Home > Community Voices > The Fight for KDNA Continues
Community Announcement #1 - The fight for Radio KDNA continues
The radio continues to be held hostage by Maria Fernandez, Executive Director and Jorge Lobos chair of the Board of Directors.
After an almost month-long strike, the staff of Radio KDNA agreed to return to work because the Board of Directors and the union that represents the employees reached an agreement to accept arbitration to determine if the fired employees were unjustly terminated, to negotiate a union contract with the Teamsters representing the KDNA employees, and to stop the unjust practices and harassment of the employees by the Director.
A week later, this agreement has not been honored. The situation for the station’s employees goes from bad to worse. The harassment continues. Why? Mrs. Maria Fernandez and the Board of Directors have virtually taken the radio hostage. Why?
They continue their injustice, harassment, and hostility towards the workers. Why?
They continue to treat us with scorn and ignore the questions and concerns that we the community have about our radio. We are afraid that our station that used to offer educational and informational programs of all kinds will disappear. We say that the radio has been taken hostage by the Director and the Board of Directors because they deny us access and do not allow our voices to be heard. They treat us like we are stupid and ignorant.
Is being a farm worker looking for answers to all these questions make us ignorant?
When we call our station and we want to participate in a radio program they ask us for our name and telephone number. Then they say they will decide if they will call us back or not. When we do speak on the air, they hang up the telephone on us with the excuse that we are crude.
What do they fear? Where is the voice of the farm worker? Why do they deny us the right to have a voice? What are their intentions for the radio? Why do the announcers sound fearful, and why are they not allowed to speak about what is happening inside the radio station?
The administration manipulates and moves programming at their whim and the news of what is happening inside the radio is concealed. They deceive the community. Community guest commentators like Ricardo Ortega, Joseph Trevino, Ricardo Garcia and Uriel Iniguez who brought us news have disappeared off the air.
We will continue to fight for our public radio! Our community has a voice! We will unite!
The membership committee of Radio KDNA.
