Friday, April 4, 2014

A tangle called Pacifica Board Meeting April 3, 2014


It may leave you no wiser, but here is an indirect link to Thursday's Pacifica National Board meeting, which was conducted over phones and had pretender to the throne Margy Wilkinson wielding the baton, although not too brilliantly. Just use this link, look for the notice below, and click "Play" or "Download".



9 comments:

  1. Thanks again, Chris. Your exercise of due diligence in the dark, your continuing attempt to enlighten, puts the Pacifica National Board to shame.

    At 32:53 someone eventually snapped & we got the frantic interjection, "stop it!, stop it, you people!, come on!, let someone speak!" How the assembled 20 or so adults remained patient up to that point only Job could know.

    Recently there has been talk of piracy concerning gifts offered during fund drives, & more generally whether there is another way to generate income, not least so as to free-up the schedule for much needed creative programming. I think I have a solution: tapes of these Pacifica National Board meetings should be sold to the Defence Department.

    Sesame Street music was pirated at Gitmo, &, let's be honest, these Board meetings would surely do a better job there. OK, this idea may not be wholly consistent with the founding ethos of Pacifica, but you can't have everything in this life - especially not in PacificaWorld.

    As a footnote, at 35:13 we get quote of the meeting: "the dog's out of order" - it was barking in frustration.

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    1. Thank you for commenting, Jara, You obviously listened carefully, which probably earns you some sort of combat medal. Yes, it's a sorry spectacle and a very far cry, as it were, from the business-like PNB I used to meet with once a month. There is debate and there is battle... this is the latter, and I really don't see any winners—least of all the listener-supporters.

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  2. The LSB meetings, the (telephonic) PNB meetings-- there may be occasional exceptions, but mostly they serve as really depressing illustrations of how easy it is to game "democracy," especially at the small-time and cheap level. And of what astonishing patience, perseverance, and resolve those on the boards who are genuinely concerned with the public good, demonstrate. You're entitled to whatever snarky cynicism you wish, Mr. Albertson-- but Margy Wilkinson is one of the heroes, beyond what Pacifica has any right to expect.

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  3. In the RIGHT corner - a Charismatic Opportunist who has everyone eating out of her hands... and in the LEFT corner we have a board in a leaky tub. The radio static of the recording sounds like the pilot to tower chatter involving a plane that is about to crash.

    This is a drag out fight over the five stations involving high stakes, and I can't even begin to speculate, as to what they are. I would like nothing better than to have the Pacifica Foundation in a receivership, answering to an administrative law judge and his SELECTED board of trustees, drawn from the mainstream educational foundations, and have Summer Reese report to a probation officer as a result of a conviction for some sort of financial fraud.

    Hell... we all can dream!

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  4. As for assertions with respect to Ms Wilkinson's claim to the status of hero (Anonymous), and accusations that Ms Reese, presumably in order to conceal her own financial fraud has as an agent of Satanic forces formally asked for investigation with respect to financial fraud (Brooser)...

    The petition for Declaratory and Injunctive relief will be given its first hearing by the court 9 April, 9a pt – stay tuned.

    We shall see if the courts agree with the profound insights of Anonymous and Brooser.

    ~ 'indigopirate'

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  5. Oh, Indigo,

    I never said that any law enforcement involvement is Satanic, on the contrary, I welcome it! Anywhere you have sharks, like Pacifica's premium pitchers and the savings of the retired people past 60, there can never be enough scrutiny! My biggest concern is that unethical does not necessarily mean illegal.

    With regards to Reese, she is an opportunist, as evidenced by her, a claimed left-wing progressive associating with a tax avoidance school scam, that attracted the elements of extremist right. Reese is not suited for the job, because she sees Pacifica as a business (as I seen a number of anonymous posters here defending the premium sales and ignorant in their small business owner's view of the economy as entrepreneurial capitalism). This shows that Reese lacks education and experience to run a non-profit educational foundation. There are a public, private and political sectors, each requires a different set of skills to run, that's why we have MBA's running businesses and MPA (Masters of Public Administration). That's why Harvard has a Harvard Business School and also a Kennedy School of Government. That is why non-profits are typically ran by MPA's, and why MPA's are also hired by huge companies that need to formulate public policy and have dealings with the public sectors. MPA's learn how to raise funds to keep entities in public interest running independently. The fact that an ambitious shark like Reese was allowed to rise and was hired as an executive director by the Pacifica National Board shows its utter incompetence. The fact that you have bonzes, like Berthold Reimers, fancying himself an business executive, shows the historic ignorance and parochialism of people who run Pacifica, because they never hired an appropriate professional to run the station as a general manager.

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  6. That audio clip was of the public portion of the 3 April National Board. After - what was it, 90 mins to agree what the agenda would be? - they then went into closed session. An hour ago, c. midday PT, Sunday, 6 April, the report of what went on was published. This is it in its glorious entirety:

    "The Pacifica National Board met in executive session to consider legal matters. No decisions were made.
    Respectfully submitted,
    Cerene Roberts
    Board Secretary" [of course, undated]

    Bless us & save us.

    Deckchairs & Titanic. Whilst Rome burns. If the National Board won't discuss the crisis, devise a strategy, motivate all those that keep Pacifica going, then the licences to broadcast will simply be taken away. End of.

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    1. Ah, Cerene! I understand that she was overlooked when Pacifica gave out the last several bunches of combat medals.

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