Liberation Radio seized

Feds and local cops shut down venerable micropowered station

By Camille T. Taiara

Shortly before 11 a.m. on Oct. 15, more than a dozen agents from the San Francisco Police Department, the U.S. Marshals Service, and the Federal Communications Commission descended on the home of Charlotte and Jim Hatch equipped with a warrant and a battering ram.

Located in a quiet, residential neighborhood in the Castro District, the Hatch residence doubled as the latest home of San Francisco Liberation Radio, 93.7 FM, the city's oldest and most tenacious micropowered radio station.

The authorities were allowed entry without incident and proceeded to confiscate thousands of dollars worth of equipment, including the station's transmitter, antenna, mixing board, computer, turntables, and cassette and CD players.

"We look at the corporate takeover of the [publicly owned] airwaves as piracy," said gray-haired, bespectacled, and soft-spoken Charlotte Hatch, interviewed by the Bay Guardian on the sidewalk outside her home as she and daughter Karoline, who, like her mother, is an SFLR programmer, dejectedly watched officers in blue shirts with "FCC Agent" emblazoned in large, yellow letters on the back place the remnants of their station into a pickup truck.

Now, after 10 years of providing San Franciscans with news and entertainment that doesn't get broadcast by the corporate media, SFLR has been forced off the air.

SFLR attorney Peter Franck of the National Lawyers Guild's Center for Democratic Communications said he and his clients received no warning from the FCC indicating the raid was coming.

"They went to a judge behind our back," he said. "You don't take people's property without notice and an opportunity to be heard. We had a right to be told the FCC was going before a judge, and to be there [to argue our case]. Basically, they violated San Francisco Liberation Radio broadcasters' right of due process under the Fourth Amendment."

Franck said it wasn't until Oct. 20 – five days after the raid – that he received a copy of the FCC's original complaint asking the judge to authorize the equipment seizure. At SFLR's request, he'll be asking the judge to rescind the order and direct the FCC to return the equipment.

We approached David Doon, the San Francisco Field Office FCC agent heading the case locally, as he left the Hatches' home the day of the raid. Doon refused to comment and directed us to Washington, D.C.-based FCC flak Suzanne Tetreault, who failed to return repeated calls by press time.

SFLR programmers said they intend to set up a Web stream at www.liberationradio.net that will allow listeners with the proper equipment to tune in via their computers and that could be picked up and broadcast over the air by anyone with a transmitter who's willing to take the risk.

The raid places the SFPD at odds with the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and its three mayoral candidates: Tom Ammiano, Matt Gonzalez, and Gavin Newsom. In a unanimous vote, the board passed a resolution Aug. 19 in support of SFLR that, among other things, directed the SFPD not to cooperate with federal agencies in any operations against the station. Numerous witnesses present at the scene that morning reported seeing SFPD officers assisting the marshals and FCC agents.

The raid followed a Supreme Court decision Oct. 6 not to hear micropower radio broadcasters' appeal of a ban against issuing radio broadcasting licenses to anyone involved in operating a low-power FM station prior to Feb. 26, 1999, when the FCC announced it would create a licensing procedure for micropowered radio.

SFLR began in 1993, initially broadcasting out of a van on Potrero Hill before finding a semipermanent home in the Richmond District and, then, moving to the Hatches' house in the Castro in the spring of 2002. It operated on 100 watts of power and was on the air from 9 a.m. until 11 p.m. seven days a week.

The station first applied for a broadcasting license through the FCC Nov. 30, 1998 – during the height of mass civil disobedience involving approximately 1,000 "pirate" stations around the country, which finally led to the reversal of a 1978 FCC regulation banning low-power FM. The previous confrontation between SFLR and the FCC came July 2, when two agents appeared at the Hatches' home and asked to inspect their equipment. The FCC threatened the Hatches with $17,000 in fines after being turned away.

SFLR activists will hold a series of benefits to help cover the station's legal costs. For details on these events and updates on SFLR's case, go to www.liberationradio.net. For updates on the legal battle for low-power FM radio, go to www.nlgcdc.org.

SFLR benefits will be held Nov. 1, 8 p.m.-2 a.m., with music by Ralph Carney, standup comedy by Tony DuShane, bingo with Chicken John, and other acts, Odeon Bar, 3223 Mission, S.F. $7-$20 sliding-scale donation. (415) 550- 6994 or (415) 648-9222; and Nov. 16, 9 a.m.-2 a.m., with a "Junk 'n' Jam" garage sale and outdoor and indoor performances, Spanganga, 3376 19th St., S.F. $7-$20 sliding-scale donation. (415) 821-1102 or (415) 648-9222.

E-mail Camille T. Taiara at camille@sfbg.com.