[grc] "Report-back" from the GRC 2016

[Ann Garrison]

My KPFA friends and allies on a yahoo list called the "kpfa-watch list"
asked me for a report back from the GRC, so I shared these first thoughts,
promised more later.  Since it went over well with that list, Tom Vorhees
asked me to share it here as well.  I'm afraid I missed my Sunday deadline
for getting a text version of my workshop remarks up on the list or the new
website, but I will work on that this week.
*"Ann Garrison <anniegarrison at gmail.com <anniegarrison at gmail.com>>*
*2:56 PM (20 hours ago)*
*to kpfa-watch*
*Thanks again to everyone who chipped in to get me to the Grassroots Radio
Conference 2016 in Hot Springs, Arkansas.  I just promised to get an
edited, text version of my remarks up on the GRC 2016 website by Sunday
since right now I'm already working on tomorrow's KPFA News. One of the
first things I said was that Anthony taught me most everything I know about
radio news writing and that at one point he banned commas in my anchor's
intros because they tended to be paragraph long, clause laden, sentences.
It's hard to hear that many meanings jammed into one sentence and Saturday
Anchor David Rosenberg said that he was running out of breath trying to
read them.  Every once in awhile I look back at the intros I was writing in
the beginning and laugh or say, "Hey, Anthony, look at this one!"  As I
told the workshop, radio news writing is an exacting discipline that made
me a much better writer.  *
*I gave one of the only content focussed workshops at this year's GRC.
which was heavy on technology and LPFM because the FCC licensing schedules
have been such that there are many LPFM stations just coming online now
and/or trying to complete the requisite steps.  There were also a couple of
governance workshops . . . yeah sure . . . in which all the problems we're
all so familiar with were described.  I have considered asking Betty
McArdle, who gave those workshops, to become an affiliate rep to the
Pacifica National Board from KBOO-Portland, if she qualifies. She knows
what she'd be getting into and knows it doesn't work very well, so she
wouldn't be coming in starry eyed. She also understands how much is at
stake.*
*One other takeaway is how many stations have been left high and dry
without a national/international newscast since the demise of FSRN, which
those who failed to get Pacifica's audits done should take responsibility
for. They cost Pacifica the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) funds
that were FSRN's sole support.  Many think that FSRN should also have tried
to develop outside sources of funding or marketed its newscast outside
Pacifica, but the loss of CPB funds was a decisive blow.*




*Ursula Rutenberg and I talked about that some and agreed to talk more.
While we were there, she also contacted the White Earth Reservation to see
if they might produce a daily or weekly Dakota Access Pipeline Report that
other stations could play.  It turns out that the pipeline route also goes
underneath the Missouri River and right past Ursula's hometown, and that of
her station, KHOI-Ames, Iowa.  You've probably seen the Democracy Now
reports on resistance in Iowa. She said that, for the first time, she's
actually imagining that they might be able to stop it.  Ursula also said
that Iowa's family farms are all gone and they're now "occupied" -
surrounded by Monsanto, Dupont, etc. There was a "sustainable farming"
department at Iowa State, the university in Ames, but it was cut back to
almost nothing because it posed a threat to industrial agriculture.  More
later.*

For real,
Ann Garrison <http://www.anngarrison.com/>
Independent Journalist,
SKYPE: Ann Garrison, Oakland
415-503-7487