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National Board Meeting Transcripts
June 14, 1998
PACIFICA FOUNDATION BOARD OF DIRECTORS MEETING
Embassy Suites
455 Plaza Drive
Secaucus, New Jersey 07094
June 14, 1998
8:30 a.m.
NEWROCK/DESIMONE
ADLER REPORTING SERVICE
15 Park Row
New York, New York 10038
(212) 267-6868 (212) 267-3343
P R E S E N T :
MARY FRANCES BERRY, Chair
HON. JUNE MAKELA, Treasurer [at large]
ROBERTA BROOKS, Secretary [at large]
PAT SCOTT, Executive Director
DAVID ACOSTA [KPFT]
CHERYL FABIO-BRADFORD [KPFA]
KEN FORD [WPFW]
FRANK MILLSPAUGH [WBAI]
MICHAEL PALMER [KPFT]
ROB ROBINSON [WPFW]
LORETTA ROSS [at large]
DOROTHY NASATIR [KPFK]
RALPH McKNIGHT [KPFK]
WILLIAM LUCY [at large]
SHERRY GENDELMAN [KPFA]
ANDY NORRIS [WBAI]
The Board was in Executive Session to consider matters relating to individual
employees, proprietary information, litigation and other matters requiring the
confidential advice of counsel, privileged or confidential commercial or
financial information, or the purchase of property or services whenever the
premature exposure of such purchase would compromise the business interests of
any such organization.
OPEN SESSION BEGINS
MS. BERRY: We are now beginning the board meeting and the first item is
the seating of members and the minutes. What I would like to do is welcome to
this meeting William Lucy, our new at large member who was elected at the last
meeting. He is from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal
Employees. He has been a great union leader and civil rights leader and
fighter in the cause of human rights and social in this country and who has
gone to jail with me a few times who agreed to come on this board. I want to
tell Bill how grateful I am and ask you to welcome him.
The next item on the agenda is the approval of the minutes of the last meeting.
The minutes of the last meeting are in your book and I believe that the only
mistake I found in the minutes was it did not include the name of June Makela
present at the meeting and you of course were present.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: The minutes failed to reflect my reelection to the
national board although it is reflected in the transcript.
MS. BERRY: And therefore we will make an addition to the minutes. Does
anyone else have any other corrections or additions they would like made to the
minutes of the last meeting? In the absence of that then could I get a motion
to approve the minutes as correct?
BOARD MEMBERS: So moved.
MS. BERRY: A second?
BOARD MEMBERS: Second.
MS. BERRY: It has been moved and seconded and all in favor indicate by
saying aye.
(Chorus of ayes.)
MS. BERRY: Objections?
(No response.)
MS. BERRY: So ordered.
I also want to point out that we need to note the schedule of this board.
October 3rd and 4th in Houston is the next meeting of this board. I visited
all the stations except Houston. So I'm looking forward to visiting the
station.
Also I want to welcome to the meeting Eunice Azzani from Korn Ferry
International who has been engaged to conduct a search for the new executive
director of the organization and, as you know, we have a Search Committee
chaired by Roberta Brooks to whom we are all grateful for taking on this
responsibility and who will be working with Ms. Azzani. She is here to observe
and so that she can familiarize herself more with the culture of Pacifica. So
I'm sure you will help her to do that.
Let me seat the alternates. The alternates who are present are Andy Norris who
is WBAI's alternate representative and Sherry Gendelman, the KPFA alternate
representative, and Ralph McKnight, KPFK alternate representative.
Is that agreed to by the board without objection?
(No response.)
MS. BERRY: So ordered. They are seated as alternates at this board
meeting. The first item is the committee reports. I am going to give the
report of the Executive Committee. After that I'm going to ask Nan Rubin to
speak on behalf of the Council of Chairs. The Executive Committee met and
spent a great deal of time discussing personnel matters of various sorts and
working our way through them. We were reminded at the meeting that we had to,
I'm saying this for the benefit of the staff really, schedule a meeting of the
Technical Committee which we did not do at this time. We do not have the
action items, is that correct, Roberta? There are no action items?
MS. BROOKS: I don't think so.
MS. BERRY: There are no action items. We had a number of discussions but
there are no items the board --
MS. BROOKS: Nothing was relevant. They were issues that had to do with
scheduling and how we were going to order certain things.
MS. BERRY: But we had a long discussion about the way people in this
organization relate to each other and so I want to discuss that briefly here
as my report from the Executive Committee.
There is a distinct lack of civility in some quarters in the operation of
Pacifica. There are people who believe that the most appropriate way to have a
discussion with their colleagues is what I call have in-your-face behavior.
Everybody has a chip. Everybody is looking for a fight. I don't know whether
this has something to do with the history of the organization. I don't really
care what it has to do with. But it will not be tolerated in this
organization.
People who are employees, who are paid employees of the organization who behave
in that way, whether they are managers or staff people will no longer be with
the organization and you will be able to observe their leaving. People who
come to the organization and who engage in that sort of behavior will not last
long in the organization. We will not tolerate people making sexist, racist,
anti-Semitic, homophobic remarks about other people, bigoted remarks, people
who feel that they should curse people and use invective and abusive language
in having discussions with their colleagues. And so, in fact what we will do
is see to it that this does not happen. We are asking that the leadership
from the top of the organization, people on the LABs, staff, all keep this in
mind because this is no way to behave toward folks in the organization.
There have been some incidents that occurred in some of the stations in which
such behavior seems to have been in evidence. We will just not tolerate it.
People should leave their emotions and their emotional lives somewhere where
they deal with them personally. We should not deal with them.
Please, ladies and gentlemen. Would the audience please be in order.
I just wanted to point that out for the benefit of everyone who was involved
with Pacifica.
Now I would like to ask Nan Rubin to come forward. She is the chair of the
Local Advisory Board in New York at WBAI.
MS. RUBIN: Good morning everyone. I also have my comments written if you
want to put them in the record.
The Council of Chairs had a conference call several weeks ago and we discussed
a number of items and I will report that to you here.
There were three major items that we talked about. I'm sure you are all aware
of the fact that there are a number of issues that concern LABs and and we
wanted to make sure were raised to the board.
The first one was the voting status of the staff and the fact that the LAB
policies as they now stand removed voting status for the staff. The Council of
Chairs has already indicated that it is largely opposed to this policy
and continues to oppose this position and wanted to make sure that there was
some ability to have it reconsidered. Both KPFA and WBAI indicated that they
were going to be considering this in their own LABs and have since passed
resolutions.
We were instructed to take this issue to the Governance and Structure
Committee of the board for further discussion which was on the agenda yesterday
and I'm sure that committee will be reporting out on that results, but this is
an issue that is of great concern to the Council of Chairs. You will hear more
about that from the report.
The second issue on the LAB policies was the mandate regarding 50 percent
minority membership and wanting some clarification of this as a goal for the
LABs.
The third issue that we discussed was the LAB policy concerning members of the
LABs speaking out on Pacifica policy and some desire to have on the list of
people. who are responsible to include the LAB chairs in terms of who could be
notified regarding speaking out on Pacifica policy.
This also needed some clarification, a little more discussion about lines of
accountability.
Another issue was the cap on the LAB size. The Council of Chairs had
recommended that there be no cap on the size of the advisory boards. In the
event that an advisory board wanted to increase its diversity or
representation by adding additional members, we felt that if any individual
LAB was prepared to manage a larger body that that was its own decision and
there was no need to set an upper limit on size.
And the last issues relating to the LAB policies was a kind of general sense
that there needed to be some real clarity and cleaning up of the language in
the document, that the tone of the policy document, was one that needed to have
a more positive presentation and also that it really needed to speak to the
relationship between the LABs and the local stations. At the moment the policy
is completely silent on that issue. It really just speaks to the relationship
between the LABs and the governing board and that the LABs do feel it needs to
reflect a more positive approach and fill in those gaps, particularly in
relationship to the stations.
Consequently there was a suggestion that WBAI wanted to initiate review of the
language and to be able to do a revision on it to reflect some of these
positive concerns and also to fill in some of the gaps. We were instructed to
take this issue to the Governance and Structure Committee of the board for
further discussion. It wasn't exactly on the agenda but I think that the
resolution that will be coming from the committee will probably speak to some
of those concerns, not all of them, but some of them.
There were two other things that we discussed. The first issue was a major one
of program review and the fact that everyone had received the draft documents
from the Program Policies and Practices Committee on program review and we had
a fairly good discussion about the implications of what it means to be doing
ascertainment locally and whether these documents would be useful to us in
terms of guiding our discussions about programming. We thought that they were
very useful as guidelines, that some of the stations felt that they were going
to be developing their own methodology and we felt very strongly that these
should be shared with each other so if one station had a success, such as we
reported for KPFT's, their town meeting, that we would want to have that
shared among us so we can use it among ourselves and benefit from the
experiences of other stations and also to be able to report back to the other
stations about our activities. To advance the program review --
MS. BERRY: You need to sum up.
MS. RUBIN: Okay, I have just two more items. The Council of Chairs agreed
that each LAB should be asked to submit an outline of its own schedule and plan
for community ascertainment activities to be submitted to the October board
meeting so that you would know what our plans were and so that we could begin
to be accountable for these activities.
The last thing that came up was the executive director search and the 50th
anniversary campaign and we were told that the LAB chairs would be informed and
receive formal materials about both of these activities and at the moment we
received none of those. So we are hoping to make sure that that obligation and
commitment would be followed up.
MS. BROOKS: What was that?
MS. RUBIN: The executive director search, we were told we would receive
the recruitment materials when they were ready for distribution or
participation and also the 50th anniversary campaign, that we would be
informed appropriately about the developments of the 50th anniversary campaign.

MS. BERRY: Nan, let me just say as far as the search is concerned, my
understanding is the materials are being worked on and materials will be
distributed including job descriptions and everything else when they are ready.
Is that right?
MS. BROOKS: Yes.
MS. BERRY: So they can't be distributed to you because they haven't been
distributed.
MS. RUBIN: I understand that.
MS. BERRY: It will all be public. And the matters you discussed before
that related to governance and structure, there will be a report on all of
them, but all of them will be considered in some way by that committee.
Does anybody else have any questions or any comments on Nan's report? If
not, we thank you very much for it.
The next report is from the Finance Committee. June, please.

MS. MAKELA: We had a very lengthy meeting yesterday. I apologize to the other
committee chairs for running over. I'm always opposed to running over. But we
had very good discussions.
MS. BERRY: Next time we will have your meeting at the end.
MS. MAKELA: Right, and we will move the schedule so that we are less
disruptive. I will try to summarize our various discussions.
We started off with a brief report from Sandra on the current financial
situation. I'm very pleased to report based on the preliminary figures and
Sandra's report that generally the units are doing well. I want to congratulate
the individual unit managers, particularly the local stations, for very
successful fund drives to date and I know what is behind that is a lot of hard
work on the part of the general manager's paid staff and volunteers at the
station. So I want to note that in the record that Pacifica continues to enjoy
successful fund drives around the country.
But I also want to recognize the unit managers for their management of the
budget. I think we are getting better at managing our budgets. So the financial
in fact, are very close to budget and reflect better control at the local
units. The one unit we were concerned about was KPFT which may be facing a
deficit by the end of the fiscal year and Garland felt it wouldn't be too large
and it is being monitored very closely between the local unit and our
controller's office.
We are still working out the bugs in our new, very sophisticated software
system that will allow all of the stations, the units and the national office
to have immediate access to financial information. We are not there yet. We are
guardedly optimistic that we will be there.
We talked a bit, there are some issues raised about national programs, their
cost, the budget of them and a number of items were sent to other committees
regarding the use of national programs in the system and you will have
presumably reports from the other committees. In executive session, we reviewed
our current and possible SCA leases and budget. We will review this again
before the October board meeting when we will finalize the budget.
The committee expressed concerns about the need to replace our transmitter in
our Los Angeles station, KPFK, and that this was not being budgeted for the
upcoming year and that we need to do something about this and called on the
staff both locally and nationally to develop a full proposal for the Finance
Committee as far as the cost for this transmitter and a proposal of how we
might go about paying for it. This is a priority for Pacifica and we will get
this plan before our October finance meeting.
We had a discussion about our CPB funding. We are always wary of the
possibility of losing it and this time we called upon each of the units to
prepare a sort of contingency plan to look at the impact of loss of CPB funding
if and when it might happen and they will prepare plans for the Finance
Committee to display for us what would happen and what their contingency plan
would be locally if they lost that funding.
We went over very preliminarily a national office budget. Both that and the SCA
budget will be revisited even before the October meeting. The committee
received a report from a subcommittee it had formed at the last meeting called
Latent Resources. Some members of the committee with some of the national staff
agreed to look into and explore in more depth any possible resources, and
sources of income that we had not explored to date. It may come as no surprise
to people that we did not discover any hidden, untapped resources of any size.
There were no brilliant new ideas. We looked talked with our national staff a
little more about the whole expansion of KU, the affiliation of other small
radio stations with Pacifica through KU, and the expansion of that is
continuing. We are very hopeful that that will continue to generate income. It
is at least paying for itself and hopefully will pay for a good part of
national programming in the future. As part of that subcommittee report, the
issue of tapping into the archives as an income generating project was also
looked at. It became clear that we did not have the capacity at the moment to
really market the archives and this is something that needs to be looked at
with further investment in the archives and/or with an outside partner.
We reviewed the proposed 1999 budgets. Just to remind people, we do a preview
of a draft budget in June to give feedback to the unit managers as they
finalize their budgets for the next year and bring it back to the board in
October when we will vote on it. So we took no votes on the budget but raised
issues with each of the units. Each of the units presented a plan, a narrative
in relation to their budget as far as how these budgets address their goals for
their strategic plan.
I am very pleased to report, and I think many of the people on the board and in
the audience attended the reception last night at WBAI, the move was
successful. BAI moved on time, on budget and it was very successful we feel
from the Finance Committee point of view as far as not strapping the unit or
Pacifica. We feel that Valerie Van Isler, the general manager of WBAI, did a
yeowoman's job in accomplishing it, both in negotiating with Pat Scott a very
good lease and an arrangement that allowed us to upgrade BAI and then carried
it off. As a national board member I was very impressed with the space, very
impressed that our staff pulled it off and very pleased that our programmers
will have this wonderful space in which to work.
We had a discussion about the archives. We are very concerned this year. The
sales have dropped off in the tapes of the archives. We are not completely
clear why. There has been some drop off in "Democracy Now!", now sales. Gail
Christian is looking at this, but what she brought to our attention, and it is
an ongoing, sometimes frustrating discussion for the Finance Committee, the
archives really needs an investment just to be maintained as a valuable
resource that it is and yet there is never enough money let alone to develop it
as an income generating project. So we called on the staff to come back to the
Finance Committee with a fuller plan so that we can discuss the whole picture
of the archives. But we noted there is an immediate need for investment just to
maintain the tapes. We will be hiring new auditors for Pacifica this summer
with the help of David Acosta on our board who is interviewing some candidates.
We will have a decision shortly.
The last thing we had asked for and were not able to get three to five-year
projected budgets. We are still working out the bugs with the new software. We
are hopeful that by October the units will be able to project some figures
beyond the coming fiscal year and we are looking to review and meet with the
unit managers to talk over the three to five-year projections for Pacifica.
MS. BERRY: Thank you. I just wanted to say too so far as WBAI is concerned we
here at Pacifica are very pleased at the reception we received and we also want
to thank not just Valerie and the people at WBAI and the staff for the move,
but the contributors and the listeners of WBAI who made contributions without
whom none of it could have happened. So I think that they deserve great credit
for their support of their station in this regard which is very strong indeed
and we hope continues to be strong.
On the Finance Committee report, could I, before I entertain questions, ask for
a motion to accept and approve the Finance Committee report?
BOARD MEMBERS: So moved.
MS. BERRY: Could I get a second?
BOARD MEMBERS: Second.
MS. BERRY: Now, are there any questions or discussion of any matters? Most of
you were in the Finance Committee or you came into the meetings. Does anyone
else have anything else they want to say?
MS. GENDELMAN: I want to know what the date was in terms of a response from the
staff about the archives, for the archival material?
MS. MAKELA: October I think. I may not have even specified.
MS. GENDELMAN: Does anybody else remember?
MS. BERRY: In advance, we will know by the October meeting.
MS. MAKELA: I think all of our requests like the transmitter plan, et cetera,
would be before the October meeting.
MS. GENDELMAN: There was so much information that was quite critical.
MS. MAKELA: I mean, they have the budget now to do basic maintenance but to
come to us before October so we can make a decision in October.
MS. BERRY: Could I then get a vote, all in favor of approving the Finance
Committee report indicate by saying aye.
(Chorus of ayes.)
MS. BERRY: Opposed?
(No response.)
MS. BERRY: So ordered.
On the 50th Anniversary report, Michael Palmer has agreed to serve and we are
very glad and if there is no objection from the board we will accept his offer,
actually he didn't offer, I asked him to. Is there any objection to the vote by
the board to the idea of Michael serving as interim chair of the 50th
Anniversary Committee instead of Roberta who is chairing the Search Committee
while she is chairing it? Do I hear objections?
Hearing none, thank you very, very much, Michael. Please proceed with your
report.
MR. PALMER: I will try to do my best in lieu of Roberta. The 50th anniversary
campaign was discussed initially I think at the last meeting in Los Angeles and
there are obvious reasons to do it. There was a plan outlined and there was
quite a bit of discussion. There was actually money set aside for the campaign.
Cheryl Garner-Shaw has stepped in for Dick Bunce who has resigned and wisely
decided to look at what had been done and give her own assessment of the
initial proposal for the campaign and her recommendations for the rest on what
should be done.
She has spent some time since she has joined Pacifica looking at the initial
proposal and its goals and the methods that it was going to implement to get
the work done. Basically to use her description, normally when you do a
campaign you figure out the amount of money you can generate.
VOICE FROM THE AUDIENCE: Excuse me, I can't hear.
MS. BERRY: Michael, could you sit on the corner and speak so the audience can
hear you.
MR. PALMER: So then basically we were going about it backwards basically. So
she has come in with a valuation and some suggestions. The valuation of the
campaign had to do with looking at the local unit's ability to conduct a
capital campaign and the local units have minimum staff in the development
departments, an average of three employees and the focus is mainly on the day-
to-day operations of the stations. All of the activities centered around
fundraising and interacting with the listeners. There was concern about a
national campaign having an impact on the local's ability to continue to raise
the money that they have to support the station's day-to-day activities. There
was an awful lot of detail that she gave but it was very methodically done and
easily spelled out and understandable.
She has presented some additional recommendations that involve the use of some
of the money that was previously allocated and those activities would include
doing research in the local markets as to the donor bases, the abilities to
handle special events, clarifying the goal of the 50th campaign and
coordinating the national level of effort as well as the local level of effort
so there is not only no overlap but you don't miss any of the obvious
individuals or entities that you could address to perhaps contribute to
Pacifica.
She is submitting and we discussed, a budget to initiate a campaign that
includes the hiring of some people to do the local research and somebody to get
an idea in the coming months about our ability to conduct a campaign and actual
economic targets. Briefly, this would include all five stations doing donor
prospect research. It would include two feasibility studies, one at KPFT and
the other as I remember at, Cheryl, correct me if I am wrong, at KPFK, then
some other major donor workshop within the local units.
Again, hiring the development planner and then the allocation of Joe Wilson's
time to assist in the major giving. Basically she has said that the original
targets were overly ambitious and they weren't really that well researched from
the economic target as well as the ability of the staff to carry out. She has
come back with a more realistic approach to doing the 50th campaign. The 50th
campaign committee yesterday approved the allocation of some monies totaling
roughly $128,000 to initiate all of this and to do the initial work to get it
going and we as a committee agreed to that unanimously yesterday and we gave
her our full support of it.
MS. BERRY: We first need a motion to accept and approve the report of the 50th
Anniversary Committee.
BOARD MEMBERS: So moved.
MS. BERRY: Could I get a second?
BOARD MEMBERS: Second.
MS. BERRY: Does anyone have any questions or would you like any further
discussion on this report? Hearing none, I call for a vote. All in favor
indicate by saying aye.
(Chorus of ayes.)
MS. BERRY: Opposed?
(No response.)
MS. BERRY: So ordered. Thank you very much, Michael, for your report.
The next report is the Standards and Practices Committee. Frank, would you
please proceed.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Thank you. The committee had a rather truncated meeting
yesterday afternoon since everything was running hours over and we were under
pressure to give the availability to the next committee. But we did cover
several items. We heard status reports from the stations on the progress of
their ascertainment projects. Naturally the stations are proceeding at
different rates. Some have gotten earlier starts than others and in one
instance, the instance of Los Angeles, there will be a delay in their beginning
the process while they are adding members and restructuring their local
advisory board.
As mentioned earlier by Nan Rubin, each of the stations has been asked to
provide a schedule of activities to be reported on at the October meeting and
other descriptions of what they have been able to achieve thus far. We had
brief reference to the AUDIOGRAPHIC material that is contained in the board
booklet. People felt that it showed some tentatively positive trends and we had
then some lengthy discussion related to the Financial Committee's discussion on
the use of premiums. But whereas the Finance Committee concentrates upon the
cost of those premiums, our concentration was upon their appropriateness and
how they represented the Pacifica stations to the audience.
Rob Robinson and Cheryl Fabio-Bradford offered to work in conjunction with Lynn
Chadwick to help with a proposal for funding for some of the activities related
to the ascertainment project. As our final item we introduced into the
committee a letter from a former member of the national board, a doctor in
academics, who has criticized some of the alternative health programming which
reflects criticism we have seen in Current newspaper in terms of how claims are
to be validated and other issues which require attention and some kind of
statement from the Board.
The fifth item on the agenda, which we did not get to, was a discussion which
had been initiated by staff, that we review the efficacy and enforceability of
what is called the must carry rule. We regrettably were not able to enter that
fray yesterday because of the limitations of time. I'm sure we will have
occasion in the future to revisit this fascinating subject.
I would welcome the other members of the committee to add or elucidate or
expand on my report.
MS. BERRY: Does any othermember of the committee care to add comments to
Frank's comments? Hearing none, we will first have a motion to approve the
minutes of discussion. Motion to approve the Standards and Practices report.
BOARD MEMBERS: So moved.
MS. BERRY: Second?
BOARD MEMBERS: Second.
MS. BERRY: Discussion? Yes, Roberta.
MS. BROOKS: I have two questions. One on the issue about the premiums. Did you
reach any conclusions?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: No, we did not.
MS. BROOKS: What is the next step?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: The next step is we are going to E-mail and phone one another
with our thoughts on this subject and try to get something more structured for
discussion at the next meeting. In the meantime, my understanding is that the
staff has put together some information for the Finance Committee on the
subject of premiums which may be useful to our discussion.
MS. BROOKS: Secondly, on this issue about the medical evaluation of the
programming, is that just related to one station?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: No, it is not.
MS. BROOKS: There is a lot of health related programming at KPFA. Is he
interested in this from a legal standpoint?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: He raised a number of points, including the intellectual rigor
of the programming.
MS. BERRY: Andy?
MR. NORRIS: Frank, will that letter be available for us to see?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Yes, the writer gave me permission to circulate it to the
committee.
MR. NORRIS: The second issue, you mentioned at the end that you didn't get a
chance to talk about the must carry rule. Could you briefly say what that is
and what that involves?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: I can briefly say that there is a rule that if a certain number
of Pacifica stations, I believe it was three of the Pacifica stations, approve
a program for national carriage, then all must carry it. This has naturally
resulted in a number of issues such as some refused to do it anyway. I'm not
sure what all of the issues are but those that needed to be, I thought,
surfaced yesterday during the discussion. I was asked by national staff to put
it on the agenda. But, as I say, unfortunately we didn't get to it since it was
last on the agenda. I need more information too which I thought would be merged
in our discussion yesterday.
Does anyone want to comment on that?
MS. BERRY: We cannot answer questions from the audience. There will be a public
comment section of the meeting which will take place beginning at 11 a.m. and
we will be happy to entertain anything that the public wishes to say.
Meanwhile, will the public please be in order.
MS. BROOKS: So that is going to be on the agenda of your next meeting?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Yes.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: The one question I forgot to ask yesterday is around the
health programs. That is, the guidelines generally. It doesn't seem as though
it is just about health programming but it might be something like program
practices.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Yes.
MS. BERRY: If no one else has a question, I will ask a question, what were the
views of your committee members or your own concerning the intellectual
validity of some of the medical programming? I know that members of your
committee have been asked by local advisory board members to listen to the
radio and I'm sure they have listened to some of these programs. How do they
fit within the mission of Pacifica as described in its charter and its bylaws
and strategic plan and other materials? Has your committee reached a conclusion
on that subject?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Those are exactly the issues we wanted to address. All we had
time to deal with yesterday was the subject matter and we asked the members to
think about this and were polling others for their views on it. We did not
discuss any specific programs. The materials that I circulated on the subject
was, as I say, a letter from the former national board member and an article in
Current newspaper discussing related issues in public television broadcasting.
And the issues raised were exactly how does such programming fit into our
mission, what are our standards that should apply. One of our concerns was that
if such programming is perceived as lacking the intellectual rigor that was
discussed in the letter, that can spill over in the public perception to our
other programming, our news and public affairs programming. If people are
making wild and unjustified or unprovable claims in one area, then why
shouldn't the audience assume we are encouraging the same thing in other areas
which are clearly essential to our mission and cause.
MS. BERRY: Will your committee be considering the balance between a desire to
have some programming concerning these medical subjects that might attract
donations or listener support and the question of intellectual validity and the
question of whether the program is important to the mission of Pacifica? Will
your committee meet and decide on this?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: I believe it would be a possibility, yes. We believe that.
MS. BERRY: I'm asking you, is that your plan to do this?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Yes, that is precisely what I think the issues are.
MS. BERRY: Does anyone have anything else on this subject, the medical
programming?
MR. McKNIGHT: I think one of the concerns expressed yesterday was the fact that
in some of these cases people were actually trying to sell their products on
the station. That would result in commercialization of the program itself.
MS. BROOKS: I think in a way maybe it is just as well that you didn't have a
chance to talk about this yet because the role of the LABs, I think Nana said
in her report, that the ascertainment was supposed to be accomplished by
October --
MS. RUBIN: I said we would have a schedule by October.
MS. BROOKS: Anyway, the needs assessment I think will be very helpful in
getting a sense at each area. We know there is a lot of programming at KPFA and
quite a bit at BAI that is in this area. I think that it will be helpful to us
to really have a more thorough examination once we get all the reports.
MS. BERRY: Let me just ask you another question about another part of your
report. Did your committee in discussing the community needs ascertainment,
have any discussion of the importance or lack thereof of the needs assessment
in terms of maintaining the viability of the stations whether or not CPB
requirements are a concern?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Well, yes, I think it is a responsibility to our audience and
to our signal areas, to be aware of these needs. Quite aside from the FCC
requirement, quite aside from the CPB requirement. I think we have the
opportunity here to explore new ground and set new patterns for this, and I
think that some on the committee feel there may be funding assistance available
to achieve this as well.
MS. BERRY: I asked you the question because there are those that believe that
the station should not be concerned about audience, or meeting any requirements
for funding by CPB or anything else, perhaps the stations would be better off
not getting any funding.
Therefore I was wondering whether you thought that community needs assessment
was important to the viability of the station even if someone thought that they
didn't care whether we got any funding from anybody or not or from CPB.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: There is certainly an aspect of an economic agenda in this
because I think it is our article of faith if we are better meeting the needs
of our audience, our audience will support the work of the station to a greater
extent. That, once again, I think is a most pragmatic and principled objective
for us to undertake. Yes, there is a position that the stations can keep doing
what they have been doing because they have been doing it and that is all that
needs to be done. We feel one of the things that the community needs assessment
will help us do is identify other needs in the community, particularly for the
diverse ethnic groups that we have and also other audiences that haven't been
tapped. Our LABs feel to pursue the status quo is to doom stations. Many of us
feel that is a disastrous course for us to follow or consider.
MS. NASATIR: Was it discussed or is it your thought about having a standard
guideline tool for doing community assessment that all of the stations would
use so there would be a uniformity?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Well, I wouldn't say uniformity, but some internal consistency.
The national staff helped to put together some formats that were circulated to
each of the members for the LAB use. Our committee at the WBAI LAB, the
audience research committee, has added to that checklist component, to both
make it easier for the people engaged in this activity as well as to provide a
little bit of consistency among the stations. However, the science is not so
developed that we feel confident in saying this is the way it is to be done, A
B, C, D, E. We have suggested some steps and we are looking at other things
that people do to see what value they have. We do not think that this is going
to be definitive in a short period of time. We think that there is an
experimental period here. That is why we are content to have the stations
proceeding at different paces. We just want to make sure that we all end up at
the same destination. We are not too concerned -- of the pace of the journey
can be different.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: Back on that health programming issue, in preparation for
the next meeting maybe we could circulate some of those tapes because I don't
think in Berkeley we get a program like that.
MS. BROOKS: Yes, we do.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: No, I'm asking whether or not we can sample tapes so when
we are talking next time we have programs in common that we can be talking
about.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: I don't know, I can't personally undertake to do that.
MS. BERRY: Why don't we ask the staff to do that. Give us a tape of some
medical programming, samples from the stations and circulate it for the next
meeting.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: I hear I hear in the KPFA area there are other kinds of
programming that there is a lot of undercurrent about. So I'm wondering if
maybe sample tape could include some of that other stuff so that when we talk
we know in each signal area what is under discussion.
MS. BERRY: That would be good.
MR. McKNIGHT: One of the other things we talked about in the committee, is
demographic shifts annually in every one of these communities. It ought to be
our responsibility to find out who these people are, what sort of needs they
have in terms of what we have to offer and those sort of things.
Secondly, as Frank said a moment ago, there is an economic aspect to this thing
in as much as every station, every business is going to lose clients or
listeners for a number of different reasons. People die, they move away, they
are not satisfied, they move on to other things. One of our responsibilities at
the station to the Foundation ought to be to replace this loss of listeners as
it were and the only way you can do that is by finding out who is out there and
by letting whoever is out there, know we are here. For those reasons alone, we
need to continue with this thing. And in terms of how we conduct the
measurement, I think Frank is absolutely right. It is not an exact science as
far as we know. So we are just going to go on and see who comes up with the
best results and
MS. ROSS: One last question for you, Frank. It was revealed yesterday that on
average every year each station loses or turns over 65 percent of its donors,
maintaining the loyalty of only 35 percent. Would it be possible for the
programming committee to examine that turnover in relationship to the
programming that they offer? Because that is a high number that truly concerns
me.
MR. McKNIGHT: What is that number again?
MS. ROSS: We lose 65 percent of last year's donors every year and maintain the
loyalty of only 35 percent on average. So my question is the relationship to
that and the programming that we offer and I would like the programming
committee to examine that. That is a very important figure that causes me great
concern.
MS. BERRY: I think you have a right to be concerned and I saw some shaking of
heads among general managers. There are some who say this isn't 65, it is
something else and somebody else's is higher. The 65 percent was not a figure
associated with any particular station. was an amalgam of a number. So it does
not apply to everyone. But it is an important benchmark.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: I think it is something we should address. It is not
immediately apparent how we will. That is probably because we don't have the
information from the ascertainment which may shed light on it. I'm a little
surprised at the figures you cite because I thought the renewals overall were
running a little better than 50 percent.
MS. BERRY: It depends on the station.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Which would mean that certainly a little less than 50 percent
were turning over as opposed to 65. But whatever the figure, if 35 percent are
turning over, we would still like to narrow that.
MS. BERRY: Now, we are going to have no more than one or two questions on this.
We need to go to the next report. I know I asked some questions so I apologize
for that. Does anybody else have any questions?
All those in favor of accepting the report of the Program Standards and
Practices Committee indicate by saying aye.
(Chorus of ayes.)
MS. BERRY: Opposed?
(No response.)
MS. BERRY: So ordered.
Next we have the Board Governance and Structure Committee. David.
MR. ACOSTA: The Governance and Structure Committee has met several times by
teleconference since the Los Angeles meeting in March and again yesterday. We
have made the following decisions: One, we are recommending to the board to
elect a new member to an at large position.
Back at the September meeting in Washington the board voted to add four new at
large positions which would bring the total of at large positions to nine and
still give majority representation to the local station representatives. At the
March meeting we elected Bill Lucy to fill one of those positions and today we
are recommending for election Jose Daniel McMurray. Committee member Rob
Robinson will speak on Jose's behalf.
MR. ROBINSON: Thank you very much, David. At the last Board Governance and
Structure Committee meeting David instructed us to begin looking and
particularly to look for additional members from the Hispanic community. So I
talked to some people in my community and I have for the committee's
consideration the name of Jose Daniel McMurray. Mr. McMurray is a resident of
Washington D.C. He is originally a native of Paraguay in South America. His
qualifications I think are very helpful for us. In the '70s he founded a
station, KBBF in Santa Rosa, California, co-founded the station. It is also a
community station. He worked for a number of years as a producer at National
Public Radio. He was one of the few Hispanic producers on the staff there. Some
members of our national staff have worked with him and also for a number of
years he was the executive director of the National Association of Hispanic
Journalists.
Jose is very active in community affairs. He is a listener of WPFW. He is
familiar with Pacifica and I know that he is going to bring to the table, to
this board, some of the communications and radio skills that will be most
helpful to Pacifica's ongoing growth and development. Thank you.
MR. ACOSTA: Thank you, Rob. Madam Chair, at this time I would like to place the
name of Jose Daniel McMurray at nomination for an at large member of this
board.
MS. BERRY: Hold on just a minute. We will take a 30 second recess.
(Pause.)
MS. BERRY: For procedural reasons which relate to screening by the Executive
Committee which has not yet taken place, we are very much encouraged that Mr.
McMurray is willing to join our board but from a technical standpoint we have
to wait until the Executive Committee reviews it which they didn't have time to
do yesterday and that was not communicated. We are really sorry about that. No
offense intended to Mr. McMurray. We will bring this up after the Executive
Committee's actions. Is that all right with you, Mr. Robinson?
MR. ROBINSON: I bow to your decision making.
MS. BERRY: Okay, we will handle it that way. So would you please continue with
your report.
MR. ACOSTA: The second issue was that we are recommending to the board to elect
a board vice chair. The position of vice chair has been vacant since September
of '97.
MS. BERRY: So for obvious reasons I am going to speak to the nomination. This
was reviewed by the Executive Committee yesterday and Mr. Acosta is someone in
whom I have great confidence and so do others on the board and he is very well
qualified for this position. I will not read his resume. As you know, he is an
accountant with wide experience and has had wide political experience and has
made great contributions to the cause of community radio. I have great
confidence in having him be the vice chair of this board. So I am naming him
for the position of vice chair and I would hope somebody would second that.
MR. McKNIGHT: Second.
MS. BERRY: Is there any discussion or any questions about the nomination?
Hearing none, all those in favor indicate by saying aye.
(Chorus of ayes.)
MS. BERRY: Opposed?
(No response.)
MS. BERRY: So ordered. Congratulations.
MR. ACOSTA: I want to thank Dr. Berry. I will take this position very
seriously. I consider it an honor, a privilege and a challenge to be a part of
the Pacifica family. Thank you. Anyway, our next item, we discussed updates on
LAB member recruitment with regard to number of members, their compliance with
the board's objective of 50 percent persons of color makeup and the number of
programmers.
At KPFT presently we have 11 members, three of them are of color and one is a
programmer. By the end of the year, December, we should be at 15 members and
seven of them will be of color with one programmer.
At WPFW we have 21 members presently and 17 of them are of color, no
programmers. By September we should have 23 members, 19 of which are of color
and one would be a programmer.
At KPFA we have ten members with two persons of color and two of them are
programmers. By September we should move that up to 14 with six people of color
and two programmers.
At WBAI we have 20 members, ten of which are of color and two are programmers.
By July we should have 23 members total with 12 of color and two programmers.
At KPFK currently we have 11 members and three of them are of color. There has
been a question as to the process by which these people have been chosen, so
the committee decided that the chair of this committee, myself, would review
the process and report back to the Executive Committee for action if anything
is necessary.
The last thing that we discussed was from Sherry Gendelman, the chair of KPFA,
and Nan Rubin, the chair of WBAI, about their concerns with the policies
governing local station advisory boards. Specifically they requested
reconsideration of the policy regarding staff participation and voting status
and generally they wanted to rewrite the document in short form or long form.
There was a question as to the process by which we should consider these
proposals and any other proposed resolution that calls for actions by this
committee to the full board. So we decided to appoint a subcommittee to review
and clarify the processes presently in place and to develop any new processes
that should be necessary. This subcommittee will be called the Process Review
Committee and will consist of at large member Loretta Ross, WBAI member Andrea
Cisco, KPFA member Pete Bramson and WPFW member Rob Robinson. I want to thank
all the members of the committee and I would ask if they want to add to this
report to do so now.
3 MS. BERRY: Does any member of the committee wish to comment on the report of
the chair of the committee? Make your comment at this time.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: I would just like to ask in terms of reporting on these
procedures, would you expect that that would be in place for the October
meeting?
MR. ACOSTA: That is what we are shooting for. We have given the subcommittee
that deadline to have something in place by then.
MS. BERRY: The first question was whether any member of the committee had any
comment. Hearing none, then if the board has questions. Frank is a board member
who already asked a question. I just want to get it straight for the
transcript. Other members of the board who had a question?
MS. BROOKS: I know we are getting minutes but is there a way you could give us
a separate sheet of paper with stats on the LABs?
MR. ACOSTA: Sure.
MS. BROOKS: Maybe fax it MR. ACOSTA: Okay.
MS. BERRY: Cheryl?
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: David, I don't remember if the intention was that this is
an ongoing subcommittee or a that is going to just address this issue.
MR. ACOSTA: Well, we are going to have to play it by ear. First of all, we are
going to review the process. We already have that in place. Then we will
clarify it and let it be known. If that is all that needs to be done then we
don't have any need for the committee again. But if we need to develop some
policies of process then we may continue it.
MS. BERRY: Micheal?
MR. PALMER: I wanted to make a comment about the request from the Council of
Chairs that came from the Houston market, the Houston LAB and the Houston
chair. We don't have any problems with the LAB procedures submitted regardless
of what has been presented by the Council of Chairs. I wanted that to go on the
record because it is not a universal complaint. The work that had been done was
understood by our board and agreed to by our board. So we don't have the
questions that other stations do about changes that have been made.
MS. BERRY: I think it is also fair to say that other LABs, have the same view.
In the meeting with the Council of Chairs, the views that were expressed most
strongly about doing something about the LAB document came from WBAI and KPFA.
There were only minimal expressions of any concern at all about the particular
aspects of it that they raised in the meeting yesterday, not referring to Nan's
report, but the business about the staff and all that. Others didn't seem to
have concerns about that. They had concerns about other matters in the document
which is why the committee is to try to take up all the concerns and have a
process for doing that.
Yes, Andy.
MR. NORRIS: At the meeting yesterday the discussion was curtailed so I don't
think we got enough input from various LABs. There had been some discussion
between WBAI and KPFA prior to this and we would be completely willing to
discuss it with other LABs. Basically our LAB has taken strong opposition to
this on several counts. First, we basically commend the document and we hope to
get a better document. The document per se needs to exist so it can be
approved, whichever items that Nan pointed to, the cap on the size needs to be
clarified, the issue about removal of members could be clarified.
MS. BERRY: I would really prefer it if we did not discuss the document here. It
will be taken up by the Board Governance Committee.
MR. NORRIS: But the major items of concern, I think there can be a lot more
clarity of the document to everyone's benefit. LAB members do not know what
LABs are. They need this as a constitution. But the most pressing concern has
to do with the personnel at the station, paid and unpaid. That has already
impeded us in our ability to attract community input to our LAB.
MS. BERRY: I asked that you not discuss the document because it is being
discussed by the committee. We agreed and Nan discussed it when she gave her
report. So we don't need to discuss it again because we are not going to make
any decision. I also ask that all of us have a decent respect for everyone
else's opinions. Michael has told you that his LAB does not have any concerns
about it. The views of his LAB are to be as respected as the views of any other
LAB and to be considered on an equal basis. Everyone's views will be
considered. But we should not think that in an organization of five stations,
because one station or two stations think something, that everyone else's views
become inconsequential. They will all be considered by the Board Governance and
Structure Committee. We also ought to have a decent respect for the amount of
time that the members of this board and this organization put into working on
this LAB document. Even before I came on board they were working on it and so
we ought to at least consider our colleagues in a collegial fashion and be
willing to respect the work that they have done. To make criticisms and
suggestions, yes, but to always acknowledge that they in fact have contributed,
do have their own views and that we respect the work that they have done and
that way they will respect us and then we will get along a lot better.
MS. ROSS: As a member of the subcommittee working on process review, I just
want to make clear what our mandate is. Which is to make sure there is a
process for input and review that is fair in terms of any proposed changes to
LAB policy, not to decide necessarily on the merit of the changes themselves
because that is a function of the committee and then the full board. Only the
board has the power to change its own policies. What we are responding to is a
request from LABs for this overworked word called clarity, which I must say as
part of the committee, clarity is often used to disguise disagreement. It is
not that it is not clear, it is that they don't like what they see. So that
will also be specified and looked at by the committee.
MS. BERRY: I'm going to take comments from Cheryl and then I'm going to see how
long that takes and I may take one other before I stop this at 11 o'clock which
is the time I'm supposed to stop it. The Technical Committee doesn't have a
report, do they?
MR. FORD: I would like to say something.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: I would just like to confirm, subcommittee will meet, will
come up with policies, we will be able to institute and use those policies at
the next meeting and have resolution to the issues that were brought?
MS. ROSS: It is more like process. We cannot make policy.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: I'm saying process, we can make it policy and engage it.
MS. ROSS: Only the board makes policy.
MS. BERRY: Ken, do you want to make a report?
MR. FORD: Just briefly, as many of you know, some of you have been assigned to
the Technical Committee. Unfortunately we did not have an opportunity to meet
nor do we have a charge at this point.
MS. BERRY: Yes, you do have a charge.
MR. FORD: Let me finish.
MS. BERRY: You do have a charge. The transmitter --
MR. FORD: That is what I'm going to get into.
MS. BERRY: The computer issue.
MR. FORD: There are three issues we have to address. Within the next two weeks
I plan get to you a series of informational packets and background on the
problems that are occurring. You will need to come up with some recommendations
to both to the board and the Finance Committee because a lot of these issues
will take funding. Basically, we have a tower problem at KPFK. We have to look
at expansion not only on the Internet but expending our usage of the KU band.
The big issue is computer accessibility. There is a problem with the stations E-
mailing each other, being able to establish a computer link between one station
and the next as well as the Solomon problem.
The new accounting system is supposed to work in an efficient fashion.
efficient fashion. We heard from the Controller that it is not and we need to
get to the bottom of this. Finally we have got to start looking at the
archives. It is a very valuable resource but it is prone to some type of
disaster should something occur like an earthquake in California or should they
get a fire in that building. We ought to start looking at investing money to
maintain it as well as protect it. We have a lot of work to do. I'm quite sure
we will have a detailed report and some recommendations to you, Madam Chair, at
the next meeting.
MS. BERRY: Did I have your report accepted?
MR. ACOSTA: No.
MS. BERRY: I didn't ask to accept the report.
MR. ACOSTA: Can I say one thing before you do that?
MS. BERRY: Yes.
MR. ACOSTA: I didn't mention Loretta Ross will be the chairwoman of the
subcommittee. I want that on the record.
MS. BERRY: Can I ask you to vote on approving the report of the Board
Governance Committee? All in favor indicate by saying aye.
(Chorus of ayes.)
MS. BERRY: Opposed?
(No response.)
MS. BERRY: Okay. Now, the Technical Committee.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: Well, I'm not a member of the committee. So I will wait.
MS. BERRY: Does anyone on the committee have something to say?
MR. McKNIGHT: Am I correct, I heard there was problems with the server in terms
of the E-mail and stuff?
MR. FORD: Yes, it is.
MR. McKNIGHT: We don't know what that problem is?
MR. FORD: We don't know but we are going to find out.
MS. BERRY: Any other member of the committee have a comment?
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: Did you list who is on your committee?
MR. FORD: Yes, we do have a listing. It is listed here.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: I was on it at one point.
MS. BROOKS: Then you are on it now. You don't get off a committee.
MS. BERRY: I don't know where the list is.
MS. BROOKS: It is on the back of the roster that was distributed. It is on the
very back page of the roster.
MS. BERRY: Ken, Peter, Andrea and Ralph.
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: I am on it.
MS. MAKELA: So we will add you.
MS. BERRY: As a member of the committee, do you have a question?
MS. FABIO-BRADFORD: No, I don't.
MS. BERRY: Now the board members. Frank?
MR. MILLSPAUGH: I would like to ask that the committee give consideration or in
some way track the developments in the field of digital transmission.
MR. FORD: We are going to look at that as a long term project. As a matter of
fact, next Tuesday I have a tour of a new digital facility at a radio station.
It is a long term endeavor. It will be five to seven years before the whole new
area of community radio transitions to digital. So we are going to take a slow
approach but right now it is not an immediate concern. We have other pressing
issues we are focusing on.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: I feel that the board will really profit from being educated
though as to the status of that technology and the progress as it goes on.
MR. FORD: What I would like to do, Frank, not for the next meeting but two
meetings out is to do a presentation to the board on that whole issue.
MR. MILLSPAUGH: That would be great.
MR. FORD: We can carve out some time.
MS. BROOKS: When we first set up the committee, I wasn't quite clear what you
were going to do. But yesterday it became abundantly clear. So good luck and
I'm glad you're doing it. One note, would everybody please review their
committee assignments. If there is any questions or concerns about it, let me
know. I know that Bill Lucy only had one assignment and Mary and I will correct
that.
MS. BERRY: He was supposed to be on the Program Committee.
MS. BROOKS: So please everybody review the roster and get back to me about
that. Thank you.
MS. BERRY: The last point I will make is on the roster you will note that
Roberta Brooks' term has expired as a member of this board. But under our rules
since her term as secretary does not expire until 1999 in June her term as a
member is automatically extended to fit that term. In any case, now I ill go to
the public comment section of the meeting.
We will go in order. The sign-up and maximum amount of time is two minutes. I
would ask Loretta Ross who is great at this whole thing to be the sergeant at
arms, to help me enforce the time limits so that we can get this done in a
proper fashion.
Could I call forward Paul S. is the first public witness to be called. Please
come forward.
MR. S: Here is a two minute summary of Paul Schaffer's views on what is wrong
with Pacifica. There is too much programming between commercial talk radio.
Much of the rest is demographically targeted music. WBAI has avoided some of
the worst excesses but not for long. Pacifica should scale back its budgets and
assets to match the size of the audiences wishing to hear what Pacifica was
created to offer. It crosses my mind that such a strategy might entail
scrapping a large part of the Washington operation if necessary, so be it.
The secrecy and elitism of Pacifica management are amazing. Late yesterday I
heard Mary Frances Berry say that even if three Pacifica people could make a
convincing case for breaking with CPB the Foundation cannot afford to do it.
Why? Because the federal government will eventually be reallocating frequencies
probably using a formula that will destroy nonprofit stations below a certain
size. On that point several board members were chuckling over the naive people
who don't realize this. If fear of federal authority is driving Pacifica's
strategy that ought to be on the agenda somewhere.
MS. BERRY: Mimi R., please come forward.
MS. R: I'm sorry that Bill Lucy isn't in the room. The last time I saw him he
was an insurgent voice in the elections of AFL-CIO, so certainly he should and
could understand some of the issues that are pertinent to those of us who are
here today.
I just want to say I'm the unpaid staff representative to the WBAI board. I
have been a producer there for approximately 20 years with the longest running,
oldest program in the country that is oriented to labor and seeks to build
bridges between community and labor people. I say that because it is strategic
to understand that most of us, whether we are in the programming end or the
production end of our station, certainly in New York, are people with deep ties
to the community. Indeed my ties to the labor movement extend over 25 years.
That is my asset and that is what I bring to the board, the voice of
information and not disruption.
I do that to segue into two things. I'm very pleased to hear that there is a
committee that is looking into the issue of governance. There indeed are things
that would seek to rob the individual signal stations of some degree of
autonomy and the culture and integrity that is endemic to the area that any one
of us are from. So within that it is absolutely strategic to look to the rules
and not maintain a hierarchal system that is devoid of input and a voice. Part
of that voice comes from representatives of the staff who are indeed the link
of vital information, not obstructionist information, but information that
helps people function and makes some determination.
In addition to that, I hope that when I hear, because there is a lack of
clarity indeed, and that is process can never be devoid from the end product.
So I take process to mean that there will be consideration of what is most
fundamental and that is input of the staff, input of the listeners and greater
input of the boards themselves to the governance changes that we all see.
In addition, I just want to bring up as somebody who, as I said, does a labor
program and was covering the AFL-CIO convention for all five of the stations,
et cetera, and has habitually been requested to do news feeds and other things
relative to the labor movement, as we live in a period of the casualization of
labor, we are right now in a major General Motors strike. That strike is about
job security. That strike is about people who are not casualized by having a
living wage. It is about anybody having the right to freedom of association and
to organizing. That is why we do the broadcasting we do so people can come
together and negotiate conditions that are better for themselves and their
colleagues.
I implore people to give some consideration to the new union movement and that
is a new movement that seeks not just the traditional forms of organizing, and
it will be one more half minute if I may, that it seeks to bring together Work
Experience Program workers not as indentured workers but as workers with full
rights. That is what the labor movement pretends to be about. That is why we
want to maintain our collective bargaining unit at WBAI. We want a fair
contract and we want to stop wasting the listeners' money on seeking to appeal
the NLRB decision which keeps a tenured bargaining unit but serves the rest of
the unit well and a right of freedom of association and to bargain.
MS. BERRY: Your time is up.
MS. R: The fact is this meeting that appropriates two minutes for people who
care dearly and work very hard at this station really represents very much less
than the democratic process that should be initiated. It is really unforg