Editing Pacifica Foundation (section)

===Financial situation in the 2010s===
On August 9, 2013, Pacifica interim executive director Summer Reese announced that due to financial problems, Pacifica-owned radio station WBAI-FM in New York was laying off about two-thirds of its staff, effective August 12, 2013. The entire news department was reportedly included in the layoff.<ref>Ben Sisario, [https://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/12/business/media/wbai-fm-lays-off-most-of-staff.html "WBAI-FM Lays Off Most of Staff"], August 11, 2013, ''The New York Times''.</ref>

After Pacifica's board of directors completed the 2016 board year with the exclusion of 75% of WBAI's board representation, it then moved to decertify Pacifica's 2016 board elections, which had been won handily by the independent faction not in power. The new 2017 board of directors replaced interim executive director Lydia Brazon with KPFT director Bill Crosier and reinstated WBAI's delegation.{{citation needed|date=October 2024}}

On Friday, October 6, 2017, Pacifica lost a $1.8&nbsp;million settlement over what they claimed was price gouging by Empire State Realty Trust (ESRT), which had been raising antenna rental charges for WBAI at 9% per year for the last 12 years under a 15-year lease WBAI signed in 2005 that did not expire until 2020.  The rent was set at more than half a million dollars annually, which Pacifica claimed was approximately 4 times the current market rent for Midtown Manhattan antenna rentals.  Pacifica Radio's WBAI has housed its transmitter on the [[Empire State Building]] since 1966.  The 9% annual rental increases were facilitated by the destruction of the twin towers on September 11, 2001, which dramatically reduced space available for comparable antennas.  The ruling encumbered all of Pacifica's assets including KPFA and KPFB in Berkeley, KPFK in Los Angeles, WPFW in Washington, DC, and KPFT in Houston in addition to WBAI in New York City but does not affect the assets of any of its affiliates.<ref>{{Citation
| date = October 6, 2017
| title = Court Protects ESRT's Lease Terms for Pacifica's Non-Profit WBAI Radio in NYC – Denies "Unconscionability" Motion
| publisher = Common Dreams
| url = https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2017/10/06/court-protects-esrts-lease-terms-pacificas-non-profit-wbai-radio-nyc-denies
| access-date = January 11, 2018}} For more information on what has happened since the October 6, 2017, court ruling, see {{Citation
| date = January 2, 2018
| title = What's Up with Pacifica Radio? WTF Pacifica?
| publisher = KFCF | location = Fresno, CA
| url = https://www.kfcf.org/whats-up-with-pacifica-radio/
| access-date = January 11, 2018}}</ref>   On April 6, 2018, The Pacifica Foundation announced the settlement on a series of agreements that release WBAI, the organization's New York radio station, from a court judgment as well as the last two years of its lease at the Empire State Building as of May 31, 2018.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.wbai.org/articles.php?article=3570|title = Pacifica Announces Settlement with Empire State Building and Empire State Realty Trust}}</ref> The Foundation later completed an agreement to relocate its transmission facility to a new site nearby.

On October 8, 2019, it was announced that WBAI's local operations were abruptly shut down.<ref>Leonard Greene. [https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ny-wbai-radio-shutdown-20191007-k4jt6xqisfg3dmarhhzhkxjwau-story.html Community radio station WBAI shuts down amid financial woes]. ''Daily News'' (New York), October 7, 2019</ref> Their programming was superseded by Pacifica Across America: a compilation of work from sister stations and other sources; ''[[Democracy Now!]]'' continued to be broadcast.

The 2019 WBAI shutdown was litigated in the fall of 2019. The [[New York State Supreme Court]] ruled in November 2019 that the WBAI shutdown by then-executive director John Vernile was executed "ultra vires" (without the proper authority) and ordered the station re-opened.<ref>{{Cite web|title=NY Supreme Court Transcript Released {{!}} Pacifica in Exile|date=November 29, 2019 |url=https://pacificainexile.org/archives/2839|access-date=December 31, 2020|language=en-US}}</ref>