Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Are LMAs in bloom again?


It was 2013, a year during which Summer Reese was Pacifica's iED and rumblings of dissatisfaction could be heard across the Hudson and beyond. It came from unhappy staffers and listener supporters, and lit a growing demand for the removal of Berthold Reimers. Ms. Reese came to WBAI, looked at the problem first-hand, listened to complaints, and took appropriate action: Reimers was fired.

Cronies stepped forward and began making outrageously baseless excuses for this man, who may well be the worst General Manager in the station's history. Then the Pacifica National Board's corrupt majority used its authority to join the apologists. Summer Reese's sensible decision was overturned and she became this Board faction's next target.

Earlier that year, Reimers' ineptitude and ongoing failure to grasp even the basic principle of Lou Hill's original concept had brought the station to a point where an LMA seemed a reasonable option, short of selling WBAI outright.

A Local Marketing Agreement is, briefly put, a contract in which a company (Pacifica) agrees to lease and operate a broadcasting station from its owner—a time-buy, of sorts. Designed to give the lessee an opportunity to reconstitute a broken operation, LMAs are akin to bankruptcies, the idea being that the reins will be handed back to a healthier owner (lessor).

The concern is that LMAs have been known to become a first step in the outright sale of the station, a prospect that spawns protest from people who see such an arrangement as a deliberate spark generated by a faction of inside schemers who have long been making nefarious moves to regress Pacifica to a West Coast operation, dumping such vital locations as NYC and Washington, D.C.

Here. for your perusal and enlightenment, are two of the better proposals that were received in 2013: One from Auricle Communications, the other from MNN (Manhattan Neighborhood Network), a well-run New York Community TV alternative.

6 comments:

  1. I'll read these documents later when I have more time.

    i just want to quickly say that while eating dinner, I popped on WBAI to hear Null blather about how there are conspiracies and they're real. I have to agree with him on this point, since, I believe, WBAI management and many producers have a conspiracy to pitch premiums with the full knowledge they won't be sent to the people who bought them.

    SDL

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    1. Null was probably selling his survivor's kit—he paints a very gloomy picture in that pitch.

      Have you noticed how use of the terms "premium" and "thank you gift" has decreased? I am hearing frequent references to "price" and "pay", even from Null, who announces "we have lowered the price" when selling his new book. Funny how their rare telling of truth is a slip of the tongue. :)

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    2. No, because I have not been listening for more than a minute or two at a time. Without OTH or (barely) TPCS, I have no reason to listen to WBAI. I am better off reading news online, watching a movie, etc.

      I shall repeat again. WBAI is just a scam to suck money from the Remnants, who are stupid enough to keep contributing while being ripped-off.

      SDL

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    3. I just tuned in to hear Prescod say that she is winding up the spring fund drive. Spring in October? These people don't think anything through and don't care what they tell the Remnants—truth is an awful inconvenience, they claim to give "truth to power", but the former scares them while the latter eludes them.

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  2. Maybe they are just winding up the Spring 'thon. Finally reached that goal.

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