The San Francisco Chronicle reports Pacifica National Board Chair Dr. Mary Frances
Berry as saying that the station will reopen at 9 am on Friday, that the guards will be removed, and the gag rule, which barred on-air discussion of the crisis, will be lifted.The gag rule was at the
heart of the crisis, which began on March 31, when popular station manager Nicole Sawaya was terminated by Pacifica Executive Director Lynn Chadwick, who then decreed in writing that the news department not
air a story on Sawaya's dismissal. KPFA's News Directors, Aileen Alfandary and Mark Mericle defied the order--the first ever attempt at censorship in KPFA's 50-year history--by reporting the termination and
the gag order on the Evening News. Veteran staffers Larry Bensky and Robbie Osman were later fired for speaking about the crisis on the air.
The matter came to a head on July 13, when investigative
reporter Dennis Bernstein, coproducer of KPFA's Flashpoints news magazine, was placed on indefinite administrative leave for airing, without commentary, a 14-minute segment of a news conference called
earlier in the day by Media Alliance. The Bay Area media advocacy group had received an email from Pacifica National Board member Micheal Palmer of Houston to Berry, which discussed the possible sale
of KPFA or its sister station WBAI in New York City.
An attempt by guards to escort Bernstein from the building disrupted the Evening News broadcast, prompting Mericle, who was anchoring at the time, to
air the confrontation. Management then took the news off the air midsentence, replacing it with archival tapes that had been brought in 10 days earlier.
Bernstein staged a peaceful sit down resistance in
the news room, as protesters gathered at in front of the station. By around midnight, 52 people had been arrested, including Bernstein, news directors Mericle and Alfandary, and this reporter, who was in the
control room when Bernstein entered, with the guards in pursuit.
Pacifica then placed the entire staff on paid administrative leave and locked down the facility.
The decision to reopen the station came
a day after the Berkeley City Council unanimously passed a resolution calling for the station to reopen. The Council also directed the Berkeley police to scale back their presence around the station, the
scene of two weeks of demonstrations including the formation of a small tent city called "Camp KPFA."
Berkeley has run up a tab of more than $150,000 in police overtime since July 13.
The
Oakland City Council also passed a resolution supporting the staff, and prominent personalities from Mumia Abu Jamal to Howard Zinn have sided with KPFA.
Berry's proposal for reopening the station calls
for selection of an interim manager, and an evaluation after 6 months of KPFA's progress toward Pacifica's goal of a larger and more diverse audience. She also indicated that mediation, including discussions
on the status of Sawaya and Bensky, could continue.
Mood among the staff ranges from joyous to skeptical. The Chronicle quotes Bensky as calling Pacifica's decision "a tremendous victory," and
Alfandary as calling the move "a major concession." However, Bernstein characterized the decision as "way too little, way too late." Save Pacifica [
