Thursday, January 4, 2018

Kettle calling....


Insignificant e-mail sent by Berthold Reimers within minutes of participating in WBAI's "Report to the Listener." A man who cannot tell a truth accuses Andrew Leslie Phillips of lying.

Andrew,
Shame on you. You keep lying. WBAI had nothing with audit not being done. You are clueless, have no backbones. You decided to leave WBAI and blamed it on Summer but it was because of your paranoia and weakness. Summer gave you a chance to help WBAI because I begged her to do so because I believed in you and gave you the authority to make the changes. Of course, all decisions you make can't go exactly your way because of the money problem we had and could not send to hire what you needed. I gave you full authority and power to make any changes you wanted and I backed you up but you punked out. These are the facts. I thought you were retiring and staying out of Pacifica. I have watched you lied and blamed everyone but you. I have also heard you perpetuate the lie of WBAI keeping double accounting book. This tells me that you are either totally clueless or dishonest. 
Click on image to enlarge
I stayed away from this stupid exchange of this list where ... I will refrain from giving my opinion of this list. But I had to set the record straight. 2018 is a new year and I am no longer letting people lie or be dishonest with impunity.

Be man enough and call me 646-620-7833 and we can talk or I would love to see you face to face eye to eye and see if you can lie in front of me.

Berthold. WBAI Radio 99.5 FM
General Manager



Berthold,

For the record this is how I recall it.

I resigned as interim PD at WBAI in mid October, 2013 after ten weeks on the job because:

1) I knew that if WBAI were to succeed it was imperative to have a strong morning presence. In my first weeks on the job you and Summer Reese failed to provide promised funding and support for the project.  This after Summer Reese and I negotiated with radio agent, Ron Hartenbaum, who'd she’d asked to help find a host for a new morning format at WBAI. This was an audacious proposal that I supported. It was the kind of out-of-the-box thinking Summer was capable of that, along with other deep program changes, may have saved the station. Hartenbaum offered  names like Thom Hartman and David Pakman and finally Karen Hunter who you can read about here:
 :https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Hunter. You’ll see she now has her own show on Sirius Satellite Radio. Since WBAI had no facilities, Hartenbaum found WBAI a professional studio at CBS at no cost to run this show. Karen Hunter, offered to help create it as a volunteer though there were expenses of course which you and Summer would not or could not meet. In fact Summer disappeared from the negotiation which was rather unnerving as she ultimately held the purse strings.  The plan was to try Hunter for a few months and see if we could break into the NYC market and become a contender. We'll never know.  


2) After that fiasco I asked WBAI’s operations director, Tony Ryan to coordinate with Jon Almelah, long-time Pacifica Technical Director and Jake Glanz, an old colleague of mine whose kept the WBAI transmitter running at the Empire State building for years, to install a Comrex system at The Commons building in Brooklyn where there was no radio studio.  Laura Flanders had agreed to work with us in the mornings, at no cost. Setting up a Comrex is a simple thing but for some reason it never worked. It was becoming evident that WBAI’s operations skills were insufficient to say the least. Almelah and Glanz were ready, willing and able to take the next step and install a simple studio but that didn’t happen either because there was no support .  A radio station can’t run without a studio and good tech support and "renting" a studio way uptown (but not paying the rent) was not a long term solution. You may recall that I brought all this to your attention.


3) The final straw came when Summer and you overrode my plan to try ween WBAI from the premium and fulfillment model that has been such a long-term disaster at WBAI. Since we had no morning host I was doing the show  - as other program directors had before (and since). But it was never a solution.  You and Summer insisted that Gary Null, with whom I had no personal animosity and who's done a great deal over the years in support of WBAI, take over the morning during fundraising and pitch his products. I walked! I remember Null opening that morning segment with Wagner's - Ride of the Valkyries!



Finally, the fact that you and other managers and some program directors before you, were illegally duplicating material for premiums which was actually against the law - and then not fulfilling listener pledges - frightened the shit out of me. I didn’t want to be a party to that and neither did another program director a while later. You may remember talk of bringing in New York's Consumer Affairs and Attorney General. 


No Berthold, it has nothing to do with backbone. I  don’t know anything about “two sets of books” I do know that WBAI seemed unable to comport with Pacifica’s accounting system and that you were in charge of the accounts. 

And I do know that you have shown no leadership - that you let WBAI flounder during Hurricane Sandy because you were unable to make very simple back-up plans. All you needed was a Comrex and a telephone line. Radio can really shine and provide real and essential services at such times but you failed our community.  WBAI went dark. You should have been sacked then. And I do know that after the Sandy WBAI disaster, over at KPFA where I was the terrible manager Mr Steinberg excoriates, I had KPFA raise nearly $200k for WBAI. I think you and Mr Steinberg, if you ask, will find that I left KPFA with head high and a new very successful morning show in place and the station in good shape despite - shall I say - the kangaroo court orchestrated by Summer Reese and Tracy Rosenberg. 

So though I respect your tenaciousness hanging onto your bloated salary for so long I don't think you have offered much to Pacifica these past seven or so years but the imminent prospect of crashing the whole damn thing.

Andrew Leslie Phillips

917-771-9382

Robert Hennelly was WBAI's PD for a brief period, but he, too, fell victim to amateur management. A prolific print and radio journalist, Bob was a clear misfit in the polluted atmosphere of a crumbling WBAI and thus able to identify with Andrew's problems all too well. He sent the following  letter of support:

Jan 4 at 9:33 PM
​Andrew, it was always a pleasure to work with you. You have an impressive body of work and more importantly you have helped train scores of people ​who have all gone on do to important work.

For you it was always about the collective succeeding. I ran into the same fiscal nightmare you did including Gary Null confronting me just before a pledge drive about WBAI counterfeiting copyrighted material. Evidently, this has been going on for years. 

When I asks around people substantiated it and when I raised it with Summer and Berthold I was terminated. Of course management will say it was because I failed to raise money but my actual termination came a few minutes after I announced DC 37 Executive Committee donating $5,000. 

The continued use of the float of the money generated by pledges to cover other bills, ignoring the legal requirement to cover the premiums that are offered, makes the station an ongoing fraudulent enterprise. 

Current management will hold on to their stranglehold on the station until either law enforcement or creditors intervene.

Bob
Robert Hennelly

25 comments:

  1. Reimers should open a school for English as a second language...

    SDL

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  2. If there were any truth to Reimers’ claim that ESRT accepted WBAI’s offer of $12,000/month, then 1) They wouldn’t have sought judgement, and, 2) WBAI/Pacifica would have made that argument, with evidence, in opposing the judgement, at the very least naming names and specifying date(s) and other particulars of the meeting(s) and phone negotiations.

    ~ ‘indigopirate’

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    Replies
    1. My guess is that ESRT might have said something about not immediately going for eviction because of the shortfall, but there is no way that they would have agreed to refrain from recovering the full rent at some time.

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  3. Chris,

    Who graded Reimers' papers at Queens College and afterwards at Baruch?

    Ed Manfredonia

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  4. Well now the rest of us have a way to contact this head honcho. Jot down that number and spread it around.

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  5. Let's get this straight. The deal, as I heard it many times, was that WBAI would TEMPORARILY pay $12,000 with the difference being accrued for future payment. WBAI was NOT being let off the hook for the full payment, nor was full payment being forgiven.

    SDL

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    Replies
    1. More important, let's open the books and see what Berthold was doing, keeping his own system within the network doesn't look or smell Kosher. For all his bluster, the IED needs a forensic audit of WBAI's books.

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    2. Reading Berthold's experience, he managed a staff of 230 employees? No wonder Pacifica is broke, still waiting for my check.

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  6. I always wonder what everyone is doing while listening to these PNB fiascos. I'm eating some Thai peanut soup, and then I'm going to play some Call of Duty: WWII, while laughing at the Funny Bunny Bunch, as I have taken to calling them.

    SDL

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    Replies
    1. Well, I for one, sit back and take a long pull on my Double Helix Water and work on my intentions of getting rich using my the latest premium, that is when it arrives.

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    2. I heard adding Red Stuff to it can make you immortal...

      SDL

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  7. Chris,

    Whenever the WBAI Finance Committee requested information from R Paul Martin, an individual who overestimates his cognitive powers, concerning the ESRT contract, Martin would state that the information was privileged.
    Mitchel Cohen never deviated from the official line of Martin. Cohen is as responsible for this debacle as Martin.

    Thank you.
    Ed Manfredonia

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  8. This is exactly why Pacifica should be permenantly shut down and top management should be banned for life from radio. How come neither Reimers or anyone else has been prosecuted? Because prosecutors think this is small time stuff. It's not because it involves millions of dollars in total assets. But they see it as, how will prosecuting this let us score points and make ourselves look good so we keep our jobs?

    Crosier's still convinced that his magical loan broker will line up one loan to help pay off another and another? In 4 days, ESRT can start to seize assets. Then, you can sit back and tell the warring Pacifica factions, see what your stupid ass bickering's accomplished? Are you happy with yourselves? You just destroyed the whole thing.

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  9. Crosier isn't on team loan He's on Team Chapter 11

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  10. Ultimately, all the talk and arguing is really about how Pacifica will go about operating in the same old fashion, while, somehow, getting someone else to pay for their political fantasy land. For all the time they spend arguing over agenda approval, minutes, etc., there is no discussion about lousy programming that brought them to this brink in the first place, which is the real cause, or they'd get enough money and have no debts.

    In the end, they are all insincere, and make excuses to cover up their own failings.

    SDL

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    1. @SDL With respect, just to compare notes with respect to a possible slight difference of opinion/judgement: I think that in one sense, they’re sincere. They’re simply talentless, not very bright, and purblind true-believer leftist political types. The programming they produce is I think all they’re capable of, and they’re sufficiently narcissistic that they probably think is Just Swell and Noble and Correct and True.

      They’re insincere and just plain lying about much of what they pretend to sell as ‘Premiums’ of course, but with respect to programming they’re probably pretty much sincere.

      Also stupid, boring [insert long list here]

      ~ ‘indigo’

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    2. Yesterday's PNB meeting was hilarious, not even the parliamentarian present was safe from the bickering.. KPFTX doesn't have it archived yet as of this morning.. aren't they supposed to archive the open meetings?

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    3. Never mind - it's up now.

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    4. @‘indigo’: I meant that the PNB people were were insincere. I know there are plenty of psychos who do programming and really believe their own drivel. I think the PNBers are all out for some agendas of their own, no matter how they talk.

      No matter what happens, they will probably be too stupid to read the fine print on the loan, bankruptcy or whatever documents and get a right royal fucking up the ass without lube.

      SDL

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    5. @SDL Correction accepted, thanks :)

      ~ 'indigo'

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  11. Andrew Leslie PhillipsFriday, January 05, 2018

    Tsk tsk. I've been on this extended email of about 90 addresses banging on about Pacifica and usually remind folks of "the manager's" $100k salary - for managing what? I don't know about "double accounting books" but understand WBAI's accounting system does not comport with Pacifica's. I replied to Berthold's school yard taunts and Chris you are welcome to post it here. Agree that a forensic audit would be a good idea at WBAI - and Pacifica for that matter. There is a history of malfeasance. I would like to see the network survive. Seven plus years of Berthold with seemingly no oversight from the LSB and PNB is pathetic.

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  12. Reggie said they're rebroadcasting yesterday's Kathy vs. Cerene fight now (2:00PM) for anyone who missed it.

    SDL

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    Replies
    1. Damn! I don't have any popcorn!

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    2. A hammer over the head will do...

      SDL

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    3. These are representatives of staff and listener ship? Ouch, no wonder Pacifica is in chaos. Where is Team Chapter 11 in this mix? Re-label the mp3 as a destructive duet, nothing comes of it. Who is lending the money and on what terms? There might be a conflict, and of course the listeners will be paying. A waste!

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