Minutes of the KPFK Local Station Board Meeting of December 29, 2012
The regular monthly meeting of the KPFK Local Station Board was held on
Saturday, December 29, 2012, 2:50 PM, at Peace Center West, 3916 Sepulveda
Blvd., Culver City, CA 90230, the Chair (Michael Novick) being in the chair and
the Secretary (John P. Garry III) being present. The minutes of the previous
meeting (November 17, 2012) were approved.
Twenty-one members were present, constituting a quorum: Ken Aaron, Chuck
Anderson,
Rodrigo Argueta, Fred Blair, Lydia Brazon, John Cromshow, John De Simio, Aryana
Gladney, Tej Grewall, Leonard Isenberg, Kim Kaufman, Fred Klunder, Ali Lexa,
Brenda Medina,
Margie Murray, Michael Novick, John Parker, Summer Reese, Lawrence Reyes, John
Wenger, Lamont Yeakey.
One member was excused: Jim Lafferty.
Two members were absent: Ankine Antaram, Dutch Merrick.
Also present: Bernard Duncan (KPFK General Manager), Terry Goodman (Audio
Recordist, Web Liaison) and members of the public
Authority and Notice: This meeting was rescheduled from its original date by a
motion of the LSB at its meeting of November 17, 2012. The date and location
was posted on KPFTX.org on November 17, 2012, with an update on November 20,
2012. Additional notice was posted on KPFK.org and other websites beginning on
November 20, 2012 (see Appendix A).
Audio Recording: The audio of the meeting is available for online streaming at
KPFTX.org.
The audio files are permanently stored for downloading from the following
links:
http://www.kpftx.org/archives/pnb/kpfk/121229/kpfk121229b.mp3
http://www.kpftx.org/archives/pnb/kpfk/121229/kpfk121229c.mp3
http://www.kpftx.org/archives/pnb/kpfk/121229/kpfk121229d.mp3
[Audio Part 2 kpfk121229b.mp3]
I.a. CALL TO ORDER / ROLL CALL (2:50)
The meeting was called to order by the Chair at 2:50 PM with an initial quorum
of 21. Prior to this meeting a Delegates Meeting was held from 1:21 PM to 2:30
PM in the same location.
I.b. EXCUSED ABSENCE REQUESTS (2:52)
The excused absence request of Lafferty was approved for this meeting and the
adjourned Delegates Meeting.
I.c. AGENDA APPROVAL (2:55)
In lieu of printed agendas, the Secretary read the Proposed Agenda aloud.
Kaufman moved a time certain for adjournment of 4:00. Aaron seconded.
Without objection, Israel Feuer (member of the public) was allowed to suggest
agenda items to the Board.
Point of order from Reyes: Doesn't it take a 2/3rds vote to amend the agenda?
The Chair ruled that that was not the case since the agenda had not yet been
approved.
Motion to set a time-certain for adjournment failed by a show of hands: Yes-8,
No-9.
Without objection, the Board decided to dispense with the Calendar of Meetings--
only the January meeting shall be scheduled. Medina requested to have a report-
out on executive sessions. The Chair ruled this out of order because an
executive session had not been held to draft a report-out. Brazon moved to add
Elections to the agenda. Passed without objection. The amended agenda was
approved without objection.
Responding to a question from Argueta, The Chair reported on the status of the
KPFK LSB staff and listener elections.
I.e. GROUND RULES FOR COMMUNICATIONS (3:03)
The Chair reiterated principles for Board communication and public
participation.
I.f. ANNOUNCEMENTS (3:05)
Reyes announced Marla Bernstein's birthday (member of the public). "Happy
Birthday" was sung by the Board.
I.d. MINUTES APPROVAL (3:06)
The minutes for November 17, 2012 were distributed electronically to the board
prior to the meeting and were approved without objection.
II. LSB OFFICERS / DECEMBER BYLAWS REQUIREMENT (3:07)
Reese moved to retain the current Board Officers until the January meeting.
Medina seconded. Passed without objection
III. SCHEDULING / NOTICE OF MEETINGS (3:08)
Saturday, January 19, 1:00 PM, Peace Center West was approved as the next
meeting without objection.
IV. GENERAL MANAGER REPORT SUMMARY AND Q&A (3:10)
The GM summarized his report. Discussion followed.
[Audio Part 3 kpfk121229c.mp3]
Discussion continued. Klunder moved to extend five minutes. Reese seconded.
Passed without objection. (3:50) Discussion continued.
V. ELECTIONS
The LSB staff and listener elections were discussed during other agenda items.
VI. PUBLIC COMMENT II (questions to GM) (3:58)
Public comment was heard for ten minutes.
Point of personal privilege from Cromshow (responding to a public comment
regarding his appearance in an on-air Town Hall): Staff votes for staff.
Listener candidates are not allowed to be on the air because they would have an
unfair advantage over other listeners.
VII. GM RESPONDS TO PUBLIC COMMENT
The GM responded to public comment during the above item.
VIII. PNB DIRECTOR REPORTS (4:11)
Reese, Lexa, and Brazon reported. Discussion followed. Lexa also demonstrated
the Pacifica App. Reese moved to extend five minutes. Passed without objection.
Discussion continued. (4:32)
IX. PUBLIC COMMENT III (questions to PNB Directors) (4:40)
Public comment was heard for two minutes.
[Audio Part 4 kpfk121229d.mp3]
X. PNB DIRECTORS RESPOND TO PUBLIC COMMENT (4:42)
Reese responded. Novick (PNB Elections Committee) responded to an elections
question.
XI. COMMITTEE AND TASK FORCE REPORTS (4:44)
Fundraising Committee (4:44)
Novick (Fundraising Committee Chair) reported on the progress of the planned
March 16, 2013 fundraiser at Jewel's Catch One. Discussion followed.
Kaufman moved to adjourn. Passed without objection.
The meeting adjourned without objection at 5:03 PM.
Respectfully submitted by John P. Garry III, Secretary
(these minutes were approved on January 26, 2013)
********
Appendix A-Public Notices
Emailed by Terry Goodman on November 20, 2012:
There will be a special meeting of the KPFK Delegates on Saturday,
December 29, 2013 at 1:00 pm at the Culver City Peace Center, 3916 S.
Sepulveda Blvd., Culver City, CA 90230 (between Washington Place and
Venice Blvd.). The location is served by the MTA 33 and 733 bus lines
on Venice and the Culver CityBus route 6 on Sepulveda. This meeting
will include voting on proposed amendments to the Pacifica Bylaws as
detailed at http://www.pacifica.org/pnb_amendments.php.
Following the Delegates meeting will be a meeting of the KPFK Local
Station Board to seat newly elected members and elect officers for the
coming year.
Refs:
http://www.kpfk.org/lsbpnbmenu/93-calenderandnotices/6575-delegates-and-lsb-
12292013-100-pm.html
http://www.kpfk.org/eventcal.html?task=view_detail&agid=3061&year=2012&month=12&
day=29
http://www.kpftx.org/pacalendar/cal_show1.php?eventdate=20121229
********
Appendix B-Approved Agenda
Proposed Agendas for KPFK Delegates and LSB Meetings of 12-29-2012
(all times include Board discussion unless otherwise indicated)
LSB Meeting
I. Call to Order / Opening Business
a. Roll Call (15 min)
b. Excused Absence Requests and approval
c. Agenda Approval
d. Minutes Approval
e. Ground Rules for Communication
f. Announcements
II. LSB Officers / December Bylaws Requirement (15
min)
a. Election of Pro-Tem Officers or Continue Current Board
III. Scheduling / Notice of Meetings (5 min)
a. 2013 Calendar of meetings
IV. General Manager Report Summary and Q&A (20 min)
a. GM Summarizes report.
b. Board questions and discussion
V. Elections
VI. Public Comment II (questions to GM) (7.5 min)
VII. GM Responds to public comment (2 min)
VIII. PNB Director Reports (20 min)
a. PNB Directors
b. PNB Committees
IX. Public Comment 1II (questions to PNB Directors) (7.5
min)
X. PNB Directors respond to pubic comment (2 min)
XI. Committee and Task Force Reports (3 min. ea.) (21
min)
Fund-Raising Committee
Finance
Programming Oversight
Outreach
Personnel
Town Hall Task Force
Governance
XII. Public Comment IV (7.5 min)
LSB Meeting Total 130 min
Delegates Assembly and LSB Meeting total: 180 min
********
Appendix C-General Manager Report
PACIFICA RADIO KPFK 90.7 FM
MANAGER'S REPORT TO THE LOCAL STATION BOARD
Saturday, December 29, 2012
(Bernard Duncan, General Manager)
Manager's Overview
. The December fund drive phone room total surpassed $555,000 on the last
day of the drive. The final figure will be higher than that, so the
result was a good one. The highest earning hours (as compiled by Roy
Tuckman) are as follows:
. Background Briefing - Sunday 9 December
. Democracy Now! - Thursday 6 December
. Gary Null - Pain and Survival Kit - Friday 14 December
. Gary Null - Pain Stuff - Wednesday 12 December
. Aware Show - Thursday 6 December
. Christine Blosdale & Mario Martinez - Wednesday 5 December
. As noted in the Engineering report below, a second Nautel transmitter
has been purchased and shipped. Its installation will take place in
January, with the aim of having KPFK restored to full power by the end
of that month.
. Despite assertions in a number of LSB candidate statements on air
during the election campaigning period that KPFK is losing listeners,
the latest Arbitron snapshot shows that audience levels are at their
highest levels in the past two months than at any time during the
previous year. Average weekly cume for December is 157,300, a slight
post-election drop from November's 167,900. The six-month average
weekly cume (from July to December 2012) is 135,317.
Outreach and Development
. Grant Proposal - A grant proposal was submitted on November 27 to the
Corporation for Public Broadcasting for their grant "Strengthening
Education Reporting". Meetings and conversations with interested
programmers from Feminist Magazine, Beautiful Struggle as well as News
Reporter Ernesto Arce and the Program Director took place to help shape
the proposal. The Project Overview follows. Note that the Overview was
character-limited to 200 words.
Project Overview
KPFK 90.7 FM is community radio produced by activist journalists who
seek the root causes of areas of conflict within our society and
culture, proposing and debating creative solutions. With a
demonstrated ongoing commitment beyond consciousness-raising
analysis of justice issues, translated into action, our approach to
education reporting is unique in public media.
Southern California has a rich landscape of linguistic and cultural
diversity; it is a concentration of the global community, presenting
unique challenges to public education instruction. KPFK's approach
will examine not only the current reasons for the dropout crisis,
but issues related to the effectiveness of our educational system to
prepare the next generation for an economy and society yet to be
created. More than a critical social issue impacting prosperity and
quality of living, graduation is a social justice issue affecting
real human potential and quality of life.
With the American Graduate: Let's Make It Happen initiative, KPFK
seeks to discover the underlying causes for the dropout crisis,
facilitate community solution-oriented dialogue among parents,
teachers and youth, and build production quality and capacity among
our community radio reporters and segment producers. Funding of
$68,600 from CPB's Strengthening Education Reporting grant will help
us achieve these objectives.
. CAB - The ad hoc Community Advisory Board met in Whittier, Fullerton
and Long Beach in September, October and November, respectively. The
goal was to meet with listeners in different regions of our listening
area to recruit for the permanent CAB. Though the meetings were
generally small (about 10 people each), a core group of interested
individuals has emerged.
. Capital Campaign-Transmitter - An additional round of donation request
letters were sent to donors residing in areas calculated to have
improved broadcast reception when the new solid state Nautel NV-20
transmitter is installed in mid January. An end-of-year web campaign
for donations will run for the last 4 days of the year.
Programming
. The Program Director is away on vacation leave during the holiday
break. A full programming report will be available in time for the
January 2013 LSB meeting.
Operations
. Energy Rate Increase - To meet legal mandates, replace aging
infrastructure and expand customer programs like energy efficiency and
solar power, LADWP received approval for a 2-year electric rate change.
The first increase went into effect November 11, 2012 and the second
year change will be effective July 1, 2013. Rates will increase by 0.62
cents per kWh in the first year and by another 0.79 cents per kWh in
the second year. The average total 2-year rate change is 1.41 cents per
kWh for all customers, for an increase of 11%. Proposed changes to
the LADWP's water rates have been deferred until next spring pending
further review.
. Facilities - The following work is planned for building maintenance
o Dec 29th High pressure cleaning of sewer line
o Dec 30th Carpet Cleaning
o Dec 30th/31st Re-painting of parking lot stripes (although this may
be postponed due to weather).
. During a routine oil fill up on our generators it was discovered one of
them was out of order and need some repairs which included a new
battery and some minor parts. We decided to have major maintenance done
on both the units at that time. This led us to pursue a maintenance
agreement to service our units twice a year. Our back-up generators at
the station will now have semi-annual maintenance performed every 6
months with Dixie Diesel & Electric. This includes one minor and major
service each year. This will help ensure that they will be running
smoothly without problems when we need them and improve expected
lifespan.
. HVAC - A/C 2 had major repairs to its heating function conducted in early
December.
. Remote Broadcast - Our annual simulcast of the LA Holiday Special with
KCET at the Dorothy Chandler Theater went off without a hitch. The
station was well represented by the hosts. When KPFK was first
announced we got resounding cheers from the audience.
. Social Media and Dispatch - Some analytics from Constant Contact
and Facebook for 1/26/12 - 12/26/12:
. Constant Contact e-mail list grew 348
. Facebook Likes grew 2228
o For the last quarter an average 382.66 unique people have
talked about us (includes some posting comments, shares, or
likes about us)
o For the last quarter we have reached on average 10,799
unique people. (includes people who have seen our content
associated with our page)
. Twitter Followers 1,374 (account was created in August)
. Google+ 13 (account was created in October)
We have seen some growth in the 4th quarter since we started
using Hootsuite to help manage our social media and by including the
news department as the primary source of content for our posts.
Social media activity requires dedicated resourcing. It is an essential
tool for any media company today. KPFK should be engaging followers/
listeners. Doing so will help establish a strong base and interest for
successful fund raising. Seeding and nurturing these online
conversations, however requires significant strategy and effort. There
is a need to develop and implement a strategy that best fits our
overall donor strategy to make it integral to our fund raising efforts.
A part of our strategy should include workshops for our programmers on
how to use social media to grow and engage listeners and their
audience. We should continue to encourage engagement with our
audience. This may also be a way to approach major donors.
Engineering
. Studios - The KPFK studios are operating properly.
. Malibu Booster site - work has begun on installation of a microwave
facility to transmit program audio from Oat Mountain to the Malibu
booster on Saddle Peak.
. Rancho Bernardo translator site - This translator is in good
condition and is operating properly.
. Santa Barbara translator site - The translator is in good condition
and is operating properly.
. Mt. Wilson transmitter site - The backup transmitter continues to
produce a reliable signal for KPFK at 50% power. The second Nautel
solid state transmitter is scheduled for delivery the first week in
January. When installation of the transmitter is completed KPFK will be
back up to full power. Completion of the transmitter installation will
likely be at the end of January.
. The Chief Engineer offers the following historical perspective for
reference:
Past, Present and Future
KPFK started to experience a series of power outages and transmitter
failures following the Station Fire in September 2009. The two
electrical power feeds to Mt. Wilson were destroyed during the fire and
the severe weather that followed. A temporary feed was put in place by
SoCal Edison Electric while they started to rebuild the electrical
circuits to Mt. Wilson. KPFK, as well as other FM stations, suffered
many electrical outages during the almost two years it took for Edison
to complete rebuilding the original electrical feeds. During this time
KPFK also started having serious transmitter problems. Despite attempts
to correct the problems for over a year, it was finally decided that it
was a waste of time and money to continue with the repairs. It was
determined that the transmitters would never be reliable operating from
the Mt. Wilson transmitter site. We ordered a Nautel transmitter and
expect delivery in January.
Despite the claims of a LSB member, "I conducted a lengthy
investigation about KPFK's frequent signal loss. As a result, that is
no longer a problem and our main transmitter equipment is being
upgraded.", a "lengthy investigation" has nothing to do with whether
KPFK produces a reliable signal or not. During the last several years a
great deal of hard work and planning has gone into upgrading the KPFK
signal. The Santa Barbara translator was rebuilt. The San Diego
translator was installed as was the Malibu booster. A new solid state
backup transmitter was installed at the Mt. Wilson transmitter site. A
permit was obtained to operate the emergency generator on Mt. Wilson.
All of this was done while repairs continued to transmitters on Mt.
Wilson. To accomplish this it was necessary to deal with agencies such
as; the FCC, FAA, Malibu planning commission, South Coast Air Quality
Management Division and the U.S. Forest Service. Continuing contact
with the owners and operators of all transmitter sites was and is
necessary to keep the installations optimum.
One of the big negatives that we have to contend with is the use of the
90.7Mhz frequency from Tijuana, it has cut into our listeners' ability
to receive KPFK particularly during hot summer months. The installation
of the new transmitter and operating reliably at full power will help
KPFK overcome interference from the Tijuana station.
There is little doubt that KPFK listenership and revenues will increase
after full, licensed power is obtained. We haven't accomplished this by
"lengthy investigation", we accomplished this through knowledge,
experience, planning and a lot of hard work.
Business Office
. KPFK's financial status reported from the Business Office as at
December 28 (cf. November 13) -
o Total Cash in Bank is $296,000 (408,879)
o Total payables stand at $58,000 (84,000).
o Central Services payments to National Office are slightly
overpaid for the financial year to date.
o Our CPB funding installment awaits collection from National
Office. The unrestricted grant due to us is $111,700.
Bernard Duncan
General Manager
December 28 2012
********