fund drives

New board members seated at Pacifica (finally)

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After much delay, the Pacifica National Board (PNB) seated newly-elected reps from its stations at a February 22-25 meeting in New York. SaveKPFA-affiliated rep Margy Wilkinson was one of them.

In her report-back, Wilkinson said highlights included a short video about the Pacifica Radio Archives and a full-length documentary about WBAI’s Bob Fass. She added that most of the meeting was spent behind closed doors in “executive” sessions, at least one of which was “probably held in violation of the law governing public vs. executive sessions.”

“We received no written reports from Summer [Reese] in her role as either as PNB chair or iED of Pacifica,” wrote Wilkinson. “The finance report, which was a statement of Pacifica National Office expenses for the first quarter of FY 2013, had no budgetary info or comparisons to previous years, making it pretty hard to evaluate. It was never presented (except for being handed out) or discussed.”

In addition, there was no action on the McCarthyite, anti-dissent, “loyalty measure” that hundreds of SaveKPFA supporters have written about to the board. You can read Wilkinson’s complete report here, or listen to audio of the Feb. 22-25 PNB meeting at these links: Feb 22 | Feb 23 | Feb 24 | Feb 25 | agenda

Network unites in emergency fundraiser for WBAI

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When Superstorm Sandy hit New York, seawater reached up to the second floor of the building that houses Pacifica station WBAI in New York. The flooding ruined the building’s wiring and interrupted a fund drive at WBAI, leaving the station broke, homeless, and unable to raise money to get back on its feet. In a tremendous show of solidarity, all five Pacifica stations joined resources for a national day of fundraising to save WBAI on November 15th. The goal was to raise $150,000 to keep WBAI from going dark. The total raised surpassed $180,000.

wbai graphicThe emergency fundraiser was initiated by Letters and Politics host (and SaveKPFA endorser) Mitch Jeserich, who formerly worked on WBAI’s morning program. KPFA interim manager Andrew Phillips, who was formerly WBAI’s program director, executive-produced the broadcast. Pacifica interim executive director Summer Reese applied the political will necessary to get a national broadcast off the ground. SaveKPFA endorsers Laura Prives and Brian Edwards-Tiekert made major contributions to planning and executing the broadcast as well. KPFK in Los Angeles provided a fully-staffed call center to take the the pledges flooding in from around the country, and programmers from across the network contributed their very best to make the day a rousing success. Kudos to all involved!

Of course, WBAI suffers from deeper problems than Superstorm Sandy: it’s locked into unaffordable leases on its studios and transmitter site, running its fund drives far too long, reaching a fraction of the audience it should in a metropolis like New York, and racking up serious deficits. But the emergency fundraising effort initiated from KPFA will prevent WBAI from going dark immediately, and will hopefully lay the groundwork for permanently stabilizing the station. You can still make a contribution here.

Keep our station afloat: benefits, KPFA crafts fair

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One of the unfortunate consequences of the election is that on-air reminders of upcoming KPFA benefit events are being crowded out by candidates’ statements and other election notices.

Remember that the annual KPFA Crafts Fair (the station’s single biggest off-air fundraiser) is scheduled for December 8-9, and that there are several KPFA benefit events on the horizon. These are important ways to raise money for our radio station.