"Concerned Listerers" Supporters-Candidates Sue Pacifica To Cover-up Election Misdeeds

If you want to check the case out on the Alameda Superior Court web site you have use the entire case number. RG07362157

If you read the Complaint filed by the CL folks the first thing you notice is what is missing from your basic suit that asks the court to straighten out an election, a request for a TRO or Temporary Restraining Order. A TRO asks the court to stop the process and straighten things out based on violations of law, Bylaws or principles of equity etc. The CL folks didn't ask for such relief?

The first court date for the suit CL filed is in May of 2008. The suit filed in New York over election irregularities has already had a court hearing and has another in January. Perhaps the reason that the CL folks didn't seek a TRO is that you have to present evidence filed with the request showing serious or irreparable harm that requires the court to step in immediately. The usual way to do this is in the form of Declarations under penalty of perjury for parties and/or witnesses. Perhaps none of the CL plaintiffs wanted to make a statement under oath or none of them thought it was really an urgent matter. Perhaps all they wanted to do was scare the National Election Supervisor(NES) into certifying the KPFA listener election.

I wonder if Pacifica Foundation Counsel, Dan Siegel, advised the NES of the weaknesses of this suit and that he could finish his work with the KPFA recount long before the court would get involved? Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot for a moment, he was prior counsel for one of the plaintiffs, Sherry Gendelman, and had improperly intervened in the election on the side of CL, wearing his other hat, as Interim Executive Director. Not likely that the NES will get straight advice.

Other facts are worth mentioning with this suit. The basic information I have is that the NES was suggested for the job by a Los Angeles PNB ally of CL. Perhaps when the NES's sense of fairness started to overcome his loyalty to those that got him the job, given CL's allies gross violations, they decided they needed to sue to scare him and get him back in line. I hope everyone understands that the NES would pay nothing if he lost the suit. The costs and fees would be born by Pacifica, your and my donation dollars.

When La Varn Williams and I were pushing for Director's inspections, an "absolute right" guaranteed under our Bylaws and State law, and wrongfully denied by the then ED who was supported by a close vote on the PNB with Sarv Randhawa and William Walker and the Justice and Unity folks all voting against transparency, the same group that supports this law suit criticized me for pointing out at a PNB meeting that if they didn't start allowing Director's inspections I would have no choice but to ask the court to enforce the rules that the then ED and PNB were wrongfully denying Directors. So they condemn others that may sue for rights denied by the "dismantlers" and their PNB allies but it is OK for them to sue to leverage the NES to certify an election they sabotaged! Are these the principles of people you want running KPFA and Pacifica?

At the recent KPFA LSB meeting many CL supporters spoke and accused the NES of being incompetent. Some other folks have opined that perhaps the NES was picked so that the elections would not go well, another form of "dismantling" the democratic process.

Finally, it is unanimous, among my attorney colleagues, some that do corporate law on a regular basis, that having an Interim Executive Director who is also Foundation Counsel is not the recommended way to do things. Having the IED's law partner act as Foundation counsel is also not proper since your law partner is you in the conflict sense. Giving yourself legal opinions destroys the checks and balances of having independent legal advice protecting the Foundation.

Pacifica needs to have legal advise from some one who is not politically involved so that they can rely on the opinions and know that they are objective and not violating conflict issues or tilted toward one faction on the PNB, JMHO.

Richard Phelps

So, CL going to court to have it enforce the bylaws deadline to certify is a BAD thing, and you suing a listener for exercising his right of free is speech is somehow NOBLE.

No wonder your Peoples Radio allies got their collective asses handed to them.

Sue Mei

Is Sue Mei a pseudonym for Sherry Gendelman?

Sue Mei: So, CL going to court to have it enforce the bylaws deadline to certify is a BAD thing,

Richard Phelps: If you read the article I wrote I never said that. I just pointed out that they didn't file the kind of suit one does to challenge an election and get prompt results if there is real irreparable harm. TRO!

Sue Mei: and you suing a listener for exercising his right of free is speech is somehow NOBLE.

Richard Phelps: Sue Mei, you really love to repeat your lies over and over again. It doesn't make them true, it only reduces whatever credibility you may have left on IndyBay, if any. For all those that you hope to prejudice with your continued assault on the facts, again the TRUTH: I sued him for defamation, printing lies about me repeatedly, not for political criticisms which he has every right to say his opinions, but for stating facts that were just plain wrong and defamatory, like Sue Mei does. You also ignore the fact that I asked him to stop for several months and he refused even after I told him if he didn't I would sue him. After the suit his criticism and distortions of reality didn't stop but the lies went way down. So it served the purpose it was filed to accomplish.

With regard to your comment about the election results, I would consider them to be more of a concern if the election was fair and not full of violations and dirty tricks and improper use of the station's resources for one side. But then the Republicans always say the same thing about Gore and Kerry regarding 2000 qnd 2004 despite all the evidence of dirty tricks. So Sue Mei, you and your allies are paralleling the Republicans so often. Your folks are clearly the conservatives/right wing and not the progressives in this political arena.

Notice that the illegal Bensky e-mail blast and the improper Dan Siegel, IED- letter attacking Peoples Radio, and the refusal to use the station to educate the listeners about the election, including a three week Gag on election info after the ballots were mailed, didn't work on the staff since they know what goes on behind the Mic. The ruling elite lost the staff election BIG TIME! Brian Edwards-Tierkert who came in first in 2004 came in third in the second to final round until Mary Tilson dropped out and transferred votes to him to get him into second. But the progressive candidates won two of the three seats, a first, despite some dirty tricks there also.

First Place votes: Shahram 57, Brian 25, Mary Tilson 22. The total first place votes for the Progressive candidates was 72 and for the "dismantlers" 57. I think the vote of the staff that does most of the work at the station was sending a very strong message to the small group that wants to continue to run the station by edict vs. democratic process and collaboration.

Perhaps, Sue Mei, you could start the new year with a commitment to the facts in search of truth and a more progressive, democratic/transparent and accountable KPFA and Pacifica. And my offer to have a public debate with Sue Mei or anyone else on the problems of KPFA and Pacifica still stands.

Richard Phelps

Regardless of what one feels about the crisis at KPFA the election results are puzzling . For example Richard Phelps has been no doubt the number one target of the Concerned Listeners . Not that there is anything wrong with that as long as it's political and not personal . He has been the most visable symbol of Peoples Radio . (though i have heard that's he's not their leader, that they have a collective leadership )
Yet he won and the other actual Peoples radio candidates lost badly . Why ? That's puzzling . Another surprise is that a running mate of Steve Zelzter's won . He makes Phelps and Peoples radio seem like moderates !
i have heard that the staff elections went well for Peoples radio . Two staff members opposed to Sasha Lilly won . How could this have happened ? After all aren't the Concerned Listeners supposed to be the pro-staff group and Peoples Radio their enemy of the staff ?
Sarv Randawa told me that the voters have spoken .Ok but in what language ?

In the listener election, people made it very clear that they want a diversity of perspectives represented. Not surprising, although perhaps unlikely to be a recipe for harmony.

In the staff election, you simply aren't making the distinction between the folks on the payroll and the much larger group of unpaid staff volunteers, quite a few of whom are angry at the derecognition of their 18 year old UPSO organization by the station management in August of 2007. That station management is assertively supported and defended by the CL-Wellstone contingent on the board of directors. So it isn't surprising that staff candidates who claim they are affiliated with that contingent didn't do too well.