Pacifica Works to Restore ‘Democracy Now!’

The fractured board of the left-leaning Pacifica radio network elected five new directors Wednesday--including former Washington, D.C., mayor Marion Barry and comedian/activist Dick Gregory--a move that members said would either begin healing the organization or dangerously escalate its internal conflict.

Members of the Pacifica Foundation board are united, however, regarding the network’s signature program, “Democracy Now!” An emergency meeting was scheduled for Oct. 3 to figure out how to get the show back on the air. The board oversees the five-station network that includes North Hollywood-based KPFK-FM (90.7) and stations in Berkeley, Houston, Washington and New York.

“Democracy Now!” has been broadcasting from New York, through last week’s terrorist attacks, but has not been heard for more than a month on KPFK and three of the other four Pacifica-owned stations because of a dispute between host Amy Goodman and network executives.

Board member and Washington attorney John Murdock said of a move to end the conflict with Goodman: “I don’t think there’s any reason to wait. It’s gone on a long time.” He added that last week’s terrorist attack and the subsequent reaction are testing “the historical strengths of Pacifica.”

“We’re all going to be greatly challenged individually and as a country,” Murdock said, regarding civil liberties, racial profiling and other social-justice issues. “We’ve got to find a way to unleash the power of Pacifica. I don’t know what the solution is, but I hope we can get together.”

Pacifica, founded after World War II in Berkeley by pacifist Lewis Hill, has ever since been an outlet for liberal ideals in America--even when such stands were unpopular, such as during the McCarthy era of the 1950s, or the Vietnam and Gulf wars.

“This is all so serious, and the only independent media network in the country is needed now more than ever,” Goodman said. “It’s absolutely critical we live up to that tradition, to bringing out the voices of people who don’t want to answer the killing of civilians with the killing of civilians.”

Goodman was broadcasting her show from a studio in a firehouse a few blocks from the World Trade Center when the planes hit, and camped out there for days, fearing authorities wouldn’t let her and her crew back in the area if they went home. But because of the management dispute with Pacifica, only the Berkeley station has been carrying her shows, while the rest aired reruns.

The attack cut electricity to Pacifica’s New York station, WBAI, which went silent until it regained power two days later. The rest of the network heard reports from the staff of its other national show, “Pacifica Network News.”

“We could have been on for the New York audience,” said Goodman, whose show airs weekday mornings from 6-7 a.m. and again from 9-10 a.m. on KPFK. “We’d bring people upstairs and interview them as they stumbled out of the World Trade Center.”

Goodman and her staff left WBAI and began broadcasting “Democracy Now!” from an alternative studio in Manhattan after a series of conflicts with WBAI management and staff, which led to a grievance filed with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.

Before the attack, a majority of board members wrote Pacifica executive director Bessie Wash and asked her to air the current “Democracy Now!” episodes, not reruns, while the dispute was resolved.

Wash refused, saying in an interview that the foundation could jeopardize its FCC license if it allowed “Democracy Now!” to broadcast off-site unsupervised.

AFTRA has been negotiating ever since with Pacifica attorneys about resolving the problems at WBAI. But true to the fractious nature of Pacifica’s internal conflict, even that process is in dispute.

Pacifica says it signed an agreement with AFTRA to ensure employee safety at the station, but that “Democracy Now!” staffers are ignoring it. AFTRA says it learned of other threats that need to be investigated before Goodman and her staff return.

For several years Pacifica has been descending into chaos, with an outspoken group of listeners and board members charging that the network is now controlled by a group trying to push it toward the mainstream. Those on the other side say they’re simply trying to strengthen the network by improving its reach and diversifying its voices.

The dispute has been marked by wholesale firings of executives and on-air personnel, aggressive public-relations campaigns, station pickets and even the shutdown of KPFA-FM in Berkeley for three weeks in 1999, spurring protests by thousands of listeners.

It has also spawned a trio of lawsuits now pending in Alameda County, Calif., Superior Court that contend Pacifica directors and executives disenfranchised the local stations’ listener advisory boards, squandered foundation money and illegally excluded the public from meetings.

“The politics of Pacifica over the last few years have been about power and control,” said board member Rob Robinson of Washington, not about improving technology or increasing listeners or funding. “It’s torn the network right down to the ground.”

Barry is hopeful the shift in board membership can bring a resolution to Pacifica’s internal conflicts.

“I think I can be a bridge between the dissidents and the other board members. I think we can quiet some of the animosities,” Barry said after the meeting. “We need to get down to the business of providing a good alternative radio outlet.”