Socialist Action /August 1999
Thousands Rally to Defend KPFA Radio
By JEFF MACKLER
BERKELEY, Calif.-Some 50 years ago, the Pacifica chain of radio stations
charted unprecedented ground in U.S. radio broadcasting. Pacifica became
the first network to be supported entirely by listener contributions as
opposed to corporate advertising or foundation grants.
Today, one in five people in America lives within reach of the FM frequencies
of the Pacifica radio network. Pacifica stations include its flagship station,
KPFA-Berkeley; KPFK-Los Angeles; KPFT-Houston; WBAI-New York; and WPFW-Washington,
D.C.
A major effort has been underway for nearly a decade to undermine these
stations, gut their left-oriented social and political content, and subordinate
them to increasing government and private control.
Unlike the corporate-owned-and-dominated radio networks, stations like
KPFA have served to inform listeners about a broad range of political and
social issues that are routinely banned from the corporate airwaves.
KPFA has been an important voice for those struggling to free Mumia Abu-Jamal,
to oppose U.S. imperialist interventions worldwide, to defend the environment,
and to fight for racial, sexual, and social equality. In decades past, it
stood up to the McCarthyite witch hunters and others who sought to silence
its criticism of the status quo.
Controversy erupted at KPFA early this year after the board refused to
renew the employment contract of the station's popular program director,
Nicole Sawaya. After several KPFA radio hosts joined listeners in discussing
Sawaya's dismissal on the air, Pacifica's board of directors charged them
with violating their policy (popularly known as the "gag rule")
that prohibits broadcasting commentary related to the station's "internal
affairs."
Later, popular commentator Larry Bensky and veteran music programmer
Robbie Osman were fired on charges of violating the gag rule.
Dragged from the studio by armed guards
On July 13, KPFA's listeners-from Berkeley south to Fresno and east almost
300 miles to the California-Nevada border-were shocked when the 6 p.m. regular
evening news program was halted by broadcaster Mark Mericle.
"We interrupt this story," said Mericle, "because Dennis
Bernstein [co-producer of the radical political commentary program, "Flashpoints"]
... has been put on administrative leave for his playing [a few minutes
earlier] of a press conference concerning the crisis here at KPFA. ... The
guards that Pacifica has placed in KPFA are trying to drag him out of the
studio."
As he struggled in the clutches of armed guards hired by Pacifica's board
of directors, Dennis Bernstein was heard in the background as saying, "I'm
nervous. I'm afraid you're going to hurt me. I'm afraid you're going to
shoot me."
A moment later the station went silent, returning to the air minutes
later with replays of taped speeches from KPFA's archives. Within minutes
listeners gathered in protest outside the station.
Inside, Bernstein, who had been informed minutes earlier of his involuntary
"administrative leave" status, was joined by other KPFA staff
and community supporters, who sat down and refused to leave the station.
Pacifica leaders called in the Berkeley police, who several hours later
arrested more than 50 people-including Bernstein, his co-producer Leslie
Kean, and six other KPFA staffers.
Prior to the 6 p.m. news, "Flashpoints" had broadcast a well-attended
news conference that had included comments on the inadvertently revealed
secret discussions within Pacifica's board in regard to the proposed sale
of the station.
This was a topic that had been mentioned in numerous mainstream media
reports, and thus did not fall under the strictures of Pacifica's internal
"gag rule."
The "Flashpoints" segment, introduced by Kean, also included
a taped segment by Mumia Abu-Jamal speaking in support of the beleaguered
station and its staff.
The following day, Pacifica locked out and placed on paid administrative
leave the station's 25 paid staff, most of whom are members of Communications
Workers of America, Local 9415. Some 150 unpaid staff volunteers were similarly
excluded, and the station was placed in the hands of management flunkies
who broadcasted "radical" tapes and music for the next two weeks.
In short order, and daily, huge crowds assembled at the station, and
Pacifica's actions became the subject of protests from every quarter. About
2500 rallied at the station a few days after the takeover, with hundreds
assembling every day thereafter.
Within a week of the station's closure, a capacity crowd of 3500 attended
a benefit concert with Joan Baez and the popular hip-hop and spoken word
artist Michael Franti. Additional hundreds were turned away by fire department
officials.
Resolutions in support of KPFA and free speech were quickly approved
by groups ranging from the Berkeley City Council and San Francisco Board
of Supervisors to the San Francisco and Alameda County central labor councils.
Hundreds of labor unions, social and political organizations, community
groups, and media organizations followed suit with statements of protest
against Pacifica's actions.
Demands mushroomed for the resignation of Pacifica's board of directors-including
its now-notorious chair, Mary Frances Berry-and Executive Director Lynn
Chadwick.
Thousands fill the streets
On July 31, a mammoth two-mile free-speech march and rally of 15,000,
called on 10 day's notice, culminated the initial protests. Demonstrators
filled buses and carpools from as far away as Portland, Ore., and Houston,
Texas.
The rally assembled at the University of California's Sproul Plaza, the
historic site of the 1964 Free Speech Movement (FSM). FSM leaders helped
lead the march along with KPFA staff and volunteers, United Farmworker Vice
President Dolores Huerta, and others representative of the multi-racial
unity that has emerged in the course of this free speech battle.
The rally raised $26,000 on KPFA's behalf. It was co-chaired by KPFAers
Bensky, Bernstein, Miguel Molina, Khalil Fantauzzi Jacobs, Whalen Southern,
Susan Stone, Walter Turner; as well as Andrea Buffa of the Media Alliance
and this writer, representing Socialist Action, one of the groups that helped
to initiate the united protest.
Actor Peter Coyote, poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and UFW leader Dolores
Huerta were joined on stage by a diverse group of KPFA supporters, including
California Labor Federation President Tom Rankin, Berkeley Mayor Shirley
Deam, and San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown. Brown, who was roundly booed
for his politics favoring big business, nevertheless called for the resignation
of the Pacifica board.
Some 80 speakers and performers addressed the six-hour event, both at
the march assembly point and at the Martin Luther King Park rally.
The event was seen as a celebration of a partial victory in light of
Pacifica's decision a day earlier to reopen the station and place its operations
in the hands of its union staff, without restriction, for a time period
of six to nine months. After this time, according to the Pacifica public
statement, and after a closer look at KPFA's Arbitron ratings, the station's
future would be reevaluated.
A maneuver to sell the station?
The stunning reversal by Pacifica's Board is widely viewed as a maneuver
to retrench and eventually sell the station to corporate or foundation interests.
Board Director Mary Frances Berry, in defense of her actions and denying
political or organizational motives, told the media at a press conference
from which KPFA staff were excluded, "There is no conspiracy or secret
agenda at Pacifica."
But an errant e-mail sent mistakenly to the radical-oriented Media Alliance
by Houston real estate developer and Pacifica National Board Treasurer-elect
Michael Palmer spilled the proverbial beans. Palmer's confidential memo
stated that there was "support in the proper quarters, and a definite
majority, for shutting down that unit [KPFA] and re-programming immediately."
Mary Frances Berry is an African American woman who, in addition to her
Pacifica post, serves as chairperson of President Clinton's U.S. Civil Rights
Commission. Berry requested the assistance of high-level Justice Department
officials to secure the assistance of Berkeley police in employing more
aggressive handling of demonstrators at KPFA.
Under Berry's stewardship and before, the Pacifica Board established
formal links to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), whose president,
Robert Coonrod, was previously the deputy director of the U.S. ruling-class-dominated
radio instrument in foreign affairs matters, the Voice of America.
Coonrod, who came to CPB in 1992, following his Voice of America (including
the CIA-influenced Radio and TV Marti) stint, has established close relationships
with Chadwick, Berry, and the board in general.
His "advice" and "counsel" were seen as critical
to Berry's recent restructuring of the network governance-that is, a power-grab
designed to insulate Pacifica from local control. Coonrod is not without
influence given the fact the CPB underwrites 14 percent of Pacifica's budget.
Money was undoubtedly another factor in Pacifica's machinations. In his
intercepted e-mail, Michael Palmer revealed that KPFA alone could be sold
for $65 to $75 million. "This is a movement from community radio to
commodity radio," said an insightful KPFA staff member.
To deflect the incredible public outrage against her actions, Berry went
to great lengths to assert her commitment to KPFA's progressive tradition.
She insisted that the Board was committed to actively seeking a more "diverse"
listener base. Berry accused critics of creating a "climate of violence,
hate, racism, and misinformation."
Where implemented, however, the results of Pacifica's "mainstreaming"
plans have been clear. A former programmer at KPFT-Houston, Rafael Renteria,
described the Board-ordered changes at the Houston Pacifica affiliate:
"There is no longer a single public affairs program rooted in the
Latino community. ... There is now one hour of feminist programming each
week. Peace Pipes and Visions, the Native American program, is gone. The
Atheist program is gone. The Vietnamese program is gone. The Chinese program
is gone. The Pakistani program is gone. Only one Black program remains today
at KPFT and an African music program. ... Today the policy is `English Only."'
"Pacifica," according to Alexander Cockburn, "is operated
like a prison run on Benthamite principles, in which the directorate levies
ever-thickening slabs of money from member stations, most particularly WBAI
in New York and KPFA in Berkeley."
An estimated 17 percent of all funds raised by KPFA through its on-air
fundraising campaigns must be sent to the Pacifica Board.
Cockburn continues, "Pacifica issues hire-and-fire commands and
stipulates silence and obedience. When Pat Scott was installed as Pacifica's
national executive director in 1995, she speedily threatened all dissenters,
hired unionbusters and made her longer-term goal the removal of Pacifica's
governing board from any accountability.
"Her successor, Lynn Chadwick, has been just as bad. With the active
connivance of the governing board, headed by Mary Frances Berry, she is
now trying to flush out the last vestiges of resistance."
Community activists and KPFA staff, paid and volunteer, are now engaged
in many informal meetings regarding the station's future, plans for programming
changes, and how best to prevent the sale and corporatization of this critical
voice of dissent.
The firing several months earlier of Program Director Nicole Sawaya and
staff members Larry Bensky remain unresolved, although Robbie Osman has
been allowed to return to work.
The broad mass mobilizations in defense of free speech and KPFA demonstrate
the great potential for a winning fight to preserve and expand listener-sponsored
radio in the Bay Area and nationally and to return all fired staff.
The corporate-oriented and government-abetted attacks on free speech
did not sit well with the tens and hundreds of thousands who see KPFA as
an alternative voice that represents their interests as opposed to the corporate
agenda. The future battles on this issue hold great potential for victory.
As we go to press, KPFA has returned to the air. -Editors
Socialist Action /August 1999 |