KPFA Morning Show

KPFA launches a morning news hour at 7AM, moves broadcast of Democracy Now to 6AM

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Starting Thursday, May 17, at 7AM, tune your dial to KPFA 94.1FM for Up Front, a news collaboration that many hope will begin to rebuild the station’s morning audience. KPFA issued this press release today about the new show, which will be a collaboration between KPFA and sister station KPFK in Los Angeles. Produced by KPFA’s award-winning News Department, Up Front will include “challenging interviews with political and community leaders, civil but heated debates, and frequent breaking news updates.”

KPFA’s Brian Edwards-Tiekert and KPFK’s Sonali Kolhatkar will co-host. Up Front will include “voices both familiar and new.” The first broadcast of Democracy Now! will return to its traditional time of 6AM to make room for the new program.

HERE’S HOW YOU CAN HELP: circulate this message to your network, then TUNE IN AND MAKE A PLEDGE on Thursday during the 7AM hour.  The number to call is 800-439-5732 (800-HEY-KPFA), or pledge online at www.kpfa.org.  You are also invited to KPFA’s studios at 1929 Martin Luther King Jr Way in Berkeley on Thursday for the program’s launch. Answer phones or bring some food to share. Let’s a take a moment to celebrate and support KPFA!

Why killing the Morning Show made no financial sense

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The Morning Show was KPFA’s biggest fundraiser — raising three times what it cost to produce. Killing the show in November  2010 made no sense financially.

Pacifica knew this: KPFA had sent charts detailing the financial contributions of the Morning Show to the entire Pacifica National Board five weeks prior to the layoffs. The truth is, Pacifica used KPFA’s finances as a pretext to eliminate its political enemies. | READ THE STORY HERE

KPFA on the brink: pledge drive falls $125,000 short

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Recall endoser Larry Bensky with KPFA's Antonio Ortiz & John Hamilton
Recall endoser Larry Bensky with KPFA's Antonio Ortiz & John Hamilton

The station ended its Winter Fund Drive one week ago, $125,000 short of its pledge goal. This is sad news for everyone who cares about KPFA, and it underscores the importance of change at Pacifica.

Pacifica’s re-programming of 6-10 AM is behind the shortfall. Those time slots used to raise 40% of KPFA’s total pledges. Since the destruction of the Morning Show, that’s dropped by more than half. For a time, station management was able to offset the plunge by lengthening fund drives, but they’ve run into diminishing returns from that strategy. (This year’s Winter Fund Drive ran 24 days, a whopping 50% increase from the length of the last Winter Fund Drive before the Morning Show was axed).

By any measure, the morning lineup that Pacifica imposed on KPFA has been a catastrophic failure. But instead of fixing it, Rosenberg, and the Pacifica managers she backs, are still defending it. They rejected over $63,000 that SaveKPFA raised to pay for the reinstatement of the Morning Show. They spent more money on lawyers to fight Morning Show co-host Aimee Allison‘s reinstatement than it would have cost to keep her on payroll for a year. And they’ll keep doing it until KPFA’s voting members call them to account.