Margaret Prescod Candidate Statement

My networks, gathered over the years, have enriched my KPFK work. I have actively participated in KPFK fund drives and I organized a fundraiser for KPFK featuring actor/activist Danny Glover. I have also consistently supported the Pacifica Archives hosting one of their top earning hours during their recent fund drives. I have advocated for resources for paid staff as well as much-needed support for unpaid staff. My orientation is collective, and my experience is that paid and unpaid staff are interdependent. Despite differences in approach within society in general that are reflected in KPFK, we must remember Pacifica is a precious resource, an information, musical and other lifeline for many, in particular but not only those with the least resources. KPFK must move further into this digital age to increase access and audience base in all communities. Outreach to youth is vital; volunteering with inner city youth, I facilitated a Black and Brown youth media training with on air experience at the station for 5 weeks.

Sojourner Truth has brought cutting-edge interviews to KPFK: Harry Belafonte, Toni Morrison, Jessie Jackson, Danny Glover, Cindy Sheehan, Richard Gott and more. I participated in the first US sitdown radio interview with Venezuela’s President Chavez along with Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, and interviewed Mme. Mildred Aristide, wife of the kidnapped Haitian president.

I also produced/hosted the national special Racism and Injustice: The Trials of Mumia Abu- Jamal including an exclusive interview with Mumia. Sojourner Truth has brought news on Benton Harbor, Michigan, where Black people live in apartheid-like conditions: tried by all- white juries, subjected to cross-burnings and more. It’s provided a voice for women, communities of color, immigrants and others from the grassroots in LA, other parts of the US and the Global South whose struggle gives direction to the movement for change but whose voices are rarely heard.

I have been an activist on the Pacifica National Board, where I moved resolutions in support of Mumia, the people of Haiti; war resister Lt. Ehren Watada; and the people of Oaxaca.

Working at KPFK, paid or unpaid, is not a job like any other. As I said when I first ran for the Local Station Board, our planet is in jeopardy and, to stem that tide, we need the power of diverse communities and individuals whose aim is not personal power and who are determined to stay the course to undermine power relations among us that ensure divisions, war, poverty, environmental devastation, etc.

Thanks to the many paid and unpaid staff who kindly signed my petition to run for the LSB.