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Pacifica Partners with Low Power FM
Despatches Tech Support to Spokane, Immokalee Barnraisings
The five-station Pacifica Radio network is partnering with
grassroots media to strengthen independent, non-commercial
media nationwide.
Last month Otis Hardy Maclay, the Program Director of Pacifica
station KPFT
90.1FM in Houston, Texas, joined in a
"barnraising" for a new Low Power FM station, KYRS
in Spokane, Washington. The effort was organized by the Prometheus
Radio Project, a Philadelphia-based LPFM advocacy group.
And next month Pacifica is set to join with Prometheus and
the Coalition
of Immokalee Workers (CIW) at a barnraising
in South Florida. The CIW is a community-based farm worker
organization based in one of the largest winter vegetable
markets in the United States. Their members are largely Latino,
Haitian, and Mayan Indian immigrant workers laboring in low-wage
jobs throughout Florida. They fight for fair wages and the
right to organize. They may be best known as the leaders of
the nationwide Taco
Bell boycott.
KPFT Program Director Otie Maclay filed this report from
Spokane:
After three years of FCC hell, KYRS
(Your Radio Station), "Thin Air Radio" went
on the air Sunday night, October 26, 2003. Spokane is a city
of around 300,000, and small enough to be covered by KYRS'
100 watt LPFM signal. In effect, this little signal is as
big to Spokane as KPFA is to Berkeley, WBAI to New York. See
www.kyrs.org
I went to support Prometheus, an organization which has
been active in facilitating LPFM installations as well as
contending with the FCC about regulations. I was there as
a representative of Pacifica's interest in promoting radio
for the people.
My participation involved teaching seminars on Noise, Programming
Policy and Basic Audio Production. I assisted in other ways
as necessary, soldering, ad hoc instruction, noticing problems
and fixing them and building relationships with this new group
of people.
The interest and excitement among the many who have been
working to get this station on the air was far more than anything
I had expected. There is a true community of interest in this
station, and meeting and supporting all kinds of people of
all ages and colors was an incredibly satisfying experience
for me. Getting these stations up is one of the most important
things Pacifica can support, in my opinion. LPFM is much bigger
than it sounds.
I'll be going to Immokalee, Florida, for the next raising
on December 7, working with Prometheus.
I also established a website for techie talk. www.indytech.org.
We'll see if it develops.
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