Union rights for unpaid staff: sore issue at Pacifica's WBAI
Originally published in Current, Oct. 12, 1998
By Stephanie McCrummen
New York City -- Pacifica founder Lewis Hill knew that participatory democracy doesn't always go smoothly. Case in point is Pacifica's New York station, WBAI, where the dispute over Hill's vision of an egalitarian organization is reminiscent of battles he faced at Pacifica's Berkeley station more than 40 years ago.
Depending on the outcome of a pending appeal to the National Labor Relations Board, and management's reaction to it, WBAI's union may strike any day now.
The union meanwhile has given Pacifica a list of complaints about General Manager Valerie Van Isler--prompting the national Pacifica board's decision Oct. 1 to send in a team of management experts to examine and try to repair relationships at the station.
Staffers also criticize the station's move in June from its gritty quarters in Manhattan's Garment District to Wall Street, the symbolic home of Pacifica's enemies.
"The space is beautiful, but we look at each other and say 'so what,'" said one wistful staff member, summing up the mood among some WBAI employees. "Because of all the problems, it's just sad."
The dispute at the NLRB in Washington is whether unpaid staff--who comprise about 90 percent of the station's workforce--should be included in the union. Management says no. The union says yes. An NLRB decision is expected soon.
Underlying the union issue is Pacifica's enduring dilemma: how to reconcile its commitment to democratically governed community radio with its desire for bigger audiences and the political impact and financial support they could bring. The union sees itself protecting workplace democracy. Management sees intransigent volunteers stifling Pacifica's potential.
WBAI's unpaid workers already have a relationship with management that may be unique in American media. In 1996, the New York office of the National Labor Relations Board ruled that paid and unpaid staff shared a sufficient "community of interest" to be members of the same union, the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America. Pacifica's appeal of the ruling is now pending.
"This is the first case of which I am aware where the question arises whether unpaid volunteers are employees under the Labor Relations Act, said David Parker, a spokesman for the NLRB in Washington. "So by definition it's an unusual case."
Yet management didn't dispute the right of unpaid WBAI staffers to unionize until national Executive Director Pat Scott took office in 1996. The contract she presented did not recognize unpaid staff as part of the union. Two other unionized Pacifica stations, flagship KPFA in Berkeley and KPFK in Los Angeles, eventually signed the contract excluding unpaid staff; local staffs in Houston and Washington, D.C., do not have unions.
Scott said there's "absolutely no justification" for unpaid staff to be part of a union whose only purpose, as far as she is concerned, is to negotiate wages and working conditions.
The real issue, Scott said in an interview, is control over programming. According to her read of Pacifica's charter, and following the dominant practice in most American media, management makes programming decisions. In practice, however, Pacifica volunteers always have had a hand in those choices and have made the programming that dominates airtime.
"I'm not negotiating national programming with them," she said, referring to the union. "I have no intention of doing that, and this organization has no intention of doing that." Although Scott is expected to step down by the end of October, it remains unclear whether her successor will adopt a similar position.
The union cites Pacifica's tradition of internal democracy and community control, and argues that unpaid staffers' interests therefore extend beyond wages and working conditions. And besides, things have worked out well so far, they say, pointing to the fact that WBAI raises more money than any other Pacifica station and has won numerous awards.
"Pacifica has never been a coherent network," said talk show producer R. Paul Martin, an unpaid staffer and union shop steward who has worked at WBAI for 17 years. "Pacifica existed for 40 years or so, and then all of a sudden, bang, we're going to tighten things up and make this like a 'real' network. You've got to expect that needs more than a dictate from on high."
Union members interviewed said they are not opposed to more national programming. In fact, both sides point to the public affairs show, Democracy Now!, hosted by WBAI's Amy Goodman, as an example of national programming at its best. Instead, union members say they merely want to maintain a meaningful voice in decisions affecting them, which they fear losing if unpaid staff are excluded from the union.
"We understand what [Pacifica] is trying to do," said one union member who requested anonymity. "They say they want to professionalize the station. They say some of the programming became stale ... and we said OK, we can sit down and negotiate about national programming, but you cannot remove unpaid staff. This is the impasse."
In late April, union members authorized shop stewards to call a strike, without naming specific conditions. Martin said that the staff might strike, for example, if management loses its NLRB appeal and then challenges it. But Pacifica's national chairman, Mary Frances Berry, said the board would abide by the next NLRB decision, according to Lynn Chadwick, the network's director of operations and planning.
The standoff between WBAI's union and Scott is mirrored by unyielding tension between the union and Van Isler, whom staff accuse of recklessly firing several pro-union employees and ignoring their concerns about the design of the new studios--charges Van Isler denies.
Chadwick made several visits to WBAI this summer, in response to the local board's request for the national organization's attention to local personnel problems, and will return this month to pave the way for further visits by consultants. She attributed much of the tension to the station's recent move.
"It was clear that some reorganization needed to be done, and it was clear that resources had been stretched to make the move happen," she said.
With even more distance from the matter, media historian Ralph Engelman, author of Public Radio and TV in America: A Political History and a former Pacifica board member, views WBAI's troubles in the context of the network's past.
"Volunteers have always played a very important role in Pacifica," he said, recalling Lewis Hill's original vision. "The challenge is to strike a balance where they have some input. ... It's the struggle to find a balance, really, between internal democracy ... and the need for ... legitimate leadership in the station. It was built in from the beginning."
Later news: Chadwick promoted to national executive director of Pacifica.
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