Arlene Engelhardt

Is there now censorship at KPFA?

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David Gans, host of Dead to the World

Station management inflicted another serious wound to KPFA’s goal of honest, free speech radio last week when it dropped a disciplinary letter and gag order on unpaid music programmer David Gans.

Gans made brief comments during his August 10 show that were critical of management, eliciting a written warning from interim program director Carrie Core not to discuss “internal issues.” Gans published his comments and Core’s letter on his blog, calling the incident “another salvo in an ongoing battle for the soul of KPFA,” and urging listeners to sign the recall petition against Tracy Rosenberg, a key supporter of management.

“Managers freely broadcast their own anti-union positions and Pacifica’s,” noted KPFAWorker.org, “but slap ‘disciplinary actions’ or gag rules on KPFA’s workers when they speak their minds about the radio network they have labored to build over decades.” Disciplinary letters have also been sent in recent months by Core to paid staffers Mitch Jeserich, John Hamilton and Mark Mericle for reporting on layoffs at the station.

Sonali Kolkathar, host of Uprising

Core also said she’s going to remove the popular Saturday morning program Uprising, hosted by Sonali Kolhatkar. A veteran Pacifica journalist working out of KPFK in Los Angeles, Kolhatkar has made several on-air statements of solidarity with KPFA’s workers.

What would replace Uprising? A “labor show” by management ally Steve Zeltzer. As KPFAWorker notes, “the same managers who supported paying over $70,000 to fight the station’s union workers” put Zeltzer forward to replace respected KPFA producer David Bacon.” Like most unpaid staff at the station, Bacon has refused to cooperate with management’s replacement of union staffers.

KPFA recall campaign: almost there!

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Supporters listening to a talk by Larry Bensky.
Supporters listening to a talk by Larry Bensky.

Signatures continue to roll in on the petition drive to recall KPFA board member Tracy Rosenberg, who also sits on the Pacifica National Board. We are close to meeting our goal, but we need your help TODAY to put us over the top.

Please PRINT & SIGN the recall petition here:
http://www.SaveKPFA.org/recall/petition.pdf
(If you have any trouble with the link, copy and paste it directly into your web browser, or contact us at votesavekpfa@gmail.com.)

Tracy Rosenberg is the architect of the destruction of KPFA’s Morning Show, a key ally of Pacifica executive director Arlene Engelhardt, and a prime mover behind efforts to illegally keep KPFA’s local representatives from taking their elected seats on Pacifica’s national board.

Recall Tracy Rosenberg
CLICK IMAGE TO DOWNLOAD & SIGN PETITION

To trigger a recall election, we need over 400 valid signatures from current KPFA listener-members — meaning people who’ve given at least $25 to KPFA in the past year. If you’re not sure if your KPFA membership is up to date, please give now at kpfa.org before you sign the petition.

We are required to turn in the signatures on paper — the old-fashioned way — so you need to print the petition, sign it and mail it. If you’ve already signed, then print a copy and sign up friends at meetings, events, and farmers’ markets.

Also, if you’re sitting on a signed petition, please mail it in now. We’ll be turning in our petitions shortly, and when we do, we want to have as strong a showing as possible. | MORE HERE

Another legal victory for SaveKPFA; court rejects Spooner action

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A last-ditch attempt by Pacifica management ally Carol Spooner to keep KPFA Local Station Board members Dan Siegel and Laura Prives from their elected Pacifica National Board seats has gone down to defeat, only a week after being filed.

It all started last December, when Tracy Rosenberg pushed an illegal motion through the national board to unseat elected KPFA reps Dan Siegel and Laura Prives. Alameda County Superior Court Judge Frank Roesch issued an injunction requiring they be seated.

The Pacifica National Board appealed the injunction and threw Siegel and Prives off the board for a second time. But Judge Roesch stepped in again, threatening to hold Pacifica National Board officers in contempt of court for their actions, and ordering Siegel and Prives to be seated. As part of the settlement, KPFA board member Richard Phelps, who had been acting as Pacifica’s attorney in the matter, paid SaveKPFA‘s legal expenses out of his own pocket and resigned from KPFA’s local board.

So did it end there? Nope. From the sidelines, Spooner filed a petition with the Court of Appeal, trying to intervene and knock Dan and Laura off the national board a third time. The Court of Appeals quickly shot that down last Friday.

Pacifica’s frivolous legal maneuvers have gotten nowhere in court, but they have managed to run up the foundation’s legal bills and keep two of our locally elected representatives from assuming their seats on the national board for nearly half their one-year terms. Accountability comes from the ballot box — send in your recall petition today!