Financial results: KPFA beating budget, Pacifica lagging

KPFA’s most recent fund drive turnaround seems to have had a big impact on the station’s bottom line. On February 23, Pacifica distributed first-quarter income statements for the network. Brian Edwards-Tiekert (now serving as KPFA’s staff rep on the Pacifica National Board) reported the statements “show KPFA outperforming its budget to the tune of $115,000 in just three months. The main driver is KPFA’s fund drives — the statements show that KPFA brought in $154,348 more listener support than budgeted” before the most recent drive even started.

“The bad news,” said Edwards-Tiekert, “is that KPFA appears to be the only part of Pacifica doing well. First, a caveat: there appear to be some accuracy problems with the numbers that the Pacifica National Office distributed. As things stand, however, every other station in the network appears to be racking up deficits right now. The worst losses are coming from the Pacifica National Office, which appears to be over-spending its budget by roughly $80,000 per month. Pacifica’s current management has not made clear what is driving the over-spending.”

Late last year, Pacifica’s board allowed the contracts of then-executive director Arlene Engelhardt and then-CFO LaVarn Williams to expire. The chair of that board, Summer Reese, is currently also acting as the network’s interim executive director.

Surprising developments at the PNB meeting in Berkeley

PNB meeting audienceKPFA listeners and staff filled the July 20-23 meeting of the Pacifica National Board (PNB) in Berkeley past capacity, spilling into the hallway during public portions of the meeting. Listeners came from all over the broadcast area — Santa Rosa, Petaluma, San Jose, Oakland, and even Fresno and Los Angeles.

Dozens spoke up eloquently during public comment, opposing more cuts at KPFA, criticizing Pacifica’s current leadership, and challenging Pacifica Treasurer Tracy Rosenberg on her unproven budget claims.

“We need quality programming in order to keep listeners and subscribers,” long-time listener Ellen Jennings told the board. “I don’t believe KPFA can survive without quality programming such as UpFront, Letters & Politics, Against the Grain and the KPFA News team.”

6-10AM weekday fundraising averagesKPFA staff passed out this flyer explaining how further cuts to KPFA would hurt the entire network. One of several unpaid programmers who spoke, Glenn Reeder, said that austerity measures like the layoffs Pacifica was proposing “don’t improve institutions in the red — investing in people does.” Many of those present had already read the recent independent audits of Pacifica, showing a healthy KPFA, but massive financial problems in the mismanaged Pacifica National Office and at WBAI, the network’s New York station.

Listener Kate Gowen said that the conflict around the station had “laid bare two very different visions of what KPFA should be, and how the role of the National Board is to be defined.” Programmer Sasha Lilley told the board it would not solve Pacifica’s financial woes by cutting paid staff, because that would result in a loss of income and listenership, as happened the last time.

For many on the national board, it was the first time they’d seen KPFA’s listeners or staff face-to-face. And what a difference it made! Here are some major developments from the weekend’s meeting.

Victory: layoffs less likely at KPFA

Pacifica management had been trying to impose $1 million of cuts on its stations, and had been pressuring KPFA to reduce staffing by $300,000 – which could cost the station 7 to 8 positions, enough to take several programs off the air. Sasha Lilley at PNBPacifica management was insisting on the cuts even though KPFA is on track to have a six-figure budget surplus this year.

On the first day of its four-day meeting, the PNB took up a resolution by KPFA staff rep Laura Prives that called on Pacifica’s executives to disclose how much they wanted each station manager to cut, and to explain the rationale for demanding those cuts. Incredibly, Tracy Rosenberg and her board allies voted against this straightforward, sensible resolution, and as a 10 to 10 tie, it failed. The next morning, a lengthy resolution from Rosenberg that gave a free hand to Pacifica to cut wherever it wanted, also failed by a 10 to 10 vote

But then, things changed. During public discussions, it became clear that Pacifica’s executives — Arlene Engelhardt, the executive director, and LaVarn Williams, the CFO — couldn’t explain why they decided the stations should take $1 million in cuts. They had done no analysis on how layoffs might hurt fundraising efforts, and couldn’t articulate any plan for financial recovery. Public testimony from KPFA’s listeners and staff against further cuts was compelling and seemed to sway some board members.

On Monday, the PNB overwhelmingly passed a resolution by KPFA representative Dan Siegel calling on station managers to assess their individual financial situations, and submit financial plans for timely payments of all their bills. This is an important step forward for local control.

Siegel says the resolution commits Pacifica to a budget process that relies on “station management to monitor and control their budgets. This is just the first step. Somehow the National Office allowed $2 million in unpaid bills, including about $1.5 million to Democracy Now!, to accumulate,” said Siegel. “We have to figure out a way to pay off these bills without undermining the functioning of our stations. The third priority is to finally deal with WBAI’s $800,000 in annual rent, which has weighed down the entire network for years. I am pushing for a quick solution that involves moving to a cheaper location in New Jersey, Queens or Brooklyn, and use of a different broadcast tower,” Siegel added.

So long, Arlene Engelhardt?

Mitch Jeserich at PNBSaveKPFA readers will remember Arlene Engelhardt: she’s the heavy-handed Pacifica manager who killed the Morning Show — at the time, KPFA’s most popular program and the station’s biggest fundraiser — and then refused pledges of over $60,000 from KPFA listeners who wanted to help. LaVarn Williams is the network’s CFO.

After a long, closed-door session, PNB chair Summer Reese read this statement: “At its meeting on July 22, the Pacifica National Board decided to open searches for the positions of Foundation Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer. The contractual terms of the incumbents, Executive Director Arlene Engelhardt and Chief Financial Officer LaVarn Williams, conclude on November 30, 2012. The Board invited Ms. Engelhardt and Ms. Williams to apply for new terms in their positions.”

margy with crowdKPFA’s local board chair Margy Wilkinson commented after the meeting: “We’ll need to talk about what this means, but I’d like to think that a majority of the PNB recognize that Pacifica is in terrible shape and these two executives cannot provide the leadership to begin to solve the problem. We’ll have to keep talking but I’m feeling better about Pacifica than I have in a long time.”

This good news is due to the hard work, persistence and support of the thousands of you who have signed petitions, sent emails, joined protests, and attended meetings. Thank you!

Support KPFA’s fund drive

kpfa logoRight now, the most important thing you can do to fight cuts to the programs you care about is to donate to KPFA’s Summer Mini-Fund Drive currently underway so the station stays in the black.

PLEASE NOTE: this fund drive is the last chance you have to become a KPFA member or renew your membership in time to vote in the upcoming general elections. SaveKPFA will be fielding a set of candidates, and we’ll need your vote. But you can’t vote if you haven’t donated, so please pledge at least $25 now!

Listeners love KPFA’s new UpFront program at 7AM

The new UpFront program from 7-8 AM hosted by KPFA’s Brian Edwards-Tiekert and KPFK’s Sonali Kolhatkar brought in the highest number of pledges per hour during KPFA’s spring fund drive, raising nearly $40,000 in just 7 days — an astonishingly good response to a new show rushed onto the air with virtually no advance publicity.

That helped KPFA’s drive finish up with nearly $690,000,  about 7% short of its $740,000 goal. You can see a breakdown of pledges by program here. UpFront‘s presence in the AM drive time also clearly pushed other slots to higher fund totals.

UpFront is an initiative of the KPFA News Department, which was given the green light by interim general manager Andrew Phillips, who admitted the decision was a “180- degree turn” for him and that “politics” had prevented him from acting sooner. Phillips told KPFA’s board on June 2 he’d received overwhelmingly positive comments about UpFront. He said the Morning Show was disbanded by Pacifica’s executive director Arlene Engelhardt in “a very abrupt, unconsultative manner,” as a result of which he heard “tremendous pain, anger, frustration, anguish from this community.” | LISTEN to Phillips (1-min audio) [longer discussion below, in the LSB meeting, part 1]