Resolution of The Pacifica National Board Governance Committee Responding To Acts Recently Taken By Certain Actors Within The Pacifica National Foundation Environment

We have recently been letting you know that, much like what is happening with New York City Libraries, in a dismantling attack on WBAI, New York's only truly listener supported public radio station and the Pacifica network of terrestrial public radio station of which WBAI is a part, WBAI has recently been removed from the New York air waves by a small group acting secretly to shut it down.

See:

    •    How The Proposed Self-cannibalizing Sale of WBAI Radio (And Other Pacifica Network Stations?) To “Finance” Pacifica Operations Is Like The Self-cannibalizing Selling Off of New York City’s Important Libraries To “Finance” Libraries- There Is Absolutely No Future In It


    •   Resolution of WBAI’s Local Station Board Responding To Shutdown of WBAI New York

Also for more overview and fairly regular updates on what is going on with the Pacifica Network as well as WBAI, which the costly shut down has now brought much focus to, we highly recommend the post you can find at Pacifica in Exile.  The perspective you will find there is informed and insightful.

There is also a petition up that you can now sign requesting that WBAI be put back on the air.

We further present the following resolution that was adopted by the Pacifica National Board Governance Committee on October 23, as providing more insight.

Resolution of The Pacifica National Board Governance Committee Responding To Acts Recently Taken By Certain Actors Within The Pacifica National Foundation Environment                                               

Whereas, a number of acts have been taken recently by individuals within the Pacifica Foundation environment including actions taken to shutdown one of Pacifica’s five terrestrial radio stations, WBAI, broadcasting in New York City to the New York metropolitan region, and also the filing of a lawsuit against the Pacifica Foundation as well as against the individuals who are directors of the Pacifica Foundation;

Whereas, the actions to shutdown WBAI were taken in secret and without consultation with those whom it would be expected would be required to be informed and from whom approvals would be required in accordance with the good and proper governance of Pacifica including how it is envisioned and provided for under the Pacifica Foundation bylaws, including that the actions were done without consultation and kept secret from the WBAI Local Station Board and from the Pacifica National Board;

Whereas, the filing of the lawsuit against the Pacifica Foundation as well as against the individuals who are directors of the Pacifica Foundation was undertaken with secrecy and without discussion or consultation with the Pacifica National Board Governance Committee which has as its purview and responsibility ensuring the proper governance of the Pacifica Foundation including that is to “regularly review the Foundation's bylaws and policies for governance of Board activities,” but the Bylaws lawsuit was kept secret from the Pacifica National Board Governance Committee and it was not consulted about it beforehand;

Whereas, it is an especial affront to this committee that members of this committee, with the resources and recourse of the committee available, participated in the filing of the bylaws lawsuit without such consultation;

Whereas, the Bylaws lawsuit, by its own express terms appears to be an effort to supplant, with costly litigation, the normal appropriate governance of the Pacifica Foundation; and

Whereas, the Pacifica National Board has recently voted taking a number of actions to reverse the shutdown of WBAI and take other corrective action with respect; now, therefore be it

RESOLVED, by the Pacifica National Board Governance Committee as follows:

Section 1.  We declare a general condemnation of the unauthorized and secretive actions described above that were recently taken by those certain actors responsible for them.

Section 2.  We second the actions of the Pacifica National board by calling for the restoration  of WBAI to the status in which it stood as of October 4, 2019.

Section 3.  We note for the record that the need to call for this restoration of WBAI and the taking of other corrective action with respect thereto is necessary because of the substantial breaches of good corporate governance that the actions of those shutting down WBAI reflected.

Section 4.  We note for the record that these substantial breaches of good governance, injurious to the Pacifica Foundation to, are also undermining of the trust that is essential to good governance within our Pacifica Foundation so important to our functioning at maximum effectiveness and on an even keel such that much work must now be done to restore that trust.

Section 5.  We call for an immediate withdrawal by the plaintiffs of the bylaws lawsuit and their efforts to supplant normal governance.
                       
Section 6.   This resolution shall take effect immediately and direct the chair of this committee to forward this resolution to the Pacifica National Board and make every effort to promulgate it widely for public view and to ensure it becomes widely known that the Committee denounces the shutdown of WBAI, the locking out of WBAI's staff, the taking over of its programming and the attempt to supplant the Pacifica Foundation’s appropriate internal governance with costly litigation.