Ultimately, someone had to state the obvious — that in an election this rancorous, the only real solution would be for the station to hire an outside group to conduct it, which Odekirk proposed to the board at the Monday meeting. The election committee was supposedly made up of two representatives of the trustees, two from Friends, and two “moderates.” But it was obviously unwise to allow any partisans to get this close to the ballots — in the board meeting, some trustees directly accused Teixeira and other Friends members of misconduct, citing not only the e-mails, but also mailouts conducted by Friends using the KOOP membership database, which the trustees claim that Friends did not have permission to use.
And Friends claim that the trustees are old hands at bending elections in their favor, especially the election that put the current trustees in place. In that election over a year ago, Taylor, McKaskle, and Donna Hoffman were elected to the Board of Trustees by the Community Board — despite the fact that they themselves were on the Community Board. When that left three vacancies on the Community Board, the remaining board members selected Odekirk, Tony Truong, and Raul Alvarez to replace them — all allies of Vera and the new board.
Following that, another trustee slot was filled by activist Gavino Fernandez, whom the Friends accuse of being recruited by Vera, and whom they also accuse of missing many meetings.
“Media Clips” has covered this controversy extensively because, as said, KOOP ought to and can be a shining example for community radio stations around the world, and we care very much about the future of this station (I personally am a former programmer there). So for probably the first time since this started, “Media Clips” is in agreement with Paul Odekirk. It will be a pain in the butt, but the election should be started from scratch and conducted by an impartial organization with no direct ties to KOOP.
This article appears in November 13 • 1998 and November 13 • 1998 (Cover).