Open Response from One LSB Member = repost from la.indymedia.org

[by Leslie Saturday, Nov. 29, 2008 at 12:50 AM
leslie@radiojustice.net ]


Do the LSB of KPFK represent a group[s] of listeners and seek their opinions before voting or making any decisions, instead of only representing their individual selves as seems to be the case now ?

We're elected by general election (and the electorate is only a smidgeon more than 10% of the listener-sponsors), so no one has a formal constituency, and we have very poor communications with the listener-sponsors or the listeners in general. Most LSB members probably operate from an ideology that they believe matches a group of listeners, but individually we have different degrees of contact with those groups.

Who does each LSB member actually represent ?

I'd say most LSB members consider themselves "representative of" a group more than they "are representing" a group.

Do they ever tell us about the size of groups they actually inform, ask, represent? ?

There's no mandate to do so, and no requirement that they represent a group.

What are the slants of those they represent ?

Politically, I think you'll find everything from left Libertarians to Progressive Democrats to academics to working class/socialists to a closeted anarchist or revolutionary. Not a nationalist in the bunch right now. We're religious, a-religious, anti-religious, and spiritual, and we're involved in the arts, charitable organizations, human rights groups, and social change organizations.

What are the ways listener-sponsors can have input to LSB members to be included, instead of just hanging out here ?

There's 2008LSB@kpfk.org. It reaches all but a couple of us (server problems). We have the rarely used http://groups.yahoo.com/group/kpfklsb_comments/ (although I don't know how many members check it any more), and just about every LSB member's email is widely available. When I wasn't on the LSB I used my (now defunct) rented web server to forward email from anybody to all the LSB members, but that was rarely used. At another point, I just collected LSB members' email addresses and had them as a group in my address book.

the way the LSB member was elected was by campaigning for votes but are these secret lists only they maintain and respond to... or are these voters then later ignored ?

"Secret lists" is a not exactly what's happening. When we're elected, we all have our own mailing lists and the lists of our friends and any organizations that choose to let us use theirs. There is one truly secret list: the email list of people participating in the Free Pacifica movement some ten years ago. A handful of people have that, and they use it for candidates they prefer, but it must be getting pretty dated by now. I don't have access to it.

Who decides who gets on the Pacifica National Board from LSB and what is the procedure for getting to move up there ?

PNB members are determined by a vote of the LSBs every January. It's the only true power the LSBs have. The Pacifica affiliate stations also nominate two PNB members.

and does it actually take hours and days and weeks of reading the bylaws and rules and all that small print to get generally informed about how KPFK & Pacifica too is actually run ?

No. It depends on the depth you want, but the Bylaws, etc. isn't the way to go. Start by following http://groups.yahoo.com/group/freekpfk, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/newpacifica, and http://groups.yahoo.com/group/kpfklsb. Then come to a few meetings, and if you have time the interest to listen, you can hear the Pacifica National Board meetings at www.kpftx.org.

does one have to be a quasi-lawyer to understand the legalities, meanings of cue words and phrases and the maneuverability of motions, language and ploys played out to have any input in what happens to OUR KPFK ?
huh?

No, but it helps. You'll pick up the trick by listening to objections to motions at the meetings.

we out here, who have paid-up generously at the long and last begging pledge drive have no information - just rumors - just allusions - to the use of the KPFK bldg being used as collateral for another Pacifica station in NY called WBAI - with the Pacifica National Board members making decisions about how to use the building that houses our resource and where our staff work. huh ?

[apparently THEY = PNB = own it ? huh?
how does that make sense ?
the whole group owns OUR building and we rent it here ?
or the Pacifica corp / organization owns it ?
or exactly who holds the deed, pays the mortgage, has title ??]

It's not our building--it was a donation to Pacifica, and the title is held by the Pacifica Foundation. We use it without charge. Right now, the plan is to mortgage the building to for $1M (far less than it's worth) to pay for various outstanding bills, do some programming changes, re-staff some national positions, pay for some promotion, and maybe hire an financial consulting firm.

And decisions are being made where ?

who is NOT PROVIDING THE LISTENERS any information, or any feedback to questions, or asking for listener-input
[no matter how wild or crazy, it is legitimate if we are the shareholder-sponsors of this thing called KPFK, whatever it contains] ?

Are decisions being made in Wash. D.C. ? in NY ? and then brought it in pretense of a 'discussion' that has no power to change what was already planned, decided and controlled elsewhere ?

Decisions are made in telephonic PNB meetings and with the CFO in Berkeley. Some speculate that there are a core of key players on the PNB who are concocting all this. I wouldn't know. Recently especially, by the time decisions get down to the LSBs (which are advisory anyway, and why aren't decisions going up?), they seem to be already made. But the LSB outcry seems to have slowed the loan process (we were told we only had until November 15, but the papers haven't been signed yet), and listener pressure can move small mountains. The email address to reach the entire PNB is pnb@pacifica.org.

And since we all over here dont - dont know s......t - about any of what is real, actual, occurring - and NOT in our name either - tho we thought we were part of the whole thing.....we are no thing, no way to have any opinion or say when we are not told what is occurring either.

Believe me, most of the LSB members who aren't on the PNB don't know what's going on, either. I don't know how much the PNB members know--if I knew how much they knew, I'd probably know what they know.


Where is the principle and essence of what Pacifica claims, what KPFK pledges and advertises...as 'we the people', ...as Free Speech [not hidden secret whispers ], ....as being in favor of egalitarian and open communications ?

what is going on ?

Hell if I know.

who else is going to tell us...the truth...finally ?