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Indybay Feature

KPFA Radio Local Station Board Candidates Forum

Date:
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Time:
7:00 PM - 10:00 PM
Event Type:
Other
Organizer/Author:
Frank Running Horse
Phone:
925-798-3698
Location Details:
Round Table PIzza
(back room)
3375 Port Chicago Highway
Concord --- (Near North Concord BART)

Occupy Concord will be hosting our one and only in-person candidate forum.

Date: Nov. 29th, beginning @7 pm

Location: Round Table PIzza
(back room)

3375 Port Chicago Highway, Concord ---
(Near North Concord BART )


ALL CANDIDATES ARE INVITED!

For more info call : 925-798-3698



In person meeting of KPFA Radio election candidates for Local Station Board.

ALL CANDIDATES HAVE BEEN INVITED
Added to the calendar on Wed, Nov 28, 2012 10:14AM
§Live! Occupy Concord KPFA LSB forum
by KPFA supporter
c17b.jpg
The one and only meet the candidates event of the current KPFA Local Station Board election, sponsored by Occupy Concord.
We expect a good local turnout of folks young & older from this activist community; please support our brothers & sisters at OC and at KPFA by attending.

Finally a live KPFA candidates forum, the only one this election cycle.
Come and meet the candidates - all were invited - and learn about current issues at KPFA from all points of view including those you may not have heard.
It's near the deadline for voting; if you are a member, and if you haven't voted yet, or even if you have, inform yourself.
(If you have, and change your mind, you can request a new ballot!)
Click on "Calendar" for directions to the event this Thursday November 29th at 7 pm,
at Round Table Pizza, 3375 Port Chicago Highway, Concord, cross street Olivera.
For more info call Frank Runninghorse at (925) 798-3698

Comments (Hide Comments)
by Kevin
I was wondering if and when there would be Candidate events in different communties.
This is the first one that I have heard about . Wasn't there events all around KPFA's listening area in previous elections ? What's going on ?
I will try to participate
by KPFA Listener activist
Kevin - There has rarely been a fair election at KPFA.
The way this year's election was conducted was especially heartbreaking. This is because the past 2 elections, while fraught with dirty tricks, were led by 2 Local Election Supervisors who did their utmost to hold as many in person forums in different communities as possible, with the aid of Election Committees made up of listeners familiar with the electoral problems at KPFA and motivated to overcome them.The number one problem being that most listener members are unfamiliar with KPFA governance, but a workable democracy needs informed voters.
The forums are an attempt to help inform the listeners.
The Local Election Supervisors make a post election report, so one would expect that each new election supervisor can build on the experience of the one(s) before.
This year, this did not seem to happen, as the new supervisor didn't want to hold forums, and did not want an Election Committee to give input and help out. It was only after many appeals, (some to the National Election Supervisor,) that we were granted these on air forums. Typically, what is now the "Save" KPFA side resists public debates, but we had to press the point that forums are fair, as long as the chance to participate has been *offered* to all candidates, otherwise some will be able to sabotage then by refusing to participate.
So it took some time to even set up the on air ones.
The in person ones he resisted announcing on air, plus the SK obstructed plans about a joint East Bay in person one, to the point where it was no longer feasible.
To see the past improvements to the process ignored, and a step taken back instead, is heartbreaking.
Not to speak of the exponentially misinformed electorate, many of whom were taken in by the SK's massive disinformation campaign about the layoffs, to believe that the layoffs were not needed to snatch us back from the brink of insolvency, that they were done as political retribution to deliberately destroy the Morning Show, were anti-union, and on and on. This is also heartbreaking.
It's impossible to say where the fault lies for this year's election problems. Probably the basic cause is the lack of support by the SK and their core staff mentors for a democratically run KPFA.
But those of us who love KPFA, want democracy and a station which is a community free speech resource, will never give up on this goal, and will work with whatever we have to push this ideal forward.
Vote United for Community Radio!

by KPFA Listener activist
Driving/Barting directions to the forum
by listener supporter
Wed Nov 28 16:39:18 2012
Here's how to get there:

Driving directions
From Berkeley: take 56th Ave toward the hills,
turn into CA route 24 east.
Keep left into Route 680 N. toward Sacramento/Concord for 4.9 miles
Slight right onto route 242.
Exit right, onto Olivera Road, to intersection with Port Chicago Highway
Round Table Pizza is on your right.

From Santa Rosa: take 101 past Petaluma and turn east onto route 37 El Camino Real/
Sears Point Road
At Vallejo turn right (south) onto I 80 West, then left onto 780
780 will merge into 680 going south.
At the intersection with Route 4,turn left, to Pittsburg/Antioch
Go 2 miles on rte. 4, then turn left onto Port Chicago Highway South,
Just past the intersection with Olivera Road you will see the Round Table Pizza place
on your right.

Public transportation:
BART to North Concord-Martinez.
#17 bus South (toward Concord Bart) 1/2 mile on Port Chicago Highway to Olivera Road.

(If you get lost, call Round Table at (925)825-1993)
by earthlink
The Morning Show was KPFA’s biggest fundraiser, raising three times what it cost to produce. So why, in November 2010, did Pacifica’s executive director kill KPFA’s most popular local programming?

First, the big picture. KPFA was hit by the global financial crisis just like everyone else. When the economy tanked, so did KPFA’s fundraising, pushing the station into six-figure deficits.

But KPFA had already addressed its deficit. In the months prior to cancelling the Morning Show, KPFA’s local managers cut roughly $500,000 in annual spending on personnel, through buy-outs, attrition, and hour reductions – all without controversy. Pacifica knew this. KPFA had sent charts detailing the financial situation to the entire Pacifica National Board five weeks prior to Pacifica’s sudden layoffs of Morning Show staff.

So, why did Pacifica kill The Morning Show?

• The financial crisis at Pacifica was (and continues to be) worse than KPFA’s . KPFA was able to use its reserves to stay current on bills, while it whittled away at expenses – during the same period, Pacifica racked up over $1.1 million dollars in unpaid bills (that number has since grown to over $1.6 million).

• Pacifica uses KPFA as a cash cow. Pacifica’s audited financial statements show the rest of the network owes KPFA $1.4 million. In 2010, Pacifica was using KPFA assets as collateral for a $100,000 line of credit. And it was pressuring KPFA to create a large surplus so it could pay Pacifica extra.

• KPFA staff were standing up to Pacifica. As a staff-elected representative on KPFA’s Local Station Board, Brian Edwards-Tiekert pushed back on attempts by Pacifica to seize station funds. The Morning Show invited Pacifica’s executives onto to the airwaves, and challenged them about how much they were taking from KPFA, and about Pacifica’s spending priorities. KPFA’s union picketed in front of Pacifica’s offices against proposed cuts.

Pacifica used KPFA’s finances as a pretext to eliminate its political enemies.
Of the three people Pacifica gave layoff notices to:

3 were outspoken critics of Pacifica.
2 were worker-elected representatives on KPFA’s Local Station Board
0 were the least-senior staff members at KPFA.

Pacifica chose to keep the Morning Show off the air.

• Pacifica had to rescind the layoff of Morning Show producer Laura Prives almost immediately – but assigned her to work on a different show.

• Pacifica had to reinstate Brian Edwards-Tiekert – with back pay – when it conceded his union
grievance, but it assigned him to work as a News Reporter, not a Morning Show Host/Producer.

• Pacifica rejected offers from KPFA listeners to pay the cost of reinstating all Morning Show staff, then paid an expensive anti-union law firm over $70,000 to defend the one layoff it prevailed on.

• When Pacifica gave the staff of The Morning Show the required 30 days’ notice of
their layoffs, they offered to keep producing the show, but Pacifica took them
off the air immediately, and rather than let them keep producing the Morning
Show, paid them to do nothing.

What’s happened since Pacifica killed The Morning Show?

• Plummeting pledges. During the four hours impacted by Pacifica’s changes – 6 to 10AM – fundraising dropped by over 50% – more than $8,000 per day.

• Lengthening fund drives. To make up for the drop, KPFA has had to add nearly three weeks to
its fundraising calendar – an increase of 30%

• KPFA has stayed afloat – despite Pacifica’s best efforts to blow all the station’s money on $400/hour attorneys. Because KPFA’s local management had made major spending cuts shortly before the Morning Show was killed, and because KPFA dramatically lengthened its fund drives after the Morning Show was killed, KPFA managed to nearly break even in 2011.

• Our station is in grave peril. Long pledge marathons drive away listeners; fewer listeners means fewer donations. KPFA’s already experienced diminishing returns from lengthened fund drives – the Winter 2012 fund drive was extended to a record 24 days, but still fell nearly $125,000 short of its goal.

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