Pubdate: Wed, 16 Apr 2008
Source: Anderson Valley Advertiser (CA)
Copyright: 2008 Anderson Valley Advertiser
Contact:  http://www.theava.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2667
Author: Bruce Anderson
Cited: Mendocino County Public Radio http://www.kzyx.org/
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Measure+G
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?115 (Marijuana - California)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Marijuana - Medicinal)

HEADS ROLL AT FREE SPEECH RADIO

Mendocino County's marijuana controversy got its best airing yet when 
free speech made a rare, hour-long appearance at the county's public 
radio station last Thursday evening. But by Friday morning free 
speech was in full, limping retreat at the Philo headquarters of 
Mendocino County Public Radio, and two KZYX staffers had been 
suspended for having committed the unspeakable act on the air.

What happened?

Thursday's debate had been advertised as "KZYX, Thursday night, April 
10, 2007. Media Panel Debate on Measure B. Moderator: K.C. Meadows. 
Guests: Keith Faulder, Ross Liberty."

The only media person in the broadcast booth was moderator K.C. 
Meadows of the Ukiah Daily Journal. Mary Aigner, a station staffer 
for many years, was also in the booth operating the call-in equipment 
for Meadows.

Mr. Faulder is an attorney and former candidate for Mendocino County 
District Attorney. Among other clients of his thriving law practice 
Faulder, who had prosecuted dope cases, now defends persons accused 
of marijuana-related offenses.

Ross Liberty is a Ukiah businessman who, along with Ukiah City 
councilman and supervisor's candidate John McCowen, and Mike Sweeney, 
manager of Mendocino Solid Waste Management Authority, devised 
Measure B, probably as a strategy to help elect McCowen to the Ukiah 
area's supervisor's seat. Sweeney, a former Maoist, and the only 
viable suspect in the car bombing of his late wife, Judi Bari, does 
the heavy intellectual lifting for his long-time friend, candidate McCowen.

Measure B would roll back Mendocino County's Measure G, an advisory 
which made personal use and possession of marijuana in amounts not to 
exceed 25 plants and 2 pounds of processed bud Mendocino County's 
lowest police priority.

In 2000, Measure G passed as an in-County advisory by 58% to 42%. 
Marijuana duly became a non-priority for local law enforcement 
although state and federally funded raids continued to be carried out 
against large-scale grows.

Proponents of Measure B, who include Ms. Meadows, who has 
editorialized for its passage in her newspaper, argue that marijuana 
production in the County is "out of control," thanks to Measure G, 
with armed criminals presiding over large-scale grows in the County's 
vast outback. Measure B's proponents add that pot growing is now 
common even in the County's incorporated jurisdictions of Willits and Ukiah.

Opponents of Measure B maintain that an hysteria over pot has arisen 
fueled almost entirely by unfounded anecdotes about the drug's 
prevalence, the crime it is said to inspire, the numbers of 
undesirables it is rumored to have recently attracted to Mendocino County.

Measure B received a thorough airing on Thursday night's program. The 
discussion was smart, civil and lively. It was adult give and take 
and interesting radio, public radio as it should be.

Enter the enemies of free speech at, of all places, a radio station 
that constantly advertises itself as "free speech radio."

In an odd series of events, peculiar even by the turbulent standards 
of local public radio, the passionate but otherwise unremarkable 
on-air debate about the pending marijuana ballot measure prompted 
station management to suspend the show's host, Ukiah Daily Journal 
editor K.C. Meadows, and to also place program manager Mary Aigner, a 
long-time employee of Mendocino County Public Broadcasting, on 
open-ended suspended status.

Both suspensions have stunned the larger Mendocino County community. 
Aigner's removal has especially shocked station listeners. She has 
been a loyal KZYX employee for some fifteen years and, it is no 
exaggeration to say, synonymous with the enterprise.

Meadows and Aigner apparently incurred the hasty wrath of station 
management when they inserted their views into Thursday's on-air 
debate between Faulder and an overmatched Ross Liberty.

The station, which was concluding a week of on-air fundraising heavy 
on promos touting its commitment to unfettered talk, also canceled a 
marijuana debate scheduled for the following Friday morning during 
which, Mr. Liberty, fresh off his audio-flagellation by the 
quick-witted Faulder, was to have debated Laura Hamburg, a long-time 
pot advocate. That discussion was to have been moderated by station 
old timer Karen Ottoboni. No reason was given for its cancellation.

Faulder said later that he's puzzled at the fallout from Thursday 
night's debate. He said he never felt embattled, never felt "ganged 
up on" by his on-air opponents. Faulder said that rumors, and they're 
flying from Gualala to Covelo, that he intended to sue unspecified 
persons or entities were "ridiculous."

Writing to K.C. Meadows from Italy where he and his wife are 
vacationing, Faulder went on to say, "I am truly sorry if you decide 
that was your last show, KC. Not for you, you'll do fine, but for the 
people of Mendocino county. I believe your participation and comments 
in the discussion on Thursday made for a more spirited and engaging 
debate. While I didn't know you were in favor of Measure B until you 
told me on the air, it didn't matter to me. It didn't change my 
position, and I certainly didn't expect you to be a potted plant in 
the room. I knew that wasn't your style. I thoroughly enjoyed myself 
and the debate.

"I have always preferred content over form and substance over 
process. It doesn't matter to me if a debate or discussion is in my 
living room or on KZYX, I want intelligent people to participate and 
share their ideas and experiences. I believe that is what you did. I 
am sure that a lot of people were talking about Measure B the next 
day. That is why I agreed to go on your show -- to get people talking 
and thinking about an important local issue. If nothing else, I think 
we all, Ross Liberty, you and I, succeeded at that. I hope you will 
go back on the air, and soon."

K.C. Meadows is a veteran journalist with an extensive background in 
both print and audio media. She has reported for and edited the Ukiah 
Daily Journal since the middle 1990s. Her paper's letters page, 
unlike KZYX's airways, is genuinely open to opinions on all subjects 
and from all perspectives. The articulate Meadows has hosted an 
interview program at KZYX that began some ten years ago as a one-hour 
per month media roundtable show with veteran local journalist Jim 
Shields of Laytonville's Mendocino County Observer. Until Shields 
ceased participating, Meadows and Shields offered the only 
consistently informed local news discussion the station has managed 
to produce in its twenty-year history. When Shields bowed out, 
Meadows commenced interviews with local politicians and other figures 
prominent in the Mendocino County news. She has been with the station 
as a programmer for about ten years.

Clearly surprised and angry at KZYX's handling of what objectively 
was nothing more than a robust but civil discussion of a 
controversial local matter, a discussion that would be viewed as tame 
and even tedious by commercial radio standards, Meadows described the 
gloomy events in a blog posting early Friday morning.

"This morning I talked with Belinda at KZYX after calling the station 
to talk to program manager Mary Aigner to congratulate her on her 
participation in my program last night on Measure B with Ross Liberty 
(Yes on B) and Keith Faulder (No on B). Mary, I was told wasn't there 
but, boy, Belinda (Station Manager) wanted to talk to me. She said 
the folks at KZYX were very upset that I got involved in expressing 
my own opinions during the hour and that Mary had been suspended for 
speaking out on problems with commercial pot growing. As soon as Mary 
(who was running the board for me and there to do pledge drive 
breaks) started saying her own Anderson Valley neighborhood had been 
overtaken by pot growers the staff at KZYX went nuts, signaling to 
her over and over to shut up. She didn't.

"Mary never said, 'Vote for Measure B.' She simply stated that 
problems with commercial pot growing were real and she'd seen them 
first hand. Suspending her for that, it seems to me, borders on a 
serious First Amendment violation. (I wonder, if Mary had said 
something like, 'It's been my experience that medical marijuana 
patients really have a problem finding supplies' she would be under 
suspension right now.)

"For some reason there was a real crowd at the station last night, I 
assume because they're in the middle of pledge drive. The crowd, I am 
told from someone standing among them, was also going crazy trying to 
get me to shut up, too. One woman (later identified as Lynda McClure, 
an opponent of Measure B) actually put a note to that effect up to 
the broadcast booth window, but I didn't have my glasses on and 
couldn't see it.

"Anyway I wouldn't have shut up. I said at the beginning of the 
broadcast that I was a fervent B supporter and that would be clear 
during the show. For some reason the folks at KZYX assumed I was 
simply hosting some kind of non-partisan debate on Measure B. I would 
never have agreed to that. First, I am not unbiased about it. That is 
why I stepped aside from my usual role as moderator for the forum the 
Daily Journal is hosting May 8 with the American Association of 
University Women and the National Women's Political Caucus. Plus, I 
express my opinions on my monthly show all the time. Why would last 
night be any different?

"Belinda (I am sorry but I don't know her last name and the staff 
isn't listed on the station Web site) told me that all programmers 
are forbidden from expressing opinions on anything on any up-coming 
ballot as they are officially representatives of the station when on 
the air. She said that's an IRS rule and an FCC rule.

"I have to say I find this odd given the dedicated bias of KZYX, NPR 
and other public radio sources on any number of left of center 
issues. They defend it saying they are basically the voice of the 
non-mainstream and that's their mission.

"Belinda said she would send me a copy of the rules.

"She said I am suspended from KZYX too.

"I said, let's just consider it my last show."

Which is the station's loss because Ms. Meadows is very good at 
radio. She is also much in demand at County political events as 
debate moderator at election time because she is able to graciously 
keep the talk moving along. Her radio shows were always lively, even 
if her guests weren't; her talent for expediting talk was 
demonstrated in her last show Thursday night when the inevitable 
non-verbal listeners called in to stumble through addled statements 
that might have rambled endlessly on if Meadows hadn't diplomatically 
ended them.

I wrote to Ms. Meadows expressing these sentiments, adding that in my 
experience with KZYX that if it's free speech you're looking for from 
them, start your search in Canada.

She replied:

"Thanks. It was an absolutely surreal experience watching the 
meltdown in the crowd outside the booth as the program progressed. I 
guess they were there for pledge night, but I'd never seen so many 
people at the station. At one point a woman [Lynda McClure] was 
holding a hand written sign up to the booth glass trying to get me to 
keep quiet. When Mary Aigner started talking about how her Anderson 
Valley neighborhood was full of commercial pot growers claiming to be 
medical marijuana growers I thought the KZYX team was going to rip 
the microphone out of the wall. Their free speech cop came bounding 
into the booth with us making faces and signaling wildly to Mary to 
SHUT UP!!!! I've had my disagreements with Mary, but I have to give 
her credit for speaking up.

"The only people having a problem throughout all this were outside 
the booth. As heartily as Faulder and I disagree on this issue, even 
he pointed out during a break after one caller claimed I was part of 
the right wing takeover that people forget the UDJ endorsed him for DA.

"Anyway, I hope Mary doesn't get thrown under the bus for this. I 
just found out when I got to work this morning that they canceled 
today's planned Measure B 'forum' with Karen Ottoboni, Ross Liberty 
and Dan Hamburg. And that they won't be airing anything on the 
subject for two weeks. Belinda said this morning to me that they were 
consulting their attorneys about how serious this flaunting of their 
rules turns out to be. I also understand that they are not allowing 
anyone to have a copy of the tape of the show either. Well, good luck to them."

But Mary Aigner has been thrown under the bus. Whether or not she'll 
be rescued or run over until she's flattened right out of a job 
remains to be seen.

This is Aigner, a single mother who has raised two daughters by 
herself, said on the public airwaves Thursday night, this is her 
crime, verbatim:

Aigner: "I just want to jump in here and say, because I happen to 
live in a rural subdivision with wonderful southern exposure, so I've 
seen what's happened in my neighborhood over the last five years. I 
must say that I don't think that anyone in Mendocino County will ever 
say they are not growing medical marijuana. According to people who 
grow it, it's all medical marijuana. And so I think that that is 
interesting to me and that's one of the things that both the Yes and 
No need to address is this huge loophole in Measure G because it's 
obviously not all medical marijuana. I don't think there are that 
many cancer and AIDS and chronic pain patients."

Faulder responded, "Why do you think that, first of all? That there 
aren't that many?"

Aigner: "Pardon me?"

Faulder: "Why do you think that? I know..."

Aigner: "Personally, I do know people who do use medical marijuana 
because they're HIV positive and it's very important for them, mostly 
as an appetite stimulant and to counterattack the drugs that they 
take. And they tell me, where they live, if they go into a 
dispensary, they see very few of people, they say very few of the 
patients they see in the dispensary, they're, you know, young, healthy kids."

Faulder: "What does diabetes look like?"

Aigner: "I'm just... I'm..."

Faulder: "What does Krohn's Disease look like? You know, I'm no 
doctor, but you can't see a lot of these..."

Aigner: "My perspective is that everyone who has, you know, is 
definitely, it's all medical marijuana and I think that that is an 
important distinction in this situation. Is that some of it's medical 
marijuana, some of it's personal use and some of it is just economic. 
And I think that that distinction should perhaps be made in this conversation."

Which is simply a statement of the obvious.

Faulder's suggestion that because a person is young and looks healthy 
he may be suffering from a terminal or debilitating disease, is true; 
but it's also untrue in the undisputed larger context, which Aigner, 
without advocating either side of that night's dispute over Measure 
B, is that the preponderance of people walking around with medically 
sanctioned pot cards simply like to smoke pot and medicinal marijuana 
is a sanctioned method of keeping the cops off their backs.

To suspend Mary Aigner, let alone fire her, as seems to be shaping up 
here, for simply stating a known fact is not only flagrantly unjust 
but, given her many years of service to the clearly ungrateful radio 
station, cruel.

Station manager Belinda Rawlins was unavailable for comment. She said 
in an e-mail that she will return to work today (Wednesday).

Vance Crow, KZYX's "communications director," said Friday he couldn't 
confirm or deny the current station status of either Aigner or Meadows.

"Out of respect to them I can't comment on station staffing, even if 
they're volunteers," Crowe said, emphasizing that station policy, 
particularly its political broadcasting policy, must be absolutely 
impartial. "In any moderated forum we have to be sure we're not 
presenting one side or the other. We can't have direct or indirect 
endorsements of any ballot measure," Crowe said.

Writing from her home on the Navarro, Pebbles Trippett, the 
Northcoast's most committed, and certainly its most relentless pot 
advocate, weighed in on the KZYX controversy.

"My primary political commitment is to freedom of speech. Everything 
else in this country flows from that right. Dialog, disagreement, 
dissent in furtherance of knowledge and justice are more important 
than affiliation, family loyalty or any other law. If freedom of 
speech goes, it'll all go.

I sincerely thank the AVA for initiating a rough-&-tumble Dialogue on 
Dope (4.9.08). This is especially important in Mendocino County due 
to the Measure B vote in June on marijuana for personal use. The 
existence of a spirited debate, dedicated to opening the floodgates 
of opinion, is more important than the topic at hand or what position 
anyone takes. We have umpteen disagreements to air and no other place 
to air them. Newspapers are increasingly moving toward long 
soundbites instead of depth journalism. The AVA is our vital artery 
to uncivil discourse, if need be.

For instance a recent 1st Amendment flap on "dope" occurred on KZYX 
without any on-air discussion post-flap to inform listeners why a 
long-time programmer, KC Meadows, and KZYX staffmember, Mary Aigner, 
were suspended and the second No on B debate canceled. It was the 
station's first Measure B debate on the marijuana for personal use 
issue between Atty Keith Faulder representing the No on B side and 
Ross Liberty representing the Yes side, with Ukiah Daily Journal 
editor, KC Meadows, moderating.

KC introduced her show stating her Yes on B bias up-front and the 
debate proceeded. Keith Faulder's well-reasoned No on B arguments 
took up most of the time. Eventually Mary Aigner, long-time KZYX 
employee who was on hand for the pledge drive, joined in the debate 
posing Yes on B comments such as possessing an MD approval is a 
ticket to grow pot, etc. Mary was not originally part of the debate 
and became a third voice for Yes on B, in addition to Liberty and KC. 
 From what I hear, it was at that point that people who were in the 
station for other reasons motioned and made signs from the other side 
of the broadcast window for Mary to stop talking and officially 
remove herself from the dialogue. The official No on B 
representative, Keith Faulder, was not bothered in the least by the 
lopsidedness. His primary loyalty is to unfettered speech. His 
comment--"I relished it."--is the official No on Measure B campaign position.

KC remarked later in assessing the situation after being suspended 
for allowing lopsidedness in a debate, "Mary wouldn't stop 
talking...and neither would I." She, like Faulder, was defending the 
importance of true debate, letting people you vehemently disagree 
with have their full say without negative consequences for unpopular opinions.

More debate, not less, is the message. The No on Measure B Campaign, 
the Director and Steering Committee, were totally unaware of and in 
no way supported cutting back on debate or punishing debaters, such 
as by suspending KZYX programmers for expressing their views on Measure B.

Taking the high road would lead to withdrawing the two suspensions 
because they were the wrong thing to do. Such suspensions are 
effectively punishment for 1st Amendment protected opinions. Mary 
Aigner's 25 year service to the station should count for something, 
and the No on Measure B Campaign position on this subject should 
count for something and neither did.

At this point the previously canceled Measure B debate with Laura 
Hamburg, moderated by Karen Ottoboni, is being rescheduled. The 
station should introduce a lot of dialogue and interaction with 
listeners on this subject, especially during the pre-election debate 
period. Perhaps a liaison committee could help increase the number of 
debates sponsored by KZYX on Measure B, in part to undo the recent 
legacy of curtailing dissent without good cause or adequate 
explanation and in part, to reflect the voices and views of their 
constituency on the vital issues of medical choice and personal 
freedom. I volunteer to help in the interests of an informed public.

Dialog is the real deal. It's what makes life dynamic or static, 
vital or dead. Dialog offers us all a chance to get off the fence, 
give our input and shape our world." 
- ---
MAP posted-by: Richard Lake