TAKE BACK WBAI! UNDO THE COUP!

2010 elections will soon be underway for the WBAI Local Station Board. To have voting rights, please become a member, or renew your membership, by June 30, 2010 (everything must be received, not postmarked, by that date). To do so online, please go to: http://www.wbai.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=9898.

Please continue reading below for more information.

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WE NEED YOUR HELP! * FIGHT BACK! * BECOME A WBAI VOTING MEMBER!
To reverse the destructive changes at WBAI over the past year (see below), it is crucial that the Justice & Unity Campaign win back its majority on the Local Station Board.

What you can do:

• It is urgent that you join WBAI by June 30. Only contributions of time or money made between July 1, 2009 and June 30, 2010 will qualify you to vote in the Fall 2010 election. You can become a member in one of two ways:

1) Donate $25 online at http://www.wbai.org (print out a receipt) or by calling 212-209-2950 during the pledge drive from May 12 - June 12; OR
2) Do 3 hours of volunteer work at the station (and keep a record of the date and time worked).

• Encourage all your friends to become WBAI members.
• Distribute copies of our flyer about the importance of joining WBAI (download at http://www.justiceunity.org )
• Speak out at the next Local Station Board meeting: Wed., June 9, 7 PM, at a location to be announced. For updates, go to http://www.justiceunity.org or call 212-591-2111.
• End the gag rule! Send an email expressing your opposition to the Pacifica National Board at pnb@pacifica.org. Please send a cc to info@justiceunity.org.

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Join Us in the Struggle to TAKE BACK WBAI

For the past year, WBAI Radio, 99.5 FM, one of the five Pacifica Network stations, has been under attack by the Pacifica National Board majority and the WBAI Local Station Board majority. In May 2009, without any due process, Pacifica summarily fired WBAI's Program Director (and longtime Black community activist) Bernard White, and removed its General Manager, Tony Riddle. Exploiting the station's financial crisis, Pacifica began implementing a long-term plan to impose its own brand of programming - removing community self-determination programs, particularly those by and for the Black community. The National Board majority wants to change programming to fashion a "wider" (read "whiter") appeal to those with more money. Local programming is being replaced by imported programs (some of it with backward, pro-war politics), and the network is eroding its longstanding commitment to airing hard-hitting voices of truth and resistance.

Since January 2009, Pacifica has terminated or forced out 8 managers and senior staff - all of them Black or Latino - throughout the network. Meanwhile, although the stated reason for removing WBAI management was the station's large deficit, a year later that deficit is worse, and early claims of big revenue gains have proven false. In fact, earlier this year the station was three months behind in its studio rent and two months behind in its transmitter rent.

Last year, as courageous programmers began airing and speaking out against these actions, Pacifica imposed a gag rule. Dissenting on-air voices have been censored, suspended, removed, forced out, and in some cases barred from the airwaves and the studio without any due process. In 2009, producers Ayo Harrington, Kamau Khalfani, Cerene Roberts, and Sheila Hamanaka were banned and Don DeBar was removed. This year, William Heerwagen has been suspended, Bill diFazio has been censored, and the entire Community Bulletin Board collective resigned rather than submit to censorship (after they included a forum on Black media at which Bernard White was a speaker). Now Pacifica's new Executive Director, Arlene Englehardt, has proposed tightening the gag rule. WBAI's new Interim General Manager, Muriel Tillinghast, is continuing the union-busting tactics of her predecessor, refusing to recognize the union contract with the Unpaid Staff Organizing Committee and refusi ng to respond to the numerous grievances filed.

The Coalition to Take Back WBAI is a group of listeners, staff, and dissenting board members formed last year to fight back against this coup and ongoing purge.

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Stay updated with:
COALITION TO TAKE BACK WBAI
<212-561-7231
http://www.takebackwbai.org
http://www.facebook.com/takebackwbai
Join the Take Back WBAI Coalition email list by emailing:
takebackwbai@gmail.com* info@ justiceunity.org

ALSO CHECK OUT:
http://www.bernardwhite.blogspot.com

http://www.wbixradio.org (Don DeBar's audio & video reports on the WBAI repression)