The California Attorney General's Office has sent a letter to Pacifica's controversial interim Executive Director demanding information for an audit that the Attorney General's Office is going to do on Pacifica. This is big news. Some folks have been calling for such a thing for years. There is the potential for some folks to experience serious legal problems as a result of this audit.
Below we have the original E-mail that made this Attorney General's Office audit public knowledge and below that we have the list of 23 sets of documents demanded by the Attorney General's Office. Below that we have more updates.
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [PacificaRadiowaves] California AG is Auditing Pacifica
Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2014 19:49:29 -0600
From: Richard Uzzell
To: PacificaRadiowaves
CC: KPFT LSB, "Duane Bradley (T-GM)"
The Pacifica Board of Directors was informed today by IED, Margy Wilkinson of a December 17, 2014 letter (sent almost a week earlier) from California Deputy Attorney General, Julianne Mossler, "for Kamala D. Harris, Attorney General." This was the first that the Board (as a whole) was informed of this letter the California Attorney General and the action it is taking toward the Pacifica Foundation Radio.
There is some question about "confidentiality" of the actual letter, so at this point I will just give the public a general idea of what the Deputy Attorney General, Mossler had to say in the letter.
Mossler began by informing Pacifica that "the Office of the Attorney General has the duty to supervise charitable organizations under California Corporate Code section 5250, and Government Code section 12580 through 12599.8." She goes on to say "One of the ways the Office performs this duty is by conducting audits of charitable organizations." Then she informs that "We (the California Attorney General's Office) have selected Pacifica Foundation Radio (PFR) for a correspondence audit."
DAG Mossler listed an extremely comprehensive list of some 23 items, many involving multiple documents; that she is requiring Pacifica to send to her Office. She went on to direct that Pacifica "send the requested documentation and information to me (Mossler) within 30 days of the date of this letter (January 16, 2015). In defining the scope of the requested documents, Mossler specifies that "unless other wise stated, documents and information produced in response to these request are to cover the period from January 1, 2010 to the date of the response."
As this week-old letter was sent to the Board today, there was no comment from IED Wilkinson as to what steps were being taken by management and/or planned to comply with the very serious investigation.
Richard Uzzell, Pacifica Director, KPFT-Houston
Tracy Rosenberg, former Pacifica Director, and former Treasurer of the PNB, has posted the following information in one of her newsletters:
Here is a list of the 23 sets of documents requested by the California Attorney General
1. Articles of Incorporation and any amendments
2. Bylaws, and any amendments
3. Names, addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses of all members of the national board of directors and all corporate officers from January 1, 2010, identifying each by position and term.
4. IRS form 1023 and proof of tax-exempt status from the Internal Revenue Service and CA Franchise Tax Board
5. Complete minutes, including attachments and reports, of all meetings of the board of directors and board committees, including any resolutions passed, from January 1, 2010 to the present.
6. 990 forms from January 1, 2010 to the present.
7. Form RRF-1 and filings with the CA AG from January 1, 2010 to the present.
8. Financial statements, including income statements and balance sheets from January 1, 2010 to the present.
9. General ledgers (if maintained electronically, please send electronic files) from January 1, 2010 to the present.
10. Bank statements for all checking, savings, and investment accounts from January 1, 2010 to the present.
11. Canceled checks for all checking, savings and investment accounts from January 1, 2010 to the present.
12. Records of all donations and grants received by PFR, including but not limited to donations received via Twitter, Facebook and Pacifica's websites, from January 1, 2010 to the present.
13. Receipts and itemized expenditure journals documenting expenses, from January 1, 2010 to the present.
14. All written policies, procedures, internal training manuals and documents related to solicitations including solicitation scripts, question and answer sheets, brochures or promotional materials used in soliciting donations and audio records of fundraising solicitations from January 1, 2010 to the present.
15. Correspondence and documents related to donations from the public, including restrictions on the use of those donations from January 1, 2010 to the present.
16. Identify and produce all complaints and donation cancellation requests along with the name, address, telephone number and email address of the requesting party from Jan 1, 2010 to the present.
17. A list of any loans made by PFR and documents related to those loans, including name, date, amount, purpose, copy of the note, terms of the loan, board minutes detailing the discussion of the loan, and a payment schedule, from January 1, 2010 to the present.
18. A list of any loans made to PFR and documents related to those loans, including name, date, amount, purpose, copy of the note, terms of the loan, board minutes detailing the discussion of the loan, and a payment schedule (from January 1, 2010 to the present).
19. A list of any self-dealing transactions (transactions in which a member of the board or an employee has a financial interest, with the date, parties, amount and purpose and board minutes of the discussion from inception.
20. W-2 forms of all employees including board officers from January 1, 2010 to the present.
21. A list of employees, consultants, officers and board members and the amount of salary and wages paid to each from Jan 1, 2010 to the present.
22. All policies and procedures related to fiscal controls.
23. All policies and procedures related to governance.
In my opinion Pacifica is going to have a hard time meeting some of these demands, at least by the deadline. Some of these things have been demanded/requested by various people involved in Pacifica governance for quite a while and we haven't seen them yet.
The interim Executive Director (iED) has issued a report dated January 8, 2015, where she says that, “... the AG has given us an extension to February 17, 2015 to respond to the requests for documents and information.” The iED also said that the National Office is, “... beginning to pull together the needed materials,” requested by the Attorney General's office, she also calls for volunteers to assist in this. The entire original E-mail is here.
We'll update this page as events warrant.
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