Illegitimate Hijacking Of Bylaws By New Day At Pacifica Continues

Open Letter from Alex Steinberg:

Report from Director in exile Alex Steinberg February 11, 2026

The Appeals process to revoke the illegitimate hijacking of our bylaws by the New Day aligned PNB-Pacifica National Board majority is still moving forward. All statements claiming that the legal challenge to the validity of the bylaws that were illegitimately imposed on Pacifica by the PNB majority have been settled are false. The Court has scheduled a date of Feb 24, 2026 for briefs to be filed. The attorney challenging the legitimacy of the New Day bylaws is working diligently to prepare that brief.

Other things at Pacifica remain largely the same as they did in my last report in January, which I will briefly recapitulate. There is one new development that I will mention at the end of my report.

The PNB majority continues to shut down all areas of communication between the PNB and Pacifica’s members and listeners. Most recently it was announced that meetings of some PNB committees, including the National Finance Committee, will no longer be streamed in real time.

It should also be noted that recently several Directors and LSB members from KPFA are showing increasing and irrational hostility towards WBAI. WBAI is being singled out and being scapegoated for Pacifica’s financial problems by the Chair of the PNB’s National Finance Committee. Could this be a prelude to another attempt to shut down WBAI as was done in 2019?

As for the financial position of Pacifica we have reached yet another month without a proper Profit and Loss statement, so it is not possible to provide an educated assessment of Pacifica’s financial situation. The most recent P & L- Profit & Loss Report we do have taken us to the end of March of 2025, covering only 2 quarters for Fiscal Year 2025 starting Oct 2024 & ending Sep. 30,, 2025).

We are now reaching 5-quarters combined for 2 recent Fiscal Years behind in getting financial reports that are up to date. We have defaulted on two loans and were forced to pay the principal on one of them, over $2 million dollars, seriously depleting whatever cash we received from the sale of the KPFK building in Los Angeles. The Winter Fund Drive at WBAI has met and exceeded its goal but lots of questions remain about the viability of the new WBAI business model. It is certainly premature to proclaim, as some on the PNB are doing, the Pacifica has turned some kind of corner regarding its financial problems.

Pacifica’s status as a non-profit as a charitable organization continues to be suspended on the California Attorney General’s list of Charitable organizations.

The auditing firm we expected to perform the audits for FY 2022 and 2023 has quit and we have yet to find a replacement for them to get us back on track.

Pacifica’s non-profit status is now also listed as “automatically revoked” by the IRS.

The full significance of this is not clear but it is obviously not good news.

In the meantime, the New Day-aligned PNB majority seems to think everything is fine and takes no responsibility for the financial problems plaguing Pacifica.

The one new development to be reported is that the PNB is rushing to replace 2 vacancies on the PNB, one from KPFT and another from KPFA, through a vote of the PNB itself and bypassing historic protocol (Pacifica’s founding Bylaws: Article Five, Board of Directors of the Foundation, Section 3 (page 17): Nomination and Election of Station Representative Directors‌ at: https://freepacifica.live/blog/

The LSB’s are supposed to elect Directors locally at each Radio Station in the Network to the PNB. This is going to happen at a special meeting of the PNB tomorrow evening (2-12-26). It’s an attempt by the PNB New Day aligned majority to create “facts on the ground” to try to legitimize their illegitimate bylaws.

Alex Steinberg,
Director in Exile (Illegally suspended by the PNB New Day Pacifica Majority at YE 2025) from WBAI