The mediations between the lawsuit plaintiffs and the Pacifica National Board appear to have fallen through. As can be seen from this link to an article in a law journal each side blames the other.
Here are three E-mails from Carol Spooner who is in charge of the listeners' lawsuit announcing the collapse of the mediation, but the continuance of talks.
Despite our hopes earlier this week for an agreement that would place Pacifica under the control of an interim board majority committed to restoring Pacifica & all five radio stations to their mission and would guarantee bylaws amendments creating a democratic governance structure for Pacifica to prevent this kind of usurpation from ever occurring again -- that no longer appears possible. Pacifica has notified the mediator that certain terms essential to our goals are not acceptable to them and they have terminated the mediator's services.
We are, of course, very disappointed. I thank you all for your kind wishes & (premature) congratulations.
We must now push on to trial in January.
Venceremos!Ms. Spooner adds more details about the failure of the mediations below.
Dear All -- I want to say that Pacifica's terminating the mediation is not the result of the leaks that occurred about some of the terms under discussion.
Larry Bensky is not to blame. I am sorry that the leaks occurred. But it is clear to me [th]at Pacifica would have backed out anyway. All participants in the mediation are still (and forever) bound by law of confidentiality of mediation -- posted again below in case you didn't see it the first time.
I wish I could tell the whole story. But I can't, so I won't.
--Carol SpoonerOn Thursday, November 8th, KPFA ran the following story, “Reports earlier today on KPFA and on Democracy Now! indicating that the mediation underway to resolve the four lawsuits filed against the Pacfica Foundation by Pacifica reformers had ended in failure were not correct. The reports were based on e-mails sent by Carol Spooner, the organizer of the so-called listener lawsuit. The other litigants spent today in court-supervised mediation with Pacifica. Neither the litigant group nor Pacifica has issued a statement. A tentative agreement was announced last Friday by Pacifica, but it has yet to be finalized or signed.”
Ms. Spooner has issued the following clarification.
On Tuesday afternoon one of Pacifica's attorneys notified the mediator that they were terminating his services and the mediation. The mediator notified Terry Gross about 3:30 on Tuesday, and Gross notified the lawyers for other plaintiffs. The mediation was not “court-supervised” mediation & either party could terminate it at any time up until an agreement was signed.
On Thursday, Terry Gross, attorney for plaintiffs in the listeners' lawsuit, contacted Robert Darby (Pacifica's attorney) to see if there was any possibility of re-opening discussions & reaching an agreement without the mediator. We do not yet know whether that will be possible. But it now appears that some non-mediated discussions will occur between the attorneys.
Terry Gross is the one who has been speaking to the attorneys for the other plaintiffs and then relaying our “joint” messages to the mediator & to the other side. As of this point, the mediator is out of the picture.
--Carol SpoonerBack to the Pacifica Theft Page.
To my home page.