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STORY: This weekend, the Pacifica National Board is set to vote on bylaws that will determine how the five-station network functions. The part of the new guidelines receiving the most attention deals with diversity of Pacifica staff and volunteers. KPFT's local advisory board member, Diallo Kantambu, wrote a proposal dealing with diversity concerns: "The proposal is called 'The Committees of Inclusion.' But what that has to do with is that at the national level there will be one Committee of Inclusion and at each station area, there will be a Committee of Inclusion that is a sub-committee of the national. And their function will be to go out into the community, to know and talk with minorities in the community to get them involved with their local stations and to try to get them involved with the activities of the station." Committees of inclusion would have no enforcement power. But, in a supplement to his proposal, Kantambu suggests if goals set by the committees are not met in upcoming Pacifica board member elections, he supports having supplemental elections of minority members only: "These members would come up from these Committees of Inclusion from the neighborhoods where they have done outreach. A certain number would be selected to go before the local boards for the local boards to vet and question and find out what their interests are." After this a vote would take place to add some of the nominees to the board. Local KPFT advisory board member Theresa Allen also sits on the Pacifica National Board. She says she plans to support the diversity proposal. "And it's very pro-active, very hands on. It really seeks out the sources of problems that you might have with disparities. I think that's a very encouraging sign. Of course, we want to take a stand that we're definitely for broad representation of our community, whatever the demographics are. But I think that because there are some limits, this is really the best plan, this is the best way to go." The limits she refers to were described by NAACP legal defense fund attorney Ted Shaw in reference to other proposed diversity plans. Shaw says these plans include quotas - which are prohibited by Title 6 of the 1994 Civil Rights Act, and by California law. Concerns that such a proposal could invalidate upcoming Pacifica elections if later found unlawful have led many to support the proposal written by Houston's Kantambu. Listen to the Friday edition KPFT News for more on this weekend's bylaw vote. Chris Sampson, KPFT News, Houston. E-mail Chris Sampson at chris@omradio.com . This story was broadcast on March 5, 2003.