[PEN-L:9737] KPFA Workers To Return?; ILWU Res. on Pacifica

[meisenscher <meisenscher@xxxxxxx>]

                 "Goodwill gesture' tempers KPFA fight
                  July 29, 1999


                 Julie Chao and Larry D. Hatfield
                 OF THE SF  EXAMINER STAFF

                 Pacifica Foundation to reopen station
                 In at least a partial surrender to
                 mounting public pressure, the Pacifica
                 Foundation says it will reopen KPFA,
                 let most of its locked-out employees
                 return to the air, remove itself from
                 the management and even consider
                 selling the Berkeley radio station.
                 The decision came as the crisis at KPFA
                 deepened - mediation appeared on the
                 verge of collapse, bigger protests were
                 planned and board members substantiated
                 rumors that Pacifica was discussing
                 selling off the left-leaning station.
                 "Reopening the station is a goodwill
                 gesture on the part of Pacifica toward
                 resolving the conflict and moving
                 toward diversification on local terms,"
                 Pacifica chairwoman Mary Frances Berry
                 said.

                 She strongly denied the station was on
                 the auction block, but said board
                 members would listen to anyone
                 expressing an interest in buying the
                 station, such as the city of Berkeley.

                 "(But) we are not attempting to sell
                 the station or any Pacifica station,"
                 she said on a telephone news conference
                 Thursday morning. "We are not - N-O-T.
                 . . attempting to sell KPFA."

                 But the perception that Pacifica would
                 like to unload its troublesome Berkeley
                 outpost could snag Pacifica's peace
                 moves.

                 "It's a positive move," Tracy
                 Rosenberg, administrative director for
                 Media Alliance, said of the decision to
                 reopen the station. "But we're still
                 concerned that the sale of the station
                 is still on the table."

                 Andrea Buffa, executive director of
                 Media Alliance, part of a coalition
                 group opposing Pacifica, added: "KPFA
                 is a priceless community and national
                 asset. For the Pacifica board to sell
                 the station rather than face the music
                 of a spreading national outcry
                 demonstrates how incredibly removed
                 this board is from the people who
                 support progressive community radio."

                 "The sale of KPFA has got to be taken
                 off the table," said Aileen Alfandary,
                 one of the locked-out employees.

                 The Berkeley City Council has discussed
                 the idea of buying the station and
                 Berry said Pacifica would listen to it
                 or any other serious offer.

                 But she repeatedly said KPFA wasn't for
                 sale. "This is not our seeking to sell
                 the station," she said in the
                 teleconference.

                 The 50-year-old listener-sponsored
                 station has been at the center of a
                 bitter struggle over the direction and
                 control of its future.

                 Pacifica closed the station two weeks
                 ago and began airing tapes of old
                 programs after a reporter was heard on
                 the air arguing with armed security
                 guards under orders from management to
                 remove him from the station for
                 reporting about the dispute.

                 KPFA union representative William
                 Harvey, secretary-treasurer of Local
                 9415 of the Communications Workers of
                 America, said Berry called him
                 Wednesday afternoon to lay out the
                 offer. She said a written proposal
                 would be presented Thursday morning
                 through federal mediators, who have
                 been involved with negotiations between
                 staff and management since last week.

                 Berry said she had talked to CWA
                 International President Morton Bahr and
                 he had agreed that union workers would
                 return.

                 Responding to a question about what
                 happens if they don't, she said,
                 "Employees are being paid to come back.
                 Tomorrow is a work day. I can't see any
                 reason why union people can't come to
                 work. What they do when they get to
                 work is up to them.

                 "We're going to open the station to see
                 if you guys want to come back to work.
                 If they don't want to come back to
                 work, in about a week, we're going to
                 have to close it up. . . because we're
                 not going to be able to pay people for
                 not working."

                 Berry said returning workers will have
                 total control over programming
                 decisions, a key dispute in the past.
                 Pacifica will not be enforcing any
                 control over content, something she
                 called a "noble experiment," but will
                 continue to monitor whether KPFA is
                 moving toward long-term goals of
                 increased listenership and diversity.

                 "In case the goals are not met, the
                 board reserves the right to take
                 corrective action," she said, without
                 spelling out what that might be.

                 Alfandary, co-news director, was elated
                 yet hesitant about the back-to-work
                 offer.

                 "I think this is an amazing
                 turnaround," she said. "I believe it
                 shows that, finally, the massive
                 political and public pressure is
                 starting to pay off. I think there are
                 major concessions here. However, I
                 would caution, I am still extremely
                 skeptical. Pacifica has not negotiated
                 in good faith from day one of this
                 crisis."

                 Berry said the station's doors would be
                 unlocked at 9 a.m. Friday, and that
                 security guards hired during the
                 lockout would be gone. She said all
                 staff members would be welcome back
                 except those still engaged in legal
                 differences with Pacifica - Nicole
                 Sawaya, the station manager let go on
                 March 31, and Larry Bensky, the veteran
                 broadcaster fired a few weeks later for
                 criticizing on the air Pacifica's
                 refusal to renew Sawaya's contract.

                 Pacifica said Bensky violated a
                 long-standing policy forbidding on-air
                 discussion of internal personnel
                 matters. KPFA supporters called it a
                 "gag rule." Harvey said Berry's
                 proposal included suspending the gag
                 rule.

                 Berry decried the bullying tactics and
                 personal attacks that some protesters
                 have used, adding that one of the facts
                 lost in the furor over KPFA is that the
                 board has the responsibility to decide
                 who manages a station and how it is run
                 "because we have the license."

                 She also said the Pacifica national
                 offices, now located in Berkeley next
                 to the KPFA station, would move to
                 Washington, D.C., where Berry, chairman
                 of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission and
                 a law professor at the University of
                 Pennsylvania, is based.

                 Pacifica, which also oversees stations
                 in Los Angeles, Houston, New York and
                 Washington, will be removed from
                 management of KPFA for a proposed six
                 to 12 months.

----------------- End Forwarded Message ----------
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W.Coast Longshoremen Want M.F.Berry & Chadwick Out

The following resolution was passed unanimously by the ILWU West Coast
Caucus on 7/19/99. The caucus represents all longshorepersons on the
west coast.

WHEREAS: Workers at KPFA radio station, represented by CWA have been
locked out by management in a labor dispute in Berkeley, California; and

WHEREAS: This non-commercial, listener-sponsored, community-based,
progressive radio station has not only covered but supported workers'
struggles like the United Farm Workers organizing drives here in
California, the anti-apartheid struggle in South Afri ca and the
international solidarity campaign of the Liverpool dockworkers; and

WHEREAS: KPFA is governed by the nonprofit Pacifica Foundation whose
National Board Chair Mary Francis Berry, and Executive Director Lynn
Chadwick, axed the entire KPFA staff for expressing free speech and
solidarity on and off the air, THEREFORE BE IT

RESOLVED: That the Longshore Division go on record to demand
	1)the immediate reinstatement of all KPFA workers, paid and volunteer
	2)the resignation of Mary Frances Berry and Lynn Chadwick and
	3)an end to the "gag rule" on "free speech" radio!