[Peace] Establishment of CROW

[Carl Estabrook]

Having been associated with our local community radio station, WEFT 90.1
FM, for more than fifteen years, and considering it an unparalleled
cultural resource in Champaign-Urbana, I've been appalled at how the
organization has tied itself in knots for the better part of a year over a
matter that should have been concluded long ago -- the banning of a
volunteer, Randall Cotton.

The fact that the matter hasn't been dealt with simply and democratically
-- but instead has been dragged through a long series of bureaucratic and
pseudo-legal procedures -- argues that something more is wrong at WEFT
than a simple managerial failure. Instead of being the open community
organization that it should be, WEFT seems to have become something
approaching a private club, the sort that black-balls potential members.

I and some others think that it's worth spending some time and energy to
make WEFT what it should be, so we're establishing an organization for
that purpose, called "Committee for the Reform of WEFT" (in part because
it makes a nice acronym). I'm appending the founding statement of the
Committee for the Reform of WEFT. I'd appreciate your reading it and
letting me know what you think of it -- and of course whether you'd be
interested in joining. I can be contacted at <carl at newsfromneptune.com> or
by phone at 217.359.9466.

Regards, Carl Estabrook

===========

	C.R.O.W.
	COMMITTEE FOR THE REFORM OF WEFT
	("Nevermore")

The Committee for the Reform of WEFT is established as a stakeholders'
committee of WEFT and Prairie Air, Inc. It consists of airshifters,
associates, members, contributors, supporters and friends of WEFT who wish
to encourage the pursuit of the goals to which WEFT is committed by
charter -- namely, to be an "accessible, responsible, and responsive radio
alternative, serving the diverse communities of radio listeners in East
Central Illinois"(Bylaws 1.03).

For WEFT to be accessible, it must be as open as possible to participation
by members of those diverse communities of radio listeners. To be
responsible, it must live up to the principles of independent media as
they have developed over a generation. To be responsive, its programming
must take in the social and political concerns of its time. And to be an
alternative, it must differ from corporate media both in its product and
its processes. In general, what is heard on WEFT should be different from
what is heard on commercial radio, and WEFT should not operate like a
commercial enterprise.

Unfortunately, WEFT at the present time -- late spring 2006 -- seems to
have turned away from these goals. For the better part of a year, WEFT has
been agitated by the attempt of a small group to ban from the station an
enthusiastic and dedicated volunteer who presented no threat to the fabric
or personnel of the station. In the course of events and meetings, it
began to seem that WEFT had become the preserve of those who want to
exclude outsiders, maintain the status quo in the station's operation by
means of a mass of regulations, and avoid alterations in present
programming. This situation hardly serves the announced purposes.

To reorient WEFT to its announced ends, the Committee for the Reform of
WEFT plans to consider questions such as the following:
	[1] Do WEFT's Bylaws and "SOPs" (byzantine in their complexity)
have WEFT acting on a corporate model -- with that model's attendant
secrecy -- and should efforts be made to return WEFT to an open and
communal mode of operation?
	[2] Should the procedures that permitted the banning of Randall
Cotton and the unconscionable maintenance of that ban be reformed, and
should efforts be made to reverse the exclusion of new people from the
activities of the station?
	[3] Would people from the community be encouraged to develop new
sorts of programming by a campaign of advertising and outreach, and should
efforts therefore be made to make WEFT once again a community resource,
whereby the community can talk to itself -- ever more inclusively --
through locally-produced shows about culture, politics, arts (including
music), and other aspects of life in Champaign-Urbana?

Several suggestions have been made about how this committee could pursue a
program of reform, as below; of course a principal task of the committee
will be to decide what actions are appropriate in pursuit of that end and
to implement them:
	[1] WEFT is a not-for-profit corporation ("Prairie Air, Inc.")
with a charter stating goals to which the administration of WEFT is bound.
The Committee for the Reform of WEFT could seek legal advice as to what
action is available against the failure of that administration,
individually and as a group, to live up to the goals of the charter --
i.e, something roughly akin to a "shareholder suit" in a for-profit
corporation. Perhaps the first step should be to secure an independent
audit of WEFT's finances.
	[2] WEFT is funded by a number of agencies, such as the Illinois
Arts Council, who do so because they believe that WEFT is adhering to the
goals of a community organization (e.g., not excluding members because
they are too active). If other approaches are exhausted, CROW could
communicate with such agencies and ask them to remind the officers of WEFT
of the goals that originally attracted the funding of such groups.
	[3] WEFT is meant to be a community organization, and it relies on
the support of the community at large, yet some of the current officers of
WEFT have been concerned to keep their proceedings secret -- not
surprisingly, because those actions contradict what WEFT should be. CROW
could inform the community of the malfeasance at WEFT through the local
media and ask for public pressure for reform.

Membership in CROW is open to all who agree with us that WEFT is in need
of the sort of reform described above. The proceedings of CROW will
normally be conducted by e-mail, through the mailing list at
<crow at reformweft.org>, with actions taken by agreement (by vote when
necessary). One can join the mailing list by sending a blank email to
<crow-subscribe at reformweft.org>. Mailing list information is at
<http://lists.reformweft.org/listinfo.cgi/crow-reformweft.org>.

There will be a monthly face-to-face meeting of interested members on the
Wednesday on or after the Dark of the Moon (e.g., June 28) at a place to
be announced. There are no officers of the committee, but there are
several ongoing tasks to be performed by members of the committee. For the
moment, they seem to be chair, secretary, list administrator and
webmaster.

This and subsequent statements from CROW will be available on its public
website at <www.reformweft.org>.  ###


2006-2006 (June 20, 2006)