"Do We Need Pacifica?"

[DToTheJ]

Former KPFA board member Carol Spooner has an interesting write-up about the goings-on behind the scenes at San Francisco's Pacifica station, and even questions whether or not Pacifica should even exist in the first place.
http://sfbayview.com/2011/kpfa-a-tale-of-foxes-in-the-henhouse/

 

[LKellerIII]

Former KPFA board member Carol Spooner has an interesting write-up about the goings-on behind the scenes at San Francisco's Pacifica station, and even questions whether or not Pacifica should even exist in the first place.
http://sfbayview.com/2011/kpfa-a-tale-of-foxes-in-the-henhouse/

Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z-Z.

Controversy, double-dealing, back-stabbing and internecine warfare has followed Pacifica and KPFA for years - decades, maybe. Similar to many radical organizations of the 60s, it epitomizes what's wrong with left-wing activist politics, and why 'the movement' will never get anywhere in this country. Put a group of lefties together and they will eventually form into a circular firing-squad.

It's too bad, too - because the station has provided some worthy programming over the years.

 

[travisl5678]

Sell KPFA already! (yes I know it will never happen) What a waste of a perfectly good signal!

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Controversy, double-dealing, back-stabbing and internecine warfare has followed Pacifica and KPFA for years - decades, maybe. Similar to many radical organizations of the 60s, it epitomizes what's wrong with left-wing activist politics, and why 'the movement' will never get anywhere in this country. Put a group of lefties together and they will eventually form into a circular firing-squad.

Careful. Your observation that liberal/left wing groups have their share (and maybe more) of trouble making organizations function smoothly, I'm not sure that your ultimate conclusion is valid. Conservative groups have their share of trouble making their organizations function smoothly. It seems that the nature of conflict within liberal organizations takes on a different flavor than the nature of conflict within conservative organizations.

Take a look at the discord currently in the world of conservative organizations and then tell me with a straight face (and no crossed fingers behind your back) that circular firing squads are peculiar ONLY to liberal organizations.

It seems to be peculiar to HUMANITY in general.

As distasteful and they may seem to some, maybe both the Pacifica Organization and the station KPFA serve civilization in some back-handed kind of way. It's kind of like those white lines at the edge of the pavement... the "fog lines" as the officer will describe them it he stops you for weaving and you drive: How will we know where "the fog lines of life" are without an occasional circular firing squad from both the right and the left?

 

[recto101]

Keep KPFA there.

 

[1069_KIFR]

Yes we need Pacifica! That seaside town is very much needed as part of San Mateo County.

 

[icybluelake]

If we lose Pacifica, it would be a cataclysmic geological event. Worse yet if it took part of Daly City with it.

 

[radioguy39nj]

Sell KPFA already! (yes I know it will never happen) What a waste of a perfectly good signal!

The two FMs Pacifica will likely never give up are KPFA (94.1 FM) San Francisco and WBAI (99.5 FM) New York. Pacifica wouldn't sell these valuable pieces of FM real estate even if someone grossly overpaid for them. I'm sure they've had offers over the years.

WBAI has had trouble paying its bills and KPFA has probably had similar issues. Both stations are a waste of perfect signals!

 

[LKellerIII]

If we lose Pacifica, it would be a cataclysmic geological event. Worse yet if it took part of Daly City with it.

Actually, we are losing Pacifica - to the Pacific - a few yards of soil and rock at a time. In a few thousand year, it will probably be gone.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Both stations are a waste of perfect signals!

But don't forget the sign often found in antique shops: One man's trash.... is another man's treasure. ;D

 

[DavidKaye]

It's too bad, too - because the station has provided some worthy programming over the years.

They say that the making of democracy is a lot like the making of sausage. You like the end result, but you really don't want to see it being made.

If Pacifica and KPFA separate it wouldn't be such a bad thing. Pacifica could become a programming cooperative more like NPR, APM, PRI, etc. which in the long run would add more diversity to programming available to member stations.

 

[Starbucks]

If we lose Pacifica, it would be a cataclysmic geological event. Worse yet if it took part of Daly City with it.

Actually, we are losing Pacifica - to the Pacific - a few yards of soil and rock at a time. In a few thousand year, it will probably be gone.

I've heard that as well. Now if we can only place KPFA's transmitter tower there.

 

[Madmansam]

Sell KPFA already! (yes I know it will never happen) What a waste of a perfectly good signal!

The two FMs Pacifica will likely never give up are KPFA (94.1 FM) San Francisco and WBAI (99.5 FM) New York. Pacifica wouldn't sell these valuable pieces of FM real estate even if someone grossly overpaid for them. I'm sure they've had offers over the years.

WBAI has had trouble paying its bills and KPFA has probably had similar issues. Both stations are a waste of perfect signals!

I think it was mentioned on this board that King Broadcasting in the 1980's offered to swap the frequency of 93.3 (then KYA-FM) for 94.1 as well as added cash. And they turned that down.

 

[recto101]

We Need Pacifica Radio as much as we need NPR, CC, K-Love, KDIA, Fox, MSNBC, CNN, Link-TV,PBS, FSTV and others. Although I like to bash some people at each of these broadcast groups for being kneejerkers I believe they have a right to exist like Wikileaks.

 

[DavidKaye]

We Need Pacifica Radio as much as we need NPR, CC, K-Love, KDIA, Fox, MSNBC, CNN, Link-TV,PBS, FSTV and others. Although I like to bash some people at each of these broadcast groups for being kneejerkers I believe they have a right to exist like Wikileaks.

People like to bash Pacifica because they're sitting on two excellent commercial channels with wide coverage. Why are they complaining? Because they want to hear their oldies formats for the umpteenth times. Stations such as KPFA and WBAI (and KPFK, by the way) need those hefty signals because the audience for their programming is small in comparison. They need the reach.

It was the Pacifica stations that paved the way for free speech on the radio, for free association in the workplace, for the dissemination of divergent political viewpoints. True, today they stumble a bit and they fight with each other, but the Pacifica stations continue to air programming that challenge the status quo, that give alternate viewpoints, and also play music you won't find elsewhere on the dial.

 

[recto101]

We Need Pacifica Radio as much as we need NPR, CC, K-Love, KDIA, Fox, MSNBC, CNN, Link-TV,PBS, FSTV and others. Although I like to bash some people at each of these broadcast groups for being kneejerkers I believe they have a right to exist like Wikileaks.

People like to bash Pacifica because they're sitting on two excellent commercial channels with wide coverage. Why are they complaining? Because they want to hear their oldies formats for the umpteenth times. Stations such as KPFA and WBAI (and KPFK, by the way) need those hefty signals because the audience for their programming is small in comparison. They need the reach.

It was the Pacifica stations that paved the way for free speech on the radio, for free association in the workplace, for the dissemination of divergent political viewpoints. True, today they stumble a bit and they fight with each other, but the Pacifica stations continue to air programming that challenge the status quo, that give alternate viewpoints, and also play music you won't find elsewhere on the dial.

Wasn't KPFA Pacifica the first Non-Profit radio station in the country? I noticed it pre-dated KQED and NPR by 20-years. and KQED-FM was KXKX-FM a religious station in the 1940's to to 1960's. was KXKX-FM ever been accused of Camping type tactics in the 1950's?

 

[w9wi]

Wasn't KPFA Pacifica the first Non-Profit radio station in the country?

Not by a long shot.

The second broadcasting station licensed, Madison's WHA, was and still is a non-commercial outlet. Quite a few other public universities (and other public and private non-profit organizations) built stations in the 1920s. Stations at the Universities of Illinois (WILL-580), Minnesota (KUOM-770), and Iowa (WSUI-910) are among those still on the air.

Non-commercial *FM* also well predated Pacifica. The Cleveland Board of Education had an FM station in the late 1930s, and I'm not certain theirs was the first.

I suppose it's possible Pacifica was the first non-profit organization founded for the purpose of operating a radio station. (as opposed to non-commercial stations licensed to non-profit organizations whose primary purpose was other than radio)

 

[Laurence Glavin]

I was perusing americanradiohistory.com a few weeks ago to compile a list of cities in the USA that had at least three network-affiliated commercial VHF television stations in 1961; Newton Minow had said there were very few...I found about fifty, covering the vast majority of TV households when he was FCC commissioner. Anyway, I also fiddled with Broadcasting Magazine annuals and White's Radio logs just before and during WWII, and there were several noncommercial FMs in the 40 to 49 megahertz days. When the switch to 88.1 to 107.9 happened, they blithely made the transition.

 

[Madmansam]

Wasn't KPFA Pacifica the first Non-Profit radio station in the country?

Not by a long shot.

The second broadcasting station licensed, Madison's WHA, was and still is a non-commercial outlet. Quite a few other public universities (and other public and private non-profit organizations) built stations in the 1920s. Stations at the Universities of Illinois (WILL-580), Minnesota (KUOM-770), and Iowa (WSUI-910) are among those still on the air.

Non-commercial *FM* also well predated Pacifica. The Cleveland Board of Education had an FM station in the late 1930s, and I'm not certain theirs was the first.

I suppose it's possible Pacifica was the first non-profit organization founded for the purpose of operating a radio station. (as opposed to non-commercial stations licensed to non-profit organizations whose primary purpose was other than radio)

Was KPFA the first non-commercial in the Bay Area?

 

[DavidKaye]

Was KPFA the first non-commercial in the Bay Area?

No, not at all. KALW 91.7 was not only the first non-comm FM in the Bay Area, but one of the first in the nation. They're celebrating their 70th year right now! KALW was erected by GE for the 1939-40 Treasure Island world's fair, along with KGEI, a shortwave station. At the end of the fair, GE operated KGEI in Belmont next to KPO (today's KNBR), and gave the FM to the SF Unified School district, which began operations with it in 1941.

Going back into history, the first non-commercial radio station of any kind in the Bay Area would be hard to pinpoint because first you have to define non-commercial, and you have to do a lot of research. If a school is a non-commercial entity, then Doc Herrold's "San Jose Calling" in 1909 (today's KCBS) could qualify, given that he used it as a training ground for his electronics school in San Jose. But not long afterward it became the first commercial broadcast station as they began running ads for music stores and the like.

But there are numerous non-commercial stations going back to the 1920s. Today's KSFO was KTAB, run by the Tenth Avenue Baptist Church in Oakland. Today's KVTO 1400 was once KRE, operated by a Berkeley church (I forget which one). There were also numerous others that have been deleted over the years as well.