Letter to Pacifica

CALIFORNIA COALITION FOR THE FIRST AMENDMENT
926 J St. Suite 1406
Sacramento, CA. 95814
Tel: (916) 447-2322
Fax: (916) 447-2328


October 3, 1995


Mr. Jack O'Dell
Chair
Pacifica Foundation


Dear Mr. O'Dell,


I am writing in behalf of a number of Californians, including but not 
limited to members of "Take Back KPFA!," concerned with the programming 
and management directions taken by the Pacifica Foundation and affecting 
member stations in the Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay Area.

Those members have been prejudiced in their efforts to monitor the 
Foundation board's leadership on these issues.  The board has, I am 
informed, used closed sessions to discuss financial and other policy 
considerations at its most recent meetings, and has even prevented a 
representative of "Take Back KPFA!" from tape recording those public 
portions of the meeting held this past weekend on Houston.

I appreciate that you were not present at the meeting.  Enclosed is a 
narrative of what occurred prepared by the person who was prevented from 
tape recording the gathering.

Although the author, Jeffrey Blankfort, understandably focuses on the 
taping question, and while we believe that issue to be a serious one. We 
are even more concerned with the board's apparent use of closed sessions 
for discussions of business matters which do not correspond to the 
recognized bases for confidential discussion in the regulations which 
bind recipients of funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Pacifica Foundation, one would think, is second to no broadcasting 
institution in its moral and political commitment to the rights of 
dissenters and the full discussion of matters of public interest.

One would also suppose that an organization which subsists on the good 
will of some of the most enlightened and politically aware sector of the 
community, would not want to risk being perceived at the end of the day, 
as just another corporate entity as reflexively jealous of its 
information control as any industrial enterprise.

You do not need me or any other stranger lecturing you on the 
inconsistency of what occurred in Houston with the mission you have 
historically undertaken.  But I am afraid the Foundation is inviting 
comments from far more voices than me, and consequences far more 
substantial than lecturing, if it persists in preventing visitors from 
taping its meetings and in taking policy matters behind closed doors 
despite 47 C.F.R. 379 (k) (4).

At this juncture we request the Board undo what has been done to the 
extent possible by suspending whatever decisions were made in the closed 
portion of the Houston meeting, by placing those matters back on the 
agenda of a future meeting for open discussion and deliberation, and by 
instructing its members and staff that tape recording is freely to be 
permitted at open meetings in the future.


Sincerely,

Terry Francke
Executive Director

cc: John Crigler, Haley, Bader & Potts [Pacifica's law firm in 
Arlington, VA]