May 12, 2011 – It is necessary to respond to at least some of the gross distortions and false claims by WBAI Local Station Board member Steve Brown, and to the accusations leveled by WBAI General Manager Berthold Reimers concerning my reporting of public information about grants to Pacifica from an arm of a major corporation.
Mr. Brown claims, “Clearly, Lederer, as an experienced news reporter, knew better than to spread a story – especially such a damaging one – without first subjecting it to elementary fact-checking.”
But the source of my “story” (i.e., my recounting of what was revealed at a public meeting of the LSB Finance Committee) was Mr. Reimers himself. It was he, as General Manager, who told us, at a public meeting, about two recent grants given to WBAI. On April 21, during a tardy quarterly (Fall 2010) review by the Committee of the station’s budget adherence, Mr. Reimers explained that the income listed under “grants” was more than expected due to two grants totaling $10,000 from “Merrill Lynch” and said that the money was for “a News Department mini-series on hydro-fracking.” When several of us expressed shock at this apparent breach in Pacifica’s longstanding prohibition on corporate underwriting of programming, he again repeated that the station was given a grant and repeated the source of the funding as Merrill Lynch. He also said that both he and national Pacifica had approved the grants, and seemed disdainful of the concern. The Committee unanimously adopted a multi-part motion urging detailed written information from him and the Executive Director, Arlene Engelhardt, on these grants.
We would later learn that Goldman Sachs Gives had given Pacifica two grants totaling $15,000, one of which was specifically designated for the hydro-fracking news series. Does this mean that Mr. Reimers was mistaken about the name of the funding source, or did Merrill Lynch give the station money as well?
Mr. Reimers writes: “I would like to point out that I find the behavior of Susan Lee [another Finance Committee member] and Bob Lederer very unprofessional and questionable…The Finance Committee is quick to make all kind of assumptions and accusations as stated below and yet has not issued a statement or resolution to condemn the irresponsible act of blasting and spinning of the situation within 1 hour of the end of the meeting before a thorough investigation of the facts.”
Both Susan Lee and I did indeed write public emails reporting what Mr. Reimers himself had stated at the meeting about corporate funding and expressing alarm at this development, including his seeming lack of concern that there might be any problem. My email also urged people to call on WBAI and Pacifica management to provide answers to the Committee’s questions ASAP. I would not be fulfilling my responsibility to the staff I represent (and the listeners I serve as an overall board member) if I did not make public this fundamental question about maintaining Pacifica’s integrity. Moreover, nowhere does Mr. Reimers take responsibility for being the source of the financial information that he released publicly at a Finance Committee meeting.
I would also note that the Committee’s first information request was not fulfilled by WBAI or Pacifica management before its next meeting, as requested, which prompted another motion (passed with the support of “all sides,” with only one dissenting vote) expressing “that it is greatly upset that Pacifica and WBAI Management failed to respond in a timely fashion to the legitimate inquiries made by the Finance Committee at its April 21 meeting.” Two weeks ago – on April 28 – the Committee requested additional information which has yet to be provided, including such important pieces as:
- What was the sequence of events that led to the receipt of those two checks by Pacifica. [My note: This should include the text of the “written request” for the funds, mentioned by Ms. Engelhardt when she spoke to the PNB Finance Committee.]
- The specific purpose to which Pacifica has put the funds or intends to put the funds.
- If the funds are used for programming, to specify whether WBAI intends to broadcast an underwriting announcement that the funds came from Goldman Sachs Gives, as mentioned in F.C.C. regulation 47 CFR 73.1212, and if not, why not.
- A complete report on any other funds from corporations or their related entities currently being solicited, or intentions by WBAI Management to solicit same in future as well as any ongoing solicitations of WBAI by such corporations or their related entities.
Mr. Brown writes: And – even stranger — why didn’t he file it with WBAI’s own news department, right down the hall, instead of phoning it into the news department of KPFA … in California?
Several days after the initial Finance Committee meeting where this came up, I received a call from KPFA News – I did not call them — saying they saw a forward of my email and were doing a report on the controversy. They asked if I would recount what happened at the Finance Committee meeting. That is exactly what I did – you can judge for yourself by listening to the audio at http://www.kpfa.org/archive/id/69234 at about 19:20. (Also, I explained to the reporter that the Committee was seeking further details.) I believe it would have been irresponsible for me to refuse to comment when asked about such troubling news revealed at a public meeting by our station’s General Manager – NOT a “false story” or “lies” as Brown labels my eyewitness account.
Furthermore, an apparent incursion of a Wall Street firm into the only non-corporate media network warrants public examination. Thus it was a thoroughly legitimate news decision for the KPFA News Department to cover the issue. This became even clearer given that the KPFA report included an excerpt from a statement made by KPFA Interim General Manager Andrew Phillips (appointed by Ms. Engelhardt) at the March LSB meeting saying that Pacifica should reconsider its prohibition on business “sponsorship” and consider allowing underwriting. (Explaining his comments after the broadcast, Mr. Phillips wrote, “I was pointing out that, given Pacifica’s depleted finances, corporate underwriting should be one of the considerations. In my opinion, it would be irresponsible not to consider it.”) In addition, the reporter did seek comment from Ms. Engelhardt, but she was not available before airtime. Indeed, Ms. Engelhardt aired her views on the topic the next day’s newscast. Yet a day later, WBAI PNB member Alex Steinberg called for Ms. Engelhardt to “investigate” the KPFA News Department for their report on this. Later, KPFA former PNB director Carol Spooner widely circulated an email labeling the KPFA news report “a firing offense,” and implying that this applied to me as well based on her false claim that “Bob Lederer quickly called the KPFA News Department to report this ‘underwriting scandal'” (words, by the way, that neither I nor the KPFA editor ever used). I find it outrageous that KPFA News editors are being criticized and threatened for their legitimate reporting about a vital public issue concerning the policies of the network.
Mr. Brown claims, “His false report about WBAI has caused enormous consternation among Pacifica’s listenership, many of whom may be dissuaded from making future donations to a foundation they believe is no longer free of corporate influence.”
Even though what appear to be Mr. Reimers’ original factual errors have seemingly been corrected (if it turns out that Merrill Lynch did NOT ALSO provide WBAI with funds), I do not think that the corrected version is any cause for comfort. What we now know, according to the letter from Goldman Sachs Gives to Pacifica that has been made public, is that although the $10,000 grant was based on a “recommendation” from what their website describes as “partners and former partners” (i.e., owners and former owners), it remains a grant from Goldman Sachs Gives. In their words, “After considering the above recommendation, Goldman Sachs Gives approved a grant to your organization.” It specifically lists “Purpose: WBAI’s News Department Hydrofracking Special Series.”
So the “grant” comes from an arm of Goldman Sachs, even if it’s labeled a “charitable” arm. And like so many corporate criminals – and GS is one of the worst – this “charitable” fund allows GS to whitewash its crimes and appear to be doing good by throwing some crumbs at a public interest project. And it starts Pacifica down the slippery slope of figuring out how else to position its programming to get more such corporate-approved largesse.
Nor is this an isolated incident. At a time when more and more voices at high levels of Pacifica are openly entertaining the idea of not only soliciting more funding from corporate foundations, but also reconsidering the longstanding ban on corporate underwriting, there is ample reason for grave alarm, and a pressing need for robust public debate.
Of course, Mr. Brown throws in various irrelevant claims and speculations about my motivations and alliances with people at other Pacifica stations, which employ his standard guilt-by-association techniques. He also can’t seem to distinguish between emails by me and those by many AIDS advocates and activists expressing their alarm at the return of Gary Null to WBAI’s airwaves. Their letters cite Mr. Null’s oft-stated denial that HIV causes AIDS, his denial that antiviral drugs have any therapeutic value, and his denial that safer sex and clean needle methods have been shown to save lives. I will not respond further to these diversionary issues, but instead refer you for more information to another website (click here).
Bob Lederer
staff representative, WBAI LSB and WBAI LSB Finance Committee
writing on my own behalf
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