I was there. Here is what happened.1) Media Alliance, a Bay Area media advocacy and education group, received an email purporting to be from Micheal Palmer, a
Houston realtor and Pacfica National board member, reporting to Dr. Mary Frances Berry, the Pacifica National Chair about his discussions with a radio broker over how much KPFA would be worth, and also
suggesting the sale of WBAI in New York City. I received a copy of the press release from Mark Mericle, co-director of KPFA News. Here are some excerpts.
"Hello Dr. Berry,
"I salute your
fortitude in scheduling a news conference opportunity in the beloved Bay Area regarding one of the most pressing issues of our time............ [NB: The press conference was originally
"invitation-only" and certain journalists were originally excluded because they were not on the list. This included the San Jose Mercury News. San Jose is the largest city in the Bay Area. Dr.
Berry opened the conference to everyone upon her arrival at the conference site.--Kellia].
"But seriously, I was under the impression there was support in the proper quarters, and a definite majority,
for shutting down that unit and re-programming immediately. Has that changed? Is there concensus among the national staff that any other than that is acceptable/bearable?
"As an update for you and
Lynn [Chadwick, Executive Director of Pacifica and the person who fired Nicole Sawaya, Larry Bensky, and Robbie Osman and imposed the gag order--Kellia] I spoke with the only radio broker I know last
week...This is the best radio market in history and while public companies might see a dilutive effect from sale (due to the approximate 12 month repositioning effort needed), they would still be
aggressive for such a signal. Private media companies would be the most agressive in terms of price, which he things could me in the $65-75m[illion] range depending on various other aspects of a deal,,,,Even
with this data my feeling is that a more beneficial disposition would be of the New York signal [WBAI - Kellia] as there is a smaller subscriber base without the long and emotional history as the Bay Area.
[F]ar more associated value, a similarly dysfunctional staff though far less effective and an overall better opportunity to redefine Pacifica going forward. It is simply the more strategic asset.
"....The Executive Committe, at a minimum, should have access to experts (whether from Wall Street, NPR/CPB, Microsoft or otherwise) to get a strong reality check (me included) about radio and Pacfica's
position in it so that informed decisions can be made. My feeling is that we are experiencing a slow financial death which is having the normal emotional outbursts commensurate with such a disease...."
Reports of our financial death have been greatly exaggerated. KPFA recently finished a record breaking fund drive. Our goal was $400,000. We raised $605,000 and 6 out of 7 pledged "under protest,"
which meant they were supporting the demands of the staff for the return of Sawaya and Bensky, repeal of all disciplinary action against other staffers, and mediation of the underlying dispute.
2) Media
Alliance called a press conference for 1:30 PM outside the Alameda County Municipal courthouse in Berkeley just two blocks from KPFA. Scheduled speakers included Andrea Buffa, executive director of Media
Alliance, Dan Siegel, an Oakland attorney about to file suit against the Pacifica National Board on behalf of the Pacifica Foundation and 18 local board members from three of the five Pacifica network
stations, and Robbie Osman, fired KPFA programmer. At 2:00pm, 13 of the 14 demonstrators arrested three weeks ago for staging a peaceful civil disobedience in front of the Pacifica National offices, which
are next door to KPFA, were scheduled to be arraigned.
You should know that the arrests made in connection with that action were entirely peaceful and not made until Lynn Chadwick made citizen's arrests on
each of the demonstrators. The police required this of her because the police did not see any crimes being committed and the demonstrators were on private property.
Later, Mary Frances Berry, who is chair
of the US Commission on Civil RIghts and Chair of Pacifica's national board, called Janet Reno (we've got that from two sources) and Reno got the No. 3 guy, who personally knows the Berkeley police chief, to
call "friend to friend" to inquire about the police handling of the matter. This No. 3 guy is the one in charge of giving out money to localities so that they can put more cops on the street. (One
wishes that Justice would spend more time on the LAPD and the New York Street Crimes Unit and stop wasting time with civilized police conduct).
3) At 11:30 am, news director Mark Mericle assigned me to
cover the press conference and the arraignment for the Evening News..
4) At 1:15, Lynn Chadwick, with one hour's notice, held a meeting with senior editorial staff, including Mark Mericle and Dennis
Bernstein, co-host/producer of Flashpoints, the investigative news show that airs during the hour preceeding the evening news.
I heard from participants at that meeting that Chadwick introduced Garland
Ganter, of sister station KPFT in Houston, and Mike Flores, of sister station KPFK in LA. Chadwick said that Ganter would be her "Special Assistant" and that Flores would be assisting Ganter. She
also re-introduced the gag rule, now in an even sterner form. (It was under Ganter than KPFT was stripped of its local news and public affairs programming as well as all its foreign language programming.
This in a city that is, among other things, one-third Latino.)
Here is the "toothy" portion of Chadwick's memo:
" In the event that we continue to experience the type of problems we
previously have, Pacifica is committed to enforcing its policies and my previous directives prohibiting on air or in-the-media disucssion of matters pertaining to Pacifica or KPFA management decisions or any
internal or external grievances or personnel or labor relations-type matters involving KPFA or Pacifica. [Definitely sounds like she got a lawyer's input on the language--Kellia]. This direction [sic]
applies to all KPFA or Pacifica personnel, including employees and volunteers alike, is without exception and also applies to all news broadcasts and programming. Any violation of this direction [sic] will
be dealt with as a serious act of insubordination as well as a violation of an important Pacifica policy and will result in disciplinary action, including immediate termination. We hope that those of you who
have previously engaged in inappropriate conduct will understand the nature of this final warning and will comply with it...."
However, aware that there would be a press conference that afternoon,
Dennis Bernstein asked if it would be permissible to cover Pacifica if mainstream media was on the same story. Ganter indicated that this would be permissible.
5) At about 1:20, I left for the press
conference in the company of Leslie Kean, co produced/host of Flashpoints. We each covered the press conference, entered the courtroom and witnessed the arraignment and interviewed the attorney for the
demonstrators and some of the demonstrators themselves. I returned to the news room at about 3 and Leslie followed soon thereafter. Contrary to public comments by Elan Fabbri, spokesperson for Pacifica,
Dennis Bernstein was NOT at the press conference. Fired KPFA programmer Robbie Osman was there, but Dennis was not. If Elan cannot tell the difference between Osman's voice and Bernstein's, that just goes to
show you how out of touch with the staff Pacifica management is.
At the press conference, Andrea Buffa of Media Alliance noted that MA had contacted its Internet Service Provider to trace the source of the
email. To the ISP's knowledge, it came from Palmer's email account. Buffa called for Palmer or Berry to confirm or deny the authenticity of the email.
6) At approximately 3:30pm Mark Mericle presented me
with the Chadwick memo quoted above, for my information. He said nothing to encourage or discourage me from proceeding with the story. I elected to proceed with my story despite the threat of termination. (I
had joined the News Department as an intern on March 2nd.)
7). Flashpoints began airing at 5:00pm with 40 minutes on a recent "Unity" convention of minority journalists held in Seattle. (The next
day, Elan Fabbri would be quoted in local newspapers as claiming that Bernstein had spent his entire hour's show complaining about Pacifica. She later admitted that she had only heard 10 mins of the
show.)Then Leslie Kean, NOT Dennis Bernstein, introduced a 14-minute cut of the press conference, stating that the listeners would hear three speakers. She noted that this press conference was also
covered by commercial press.(The SF Examiner and several other print journals, someone with a video camera, and I was told, KQED radio, the NPR outlet in the Bay Area). There was no commentary, just the clip
of the conference. After that two short statements in support of the staff at KPFA were aired,one by Mumia Abu Jamal, the other by Skoop Nisker.
8) At about 5:30 pm, Mark Mericle received a phone call
from Dr. Berry authenticating the Palmer email, denying that the station was for sale and claiming that Palmer was "an idiot on the question." A summary of that phone called, including her
reference to Palmer, which Mericle got specific permission to use--I heard him ask--was inserted into my copy on the Pacifica story and would have been read had the Evening News been broadcast as usual.
9) At 6:00 pm, Flashpoints ended normally and the Evening News began normally. Mark Mericle was anchoring for the moment and began reading headlines. My story was scheduled to run second, after a story on
the Senate vote on the patients' bill of rights.
Just as the newscast began, Ganter summoned Dennis Bernstein into "his" office and informed Dennis that he was being placed on indefinite
administrative leave, effective immediately and that he was to leave the building. Dennis made his way to the news control room followed by Ganter (a beefy man taller than Dennis) and three of the armed
guards from the firm Pacifica had hired, a firm that specialized in "hostile terminations."
Please note that Pacifica's mission is to promote peace and social justice. The staff of KPFA regards
the bringing of weapons into the station as an obscenity.
There was a bit of pushing and shoving at the entrance to the control room. I witnessed this because I was getting ready to enter the studio to
voice my copy on the press conference/arraignment.
Dennis got into the control room and Aileen Alfandary, the news co-director and co-anchor that evening, tried to get Dennnis into the studio with Mark.
They were prevented by the armed guards.
Dennis, in vehement, but nonviolent verbal terms, refused to leave and asked if the guards were armed (they were silent) and would they hurt him if he refused to
leave. He kept identifying himself as a reporter who had just broadcast a public press conference.
On three occasions, Dennis was backed by the guards into the tape recorder that was running Mark's story
on the patient's bill of rights. Three times Mark left the studio to restart the tape, then he gave up. He directed the engineer to put on the control room mike. Then he got back into the studio and did
running commentary over the guards' confrontation with Dennis. After about 4 minutes, Ganter and Flores took over a downstairs production room and knocked the news cast off the air, After a few minutes of
dead air, they replaced it with, of all things, tapes of Marxist-Maoist analysis of capitalism. My story on the press conference/arraignment was never aired.
10) Fairly soon the demonstrators started
arriving. Dennis stayed on the floor of the news control room. Various other people on staff, including Wendell Harper, our main Evening News reporter, taped the goings on. Leslie Kean got some of it on
video. During the course of the night we contacted and fielded calls from various media. Berkeley City council people and the city manager arrived. More demonstrators arrived, more police, this time in riot
helmets arrived. Arrests were made downstairs in the lobby and outside. Some people tried to block the police vans by lying down in from of them, etc.
11) At about 11:35pm, after being ordered by Ganter
to leave, and warned that any paid staff arrested would be immediately terminated. Berkeley police peaceably arrested News Directors Mark Mericle and Aileen Alfandary, Flashpoints coproducers Dennis
Bernstein and Leslie Kean, Robbie Osman, me, and three KPFA listener/supporters. We were handcuffed and taken in the black mariah to Berkeley police station three blocks away, where we were booked on
misdemeanor trespass, cited and released.
The management called the rest of the staff, said that they were being put on paid administrative leave and the station has been broadcasting archival tapes ever
since. Ironically, they are tapes of people such as Angela Davis, Barbara Ehrenreich and Michael Parenti, who are on our side and ever critical of the type of corporatist conduct Pacfica is now engaged in.
So there you have it. A Foundation which holds an FCC license as a public trust, which has a mission dedicating it to peace and social justice, and giving voice to the voiceless, and which is headed by an
African American law professor who currently chairs the US Commission on Civil Rights, has imposed censorship, backed by armed guards, and taken over the oldest public radio station in the nation.
Again, I
must emphasize that contrary to earlier reports in some media, Dennis Bernstein's show was not pulled off the air, it was the Evening News that was pulled. And Dennis was not forceably dragged from the
studio. In a great triumph for those who believe in the power of nonviolent action, he faced down four men taller and heavier than he, three of whom were probably armed. His courage enabled himself and other
journalists in the newsroom that night to continue to function as journalists, to get this frightening story of corporatist (and possibly government) censorship out to the world.
KGO radio conducted an
hour's interview with News Director Mark Mericle; KQED's Forum, with Michael Kraszny, devoted an hour to the issues. AP picked up the story; a friend in Cleveland saw it in the Plain Dealer. We have been in
the San Francisco newspapers every day since the coup, and despite the fact that many local stories have been preempted by coverage of the Kennedy tragedy, Chs. 2, 4 and 5, at least--I did not get to 7 in
time to check, made some mention of us yesterday.
I have recently read the statute under which we in the newsroom were arrested. It is part of the California Penal Code governing trespass for refusal to
leave when asked. The statute specifically states, " ... this subdivision shall not aply to persons on the premises who are engaging in activities protected by the California or United States
Constitutions..." We were there as journalists. They don't have a case.
A lawsuit seeking an injunction against the Pacifica National Board to overturn the governance changes made in February that
made the National Board a self-perpetuating body accountable to no one but iself was filed on Friday. The suit also seeks to undo any decisions made by this illegally constituted board and to block any
attempted sale of Pacifica assets.
For more information see
