By Per Fagereng

In April 1997, the inspector general (IG) of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) completed his audit of Pacifica Radio. As reported in our last (May/June) issue, he praised Pacifica's stated goals but criticized some of the network's practices. Inspector General Joe Arvizu listed these deficiencies:

The report listed specific actions that Pacifica must take to comply with legal requirements. It recommended that CPB give Pacifica until November to comply or lose its federal funding. Pacifica disputed Arvizu's findings. According to spokesman Burt Glass, "This inspector general is a guy who is brand new to the job. In all due respect, when we go to his bosses, these things will be cleared up."

On May 19, Arvizu's bosses, the CPB Board, met in Washington, D.C., to consider the report Invited to speak were Jack O' Dell for the Pacifica Board and Jeff Blankfort of the dissident group, Take Back KPFA. But at that meeting the CPB Board handed out copies of its finding. In other words, CPB made its decision before it heard O' Dell or Blankfort, although it praised them (in advance) for helping to enhance "our understanding of the report. …"

Then came a major discrepancy. According to the CPB Board, it "accepts the Inspector General's do it finding that no actions by Pacifica were such [as] to warrant denial or reduction of CPB grants." But the IG clearly stated, "Funding for the next fiscal year should be contingent on completion of those actions" (those he recommended in his report). Then came what could be a veiled threat: "The CPB wishes to re-emphasize its commitment to compliance with its requirements for open meetings, timely notification and good record-keeping." One could take this to mean that whatever Pacifica did not do in the past, it better not do it again. Pacifica took the CPB decision as a vindication. "Rather than accepting the IG's finding that Pacifica board meetings were improperly closed to the public, the CPB board instead opted to develop new guidelines for open meetings for all CPB-funded stations," said a Pacifica press release. Not quite true. CPB merely said that codification of existing law "would be useful in avoiding any possible misinterpretation in the future."

Take Back KPFA took the decision as a whitewash. According to Blankfort, "The de facto rejection of the audit conducted by its new Inspector General also seems to indicate that the firing of two previous investigators... reflects an effort by someone of importance in Washington who wishes to see Pacifica continue in its present direction." In a letter to CPB, the dissident group served notice that it was taking its case to the General Accounting Office.

However one interprets the CPB decision, Pacifica had another chance to comply with the law. In June, Pacifica's National Board came to Oakland's Marriott Hotel to hold a scheduled meeting. Right away there was confusion over how many sessions were open to the public and how many were closed. According to Take Back KPFA, only one hour was open and the budget session was closed, in violation of law. Burt Glass replied that only one hour was closed, and four-and-one-half hours were open. With all the committee meetings, said Glass, ten hours were open and five were closed. The final agenda listed nine hours closed and six-and-one-quarter open. The longest closed session was the finance committee’s - four hours to pass a budget.

Then came a last-minute change. Pacifica opened two hours of the finance committee session. When that time was up and spectators refused to leave their seats, the committee went to another room and finished its deliberations, in secret Perhaps the committee discussed a looming deficit. According to the Bay Guardian newspaper, Pacifica Executive Director Pat Scott said that the network would be $100,000 in the hole if it did not revise its budget. 

But the board's agenda contained another hot issue - how much power should go to local station advisory boards. According to Inspector General Arvizu, these boards had been largely sidetracked and threatened by Pacifica's National Board. CPB had little to say on the issue, but the local boards themselves had already spoken out.

The Pacifica National Board has fifteen members - ten are appointed by local boards, whose members are themselves appointed by station management: the other five are appointed "at large" by the national board. Under a proposed change in the bylaws, the national board would appoint five of the ten from the local listening areas. This would shift power away from the local boards, and they came out against it.

In early June, the KPFA board unanimously approved a letter to the Pacifica board in support of Arvizu's findings. According to the letter, Pacifica has ignored both the local board and federal law. Local boards in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., also opposed the bylaw change. Hank levy, chair of the KPFA board, supports Pacifica's programming changes. "But speaking personally," he said' "I think Pacifica needs to clean up its act and begin listening to us."

When bylaw changes came before the Pacifica board, Article Three, Section 2 (which would have changed the way local representatives are chosen) was bypassed. A transcript of taped remarks, provided by Take Back KPFA, showed that Section 2 was to come back to the board in September. But Chairman Jack O'Dell and Secretary Roberta Brooks (also an aide to Congressman Ron Dellums) later said that Section 2 had already been passed by the board in February. Then why did it return at the June meeting? 

According to the Bay Guardian, Brooks said in March that the full board would approve the change in June. Does that mean a less-than-full board approved it in February? Also according to the Bay Guardian, Brooks 'had changed her time, claiming that the changes didn't require the full board's approval." That view was repeated by Pacifica spokesman Burt Glass. But Hank Levy of the KPFA board felt that Section 2 had been tabled until September. 

According to Nan Rubin of New York, Brooks had tried to get Section 2 approved by mailed-in proxy votes. But that would violate Pacifica's bylaws, says Rubin; voting must be done in person with the subject made public thirty days before.

Levy says that by then the Pacifica board will have some new members. Already Chairman O' Dell has stepped down to be replaced by civil-fights activist Mary Frances Berry. I asked Levy if the new members would be chosen by the old method; he thought they would. So if KPFA and other local boards act on that belief, while the national board chooses its own people, a greater conflict lies ahead. 

Another conflict has arisen over Helen Caldicott, an Australian physician and prominent anti-nuclear activist In April Caldicott spoke in Berkeley on "Tritium and Consequences." Her talk was taped by KPFA and used as a fund-raising premium. According to Maria Gilardin of Take Back KPFA, some of Caldicott's remarks were edited out In her talk, Caldicott related how the major networks had censored her and halted an appearance on the Today Show. "So we are in bad trouble," said Caldicott. "That's why KPFA is so incredibly important. You've got to read this. ... (holds up clipping about Pacifica; applause). I think KPFA and Pacifica are in trouble and you better save it (applause). I am on Pacifica. I have my own program in New York every Monday night I think it is pretty good -- call-in and stuff. And it was going to go national and it hasn't and I don't know why. So anyway, back to Tritium."

According to Gllardin's transcript, the part about KPFA was snipped. 'The edited version goes directly from 'So we are in bad trouble' to 'So anyway, back to Tritium.'" 

KPFA's program director Ginny Berson says the station did not censor Caldicott. A lot of remarks get edited, says Berson, and she felt listeners "were more interested in Tritium."

As to the New York program, WBAI's Program Director Samori Marksman says it was taken off the air because Caldicott is frequently away on speaking tours. She will be in Australia for three months, according to Marksman, but her program will be back on WBAI in September. He said the station will also carry a live broadcast from Australia in August.

[The Portland Free Press has prepared a packet of all its articles on Pacifica Radio, dating back to July/August 1995. For your packet, send $3 to PFP, Post Office Box 1327, Tualatin, Ore. 97062.]