September 9, 1996

Pacifica Radio's Executive Director, Pat Scott, has justified the recent actions of her administration as being necessary to "find solutions to benefit our audiences."

At KPFK, Pacifica's Los Angeles station, listeners are now "benefitting" by having timely material on Ralph Nader withheld in order to extort their contributions. Pacifica's founder Lew Hill, who developed listener-sponsorship as a freely made covenant between the broadcaster and the listener, can only be gagging in his grave.

A memo posted at KPFK-FM, shows how its new "program director" Kathy Lo is "impacting the status quo."

August 23, 1996

To: Diane James

From now until October 20, do not broadcast any Alternative Radio programs that include Ralph Nader. If there are any changes, I will notify you of this in writing. Thanks for your cooperation.

For the first time in memory, Americans may have the opportunity to hear a progressive analysis of problems and solutions on network television, if Ralph Nader is included in the nationally televised presidential debates. Activists who REALLY care if this message is heard are engaged in an emergency letter writing campaign to merican political landscape.

KPFK's next on-air fundraising drive will start on October 4, and run to October 18. A tape of KPFK's broadcast of Nader's acceptance speech will be offered as an incentive to subscribe. A recently mailed fundraising letter from station manager Mark Schubb mentions KPFK's live broadcast of Nader's speech as one of the reasons listeners should contribute. People's passionate desire to see change in America is now being cynically manipulated by an organization they thought they could trust.

Eyewitnesses to events inside the station reported, listeners responded with enthusiasm to the live broadcast of Nader's speech. Many listeners who either missed the speech, wished to hear it again, or share it with others called the station asking to buy tapes. KPFK's new "modern, effective" management hopes to translate their desires into dollars, and fuel their ardor by playing "hard to get."

Instead of scheduling a rebroadcast, Lo also attempted to prevent Roy Tuckman, the producer of a late night program, from broadcasting Nader's speech for his night owls; fortunately for his listeners, Tuckman had already run the speech before the memo from Lo was issued. Otherwise, they would not have heard Nader's acceptance speech on KPFK until the fund drive, when they would also be asked for money to support "their " station.

As a former KPFK staff member who spent 7 years deeply involved in fundraising at the station, I am completely appalled not only by current management's obliviousness to the public service Pacifica's mission mandates, but by this treatment of David Barsamian, whose generosity over the years has netted Pacifica many thousands of dollars. In the old, "irrevelant, elitist" Pacifica, a "fundraising strategy" such as Lo's would have been shouted down in outrage. Now, of course, anyone who shouts about anything is fired for "insubordination."

What I want to know is: what exactly is it going to take for the alternative media to cover the story of what the so-called "positive changes" at Pacifica Radio really entail? I pose this question particularly to The Nation magazine and FAIR----as two media entities who have broadcasts on Pacifica radio which they are using to increase their own subscriber bases. Since those Pacifica listeners who are also now their subscribers are in many cases completely unaware of what is occurring due to a gag rule imposed at Pacifica---- what moral obligation do these organizations have to these individuals?

Pat Scott has also said, "But our opposition has chosen to couch this in terms of a moral struggle," a framework she apparently doesn't consider "relevant." Perhaps The Nation, which produces RadioNation at KPFK, and FAIR, whose previous Los Angeles Chapter Director, Mark Schubb, is now general manager of KPFK (and FAIR's current LA Director, Jim Horowitz, sits on the KPFK advisory board) share Pat Scott's view of "moral struggle" as no longer "relevant" to an organization founded to promote peace and justice.

To The Nation, FAIR and the other organizations who may have kept silent for fear you too will lose access to airtime, haven't you realized everyone is now expendable in the Brave New Pacifica?

Many people have expressed private qualms about the situation at Pacifica, but have hesitated to take public action for fear of "destroying the institution." Can't you see that is already happening?

If you want to do something about it, you can. Be journalists---report the story--all of it. There has been enough silence.

Lyn Gerry
former KPFK staff member
fired--and proud of it!