KZYX&Z Board Meeting Erupts in Arrest
Random Chaos & Incompetence Characterize KZYX&Z Board Meeting
Mendocino County Public Broadcasting held their Board of Directors meeting at the Point Noyo Restaurant where acrimony and strife hit a new low when a board member called the police on a KZYX member, accusing him of unruly behavior and trespassing.
The room was packed, with some members having to stand in the cramped space. A pool table separated the board from the audience, necessitating yelling and shouting to make one self heard. Once again there was no sound reinforcement
The evening got stranger when members were instructed to not partake of the meager supply of snacks on display on the pool table. The tense atmosphere in the room was exacerbated when Tim Bray physically attacked Jeff Wright and Derek Hoyle when, while walking by, he threw a glass of water on them, getting both of them wet and endangering the electronics and cameras. The assault by one KZYX member on another went unmentioned by the board officers. Meg Courtney continued Election of Officers, as far as we can understand. The room had erupted in shouting making it near impossible to hear anything. Still, no gavel was hammered. As chaos erupted, no board member made any attempt to enforce order and pointedly ignored the acrimonious activity in the room.
As the meeting progressed it became difficult for attendees to understand what was being said, as the staff did not bring a PA system and microphones. This has been a constant problem at their meetings where the attendees cannot hear what’s being said. Curiously missing since the new General Manager is also their field audio engineer.
Jeff took it upon himself to purchase 10 plates of garlic fries from Point Noyo to supplement the snacks provided. As Jeff started throwing plates of fries on to the pool table he also attempted to vociferously oppose the election of Stewart Cambell to Treasurer.
While Jeff was loud and disruptive at times, the board refused to address his questions and never once called him out of order or made an attempt to control the room. While Jeff assured the meeting that he would “Not call 911 to have Tim Bray arrested for throwing water on him”, a board member surreptitiously called 911 to come arrest Jeff.
Ironically Jeff was charged with Trespassing and Disruptive Behavior after purchasing 10 plates of Garlic Fries from the establishment while the Board of KZYX brought food purchased from elsewhere. Jeff Wright was arrested, handcuffed and taken away in a police cruiser after which the Board considered leasing new office space and sound facilities from the new Station Manager, Lorrain Dechter.
Update; May 3 2016
Derek Hoyle has filed charges for Assault against Tim Bray, which will now go to the District Attorney for possible prosecution.
Krrazyx Board Meeting from Terrence Vaughn on Vimeo.
This is my public comment for that public meeting. Word-for-word.
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My name is Scott M. Peterson. I live in Mendocino. And I’d like to talk about conscience. Community conscience.
Any board of directors needs information. About the organization it serves. This includes information about finance. And policy. Furthermore it needs accurate information.
There’s only one place to get this information. On something called a Form 990. Filed every year. With the IRS.
All of you with an Internet connection. Look at the KZYX website. Go to the tab titled About. Then to Station Business. And to the fourth item down. Titled meeting minutes. They go back for seven years. I’ve looked through all of them. There’s no mention of the Form 990. Anywhere.
Some of these forms can be found. On the KZYX website. But they’re buried. And incomplete. There’s only seven years worth there. The most recent one is missing. Along with five previous years. 2002 through 2006.
A complete set can be found at the Registry of Charitable Trusts. And the National Center for Charitable Statistics. For fifteen years. Including the most recent one.
The complete set tells a complete story. About what’s happened here. With finance. And policy. Here’s a summary of that story.
KZYX was declining in 2002. Public support was dropping. By about fifty thousand dollars a year. So a brain trust stepped in. With a community conscience. And created a complete set of policies. Adopted in 2006. By the board of directors. This reversed that decline. More than doubling KZYX’s net assets. To over $360,000.
Then something happened. The new policies got ignored. And KZYX went into decline again. By the end of 2015, KZYX had lost seventy-five percent of its net assets. That can all be seen on the Form 990s. With a look-back. Something required by KZYX policy. But ignored.
These minutes are definitely worth reading. All of them. Look for the word policy. You’ll see it mentioned twice. In seven years. Not by directors. But by members of the public. Who wanted to know one thing. Why that policy wasn’t being followed.
The response is something that KZYX should be ashamed of. The people who asked about policy were vilified. By sitting directors. This all came to a head recently. When a KZYX treasurer tried to get finance information. And couldn’t. So he went to the FCC. And the local press. Which was the responsible thing to do. Then he was vilified too.
The meeting minutes on the KZYX website are incomplete. The ones for July 7, 2014 are missing. But you can find them on Google. Where you can see that vilification. Calling that treasurer out. Over a lack of conscience.
I read that treasurer’s FCC complaint. Along with his press release. Everything he said was absolutely true. And conscientious. You can see that in the Form 990s. And the meeting minutes.
I could only see one lack of conscience here. For ignoring KZYX policy. For keeping everyone in the dark. And for losing seventy-five percent of KZYX’s net worth.
So let’s talk about community conscience. Please.
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Sincerely,
Scott M. Peterson
Mendocino
Hello Scott, don’t know if you remember me, I was Fingerz of the Privateer era almost 40 years ago. I have tried to find you in Mendo but not much luck. Please contact me if you get this message at magicgeorge@gmail.com. Hope to hear from you. George