Date sent: Thu, 23 Oct 1997
14:35:37 -0700
From:
San Francisco Liberation Radio <sflr@slip.net>
Hello All,
We are asking for people to call San Francisco rock station KFOG and
request that they do two things:
1. Resign their membership in the National Association of Broadcasters,
and,
2. Issue a public statement supporting the right of Free Radio Berkeley
and San Francisco Liberation Radio to share the airwaves in this market.
We think that if we could get KFOG to acquiesce on these two issues
that
it would be a major victory for the micro radio movement. We
further
feel that making such a demand upon KFOG is just, as it was their chief
engineer, Bill Ruck, who electronically tracked and spied upon SFLR
&
FRB. We have proof of this on tape, and we will attempt to upload
that
tape to A-Infos this weekend.
KFOG can be reached by phone at: 415-817-5364; or by email at:
kfog@kfog.com
BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
In April of this year the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB)
held a convention in Las Vegas during which they blasted micro radio
(which they, naturally, refer to as "pirate radio"). Sitting
on this
panel discussion were: Jack Goodman, described on the tape as "the
NAB*s
point man on pirate radio;" Beverly Baker, chief of the Compliance
and
Information Bureau of the FCC (Ms. Baker has, since this convention
took
place, left the FCC); and Bill Ruck, chief engineer for two San
Francisco Radio Stations, KFOG & KNBR (both stations, owned by
the
Susquehanna Radio Corp., are housed in the same building at 55 Hawthorne
St. in SF).
The participants in this panel discussion were very free with their
comments regarding micro radio. Amazingly, the discussion was
recorded.
The micro radio movement has obtained the tape. Again, we will
upload
the sound from that tape this weekend, but, for now, here are a few
choice quotes:
Regarding Free Radio Berkeley:
"They*re into their own self-serving anarchy kind of mentality."--Ruck
Regarding San Francisco Liberation Radio:
"I call this the propaganda voice of Food Not Bombs."--Ruck
Regarding Food Not Bombs:
"This is a group that says we should*t be putting money into military
things, we should be using the money to feed the homeless etcetera,
etcetera, etcetera. The only thing about Food Not Bombs is they*d
much
rathere have a police riot than actually distribute any food.
They
believe they should not have to get permits and comply with health
code
regulations, they just wanna give food away. And as a result
there*s
always a police riot whenever they show up...the thing I wanna point
is
that in San Francisco there are a lot of groups that give away food,
and
they all seem to manage to comply with police and health codes and
everything else, but these guys insist that they don*t need to have
permits because they*re doing good things"--Ruck
Regarding FRB co-founder Stephen Dunifer:
"He*s misguided perhaps, but you need to understand where he*s coming
from so you*ll understand what he*s trying to do. Steve was basically
driven out of KPFA/Pacifica Foundation, for he was too radical for
KPFA,
which is somewhere to the left of left."--Ruck
"Dunifer and his co-horts attempted to pack the courtroom without much
success."--Goodman
Regarding micro radio in general:
"We want them all off the air."--Baker
"Some of them are connected to the militia movement."--Baker
"The fact is they*re crooks."--Goodman
"They*re preference is to simply violate the law."--Goodman
"Some of the ones in Florida are connected to the drug trade."--Baker
Again we would like to urge people to call KFOG. I doubt there
is much
that complaints and phone calls can do to sway the NAB or the FCC;
however, I think KFOG is the weak link in the chain. Should their
commercial rock listeners find out what they*ve been doing
behind-the-scenes to undermine micro radio and free speech they would,
perhaps, be vulnerable to a campaign of public pressure. Again,
people
should call KFOG at 415-817-5364 and request that they do two things:
1. Resign their membership in the NAB, and,
2. Issue a public statement supporting FRB*s and SFLR*s right to share
the airwaves in this market.
They can also be reached by email: kfog@kfog.com
Getting just one commercial radio station to support micro radio could
be a big step toward winning this overall struggle.
Richard Edmondson
P.S. One of our volunteers reported the following:
Hi Richard,
When Ken called the station from work this morning, he found out that
they are referring all protest calls to their corporate counsel in
Pennsylvania. They are referring people to:
Craig Bremer
General Counsel and VP
717-848-5500
PO Box 2026
York, PA 17405
I think this indicates that they are getting a lot of calls, otherwise
they'd just blow it off, as they did mine yesterday, and rather rudely.
My view is that you should keep hammering away on the air that people
should protest this action with the LOCAL station. The local people
should not be let off the hook just because they are owned by someone
else. Ruck works here and we listen here. If people can drop a note
to
Pennsylvania or can afford the LD call, fine. But the local station
should be the one getting the flak, in my opinion.
Good work!
Jackie
PS: Both KFOG and KNBR can be reached at either PH. The GM for both
is
Tony Salvatore and you get routed to the same office and the same
assistant.
San Francisco Liberation Radio http://www.slip.net/~dove
Free Radio Berkeley http://www.freeradio.org
Radio4All http://www.radio4all.org
legal website http://www.surf.com/~graham