WBAI Radio Listeners And Staff Rally To Reverse

Onslaught Of Firings, Program Changes And Gag Rule

Press Release: The Coalition to Take Back WBAI

WHAT: Demonstration to take back WBAI and keep it under local control

WHEN: Wednesday, June 17, 5:00 - 8:00 PM

WHERE: In front of WBAI, 120 Wall St. (corner of South Street). Trains: 2,3,4,5 to Wall St.

A broad coalition of WBAI Radio listeners, staff, and community activist organizations will hold a rally in front of the station on June 17 to protest a wave of recent firings, program changes, and the imposition of a "gag rule" on dissenting programmers. The Coalition to Take Back WBAI charges that the changes are aimed at undermining the station's long history of providing a channel for diverse community issues and movements, with a particular open door for communities of color.

Last month, Grace Aaron, the Interim Executive Director of the Pacifica Foundation, the national organization that holds the license for WBAI and four other listener-sponsored, community-based radio stations, abruptly fired the New York station's General Manager, Anthony Riddle, after he refused her demand to fire Program Director Bernard White without due process. Pacifica then installed LaVarn Williams, Pacifica's Berkeley-based Chief Financial Officer, as Interim General Manager. Williams fired White and barred him from WBAI's studios and the airways. Since then, Williams has removed two popular programmers from the morning show, News Editor Don DeBar and Wednesday host Mimi Rosenberg, and barred criminal justice programmer Ayo Harrington from the studios and airways without any explanation. All three are critics of the new policies.

Williams also cut an hour from what had been a three-hour (6-9 AM) morning show showcasing local issues, using the last hour to run the national "Democracy Now" news magazine, formerly run only at 9 AM. "Democracy Now" co-hosts Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez issued a statement criticizing the time change and decrying the removal of White as Program Director. Earlier, Aaron had imposed a rule forbidding WBAI programmers from engaging in on-air discussions of station matters that she claimed would put Pacifica at "legal risk," but that opponents say is simply a gag rule to prevent airing news and dissenting opinions about the drastic changes underway.

"Pacifica national management, with the support of many local board members, has exploited and exaggerated WBAI's genuine financial crisis as a pretext for destroying the local autonomy that all the network's stations have had for decades," said Lisa Davis, a member of WBAI's Local Station Board. "The new management's goal is to reshape programming to include more celebrities and appeal to a more well-heeled audience," Davis added. She noted a wave of removals of other staffers, particularly people of color, around the network in recent months. Davis said, "A vitriolic campaign of racist stereotypes and false allegations of wrongdoing has gone on for years, seeking to eliminate particular staff and - at WBAI - claiming without basis that some programs are 'anti-white.'" In 2007, White, who is Black, filed a complaint with the Pacifica Board about racial harassment by members of the Local Station Board, which went unanswered. Another Black employee, former Pacifica Chief Financial Officer Lonnie Hicks, recently filed a lawsuit charging wrongful termination and racial discrimination.

All of these events have spurred the formation of the Coalition to Take Back WBAI, which represents many listeners, staff, and community leaders such as City Councilmember Charles Barron and prominent defense attorney Lynne Stewart, as well as dozens of organizations ranging from the People's Organization for Progress, a New Jersey human rights organization, to the December 12th Movement, an organization for Black liberation, to ProLibertad, the freedom campaign for Puerto Rican political prisoners, to ACT UP/New York, an AIDS activist group.

Coalition spokepeople said the rally is just the beginning, and that they will continue activities aimed at reversing what they call the "coup." Their goals include reinstatement of White, Riddle and all removed WBAI programmers; lifting the gag rule; and returning genuine autonomy to the station. Among the other efforts underway is a recall campaign to remove from office two of the Local Station Board members that the Coalition deems most destructive of local autonomy, board chair Mitchel Cohen and board member and multimillionaire marketing executive Steve Brown.

For more information, go to <http://www.facebook.com/pages/takebackwbaiorg/89438391508>http://www.facebook.com/pages/takebackwbaiorg/89438391508