratings.  Does each station get them?  I propose to share<br />
ours with the rest of you to enable comparative analysis.  LA needs to<br />
increase listenership, and I would like to know how each of you obtains<br />
most of your listeners, so that we might consider importing your best<br />
practices to LA.<br />
<br />
KPFK is paying $21,000 a year for Arbitrons, WBAI is not getting Arbitrons<br />
at all and other stations are getting some. The CFO gets copies of what the<br />
stations get. The Chair said that the PNB should have a policy statement on<br />
this, and she'd like information on what we're paying.<br />
<br />
E.  Our LSB voted last year to increase our Arbitrons to the highest level<br />
of granularity to support analyses.  I believe we pay for, and get, quarter<br />
hour numbers for every hour of the week.  I say "believe" because our<br />
Interim GM has refused to provide them to our LSB when we passed a motion<br />
asking him to provide us with accounts at My.Arbitron.Com so that we can<br />
see all of our data.  How can the NFC help us get our own Arbitrons from<br />
our uncooperative GM?  Arlene, would you please "ask" him to cooperate<br />
with our LSB.  If that fails, would you please order him to work with our<br />
LSB?<br />
<br />
This was discussed briefly, the Chair said that the PNB may need a motion<br />
on this.<br />
<br />
F.  Metrics of Management Fatness?  I would like us to develop metrics of<br />
the Management Fraction of payrolls, station by station, and department by<br />
department.  These would support interstation comparisons, and might prove<br />
illuminating, particularly toward the goal of identifying best practices.<br />
<br />
Committee members told what they knew of their Management numbers, a pie<br />
chart was suggested.<br />
<br />
G. What is the NFC process for dealing with unbudgeted hires?<br />
<br />
Members related what they knew, the CFO said that the Executive Director<br />
would be sending out a memo on this. WBAI and WPFW were discussed briefly.<br />
It was pointed out that some of this information is confidential.<br />
<br />
Allowing non-LSB members to participate in LSB Finance Committee executive<br />
session meetings 10:06 PM (ET)<br />
<br />
R. Paul Martin brought up that the WBAI LSB Finance Committee had passed<br />
the following motion, "The Finance Committee asks the LSB to allow the<br />
Finance Committee members to be able to go into executive session with the<br />
understanding that members will have to sign a confidentiality agreement<br />
and be subject to the same conditions as LSB members." The question of<br />
whether or not this was allowed by Pacifica policy or if it was a good<br />
idea was debated. It was revealed that all of the stations have different<br />
policies regarding the composition of the local Finance Committees, and<br />
one station hadn't had a Finance Committee at all. The confidentiality of<br />
salaries was discussed. It was suggested that this matter needs to be<br />
discussed more and that a motion might be brought to the next meeting.<br />
<br />
Question of whether stations are being double billed for sending Directors<br />
to PNB meetings. 10:36 PM (ET)<br />
<br />
The question was raised if stations were being double billed for their<br />
participation in PNB meetings because they have to budget sending<br />
Directors to the PNB meetings but they already pay central services fees.<br />
The use to which central services fees are put and why the cost of sending<br />
Directors to PNB meetings is separate were explained. A desire to discuss<br />
the matter more in executive session was expressed. It was noted that two<br />
stations aren't making central services payments. The National Office gets<br />
93% of its revenue from central services payments and so far in FY10 it has<br />
gotten $1.4 million in central services and has had to face $1.7 million in<br />
expenses.<br />
<br />
It was noted that Pacifica will have to re-file its 990 forms because some<br />
minor things were missed on the audit, but the numbers remain the same.<br />
<br />
Motion: (Summer Reece) "That the committee meet on August 3, and 24, and<br />
that we schedule an executive session for each meeting." (Passed without<br />
objection)<br />
<br />
Motion: (Lavarn Williams) "To adjourn." (Passed without objection)<br />
<br />
Adjourned 11:09 PM (ET)<br />
<br />
Submitted by R. Paul Martin, Secretary<br />