Kpfk

KPFK-FM (90.7), which recently underwent a management overhaul, will unveil a new weekday schedule Wednesday that is intended to provide listeners with a clearer and more consistent program lineup. Executives at the listener-sponsored station hope the schedule--made up of Monday-through-Friday "strips" of thematically connected shows--will attract a wider audience and win back listeners who had abandoned KPFK because of its "hodgepodge" scheduling, said newly named program director Gwen Walters.

A memorial service is scheduled for Sunday for Charles Morgan, an award-winning National Public Radio broadcaster known locally for his call-in show "Talk to Me" on KPFK. Morgan was 78 when he died Aug. 7 in Los Angeles after a long illness. He joined KPFK in 1974 as a commentator and was heard Monday and Friday evenings. During a broadcast career that began in the 1930s, he won two Associated Press awards and a Golden Mike from the Radio and Television News Directors Assn.

KPFK-FM (90.7), the local affiliate of the Pacifica radio network, is holding an open house and barbecue from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. today so listeners can see the new studio and production facilities made possible by the station's first $1-million fund drive, completed last winter. The open house will feature music by the DJs of the station's "Divine Forces" program. The event completes a 10-day fund drive that the station hopes will raise $800,000 for outreach, training and newsroom programs.

In a memorial tribute to artist-photographer Edmund Teske, KPFK-FM (90.7) will rebroadcast "Edmund Teske: Being and Becoming," Thursday from 10-11 p.m. The Teske program first aired in 1993 to coincide with the J. Paul Getty Museum exhibition "Being and Becoming/Photographs of Edmund Teske." The 85-year-old Teske died in November.

Ruth "Uncle Ruthie" Buell, who lives in L.A.'s Pico-Robertson neighborhood, had a thought one day. Actually, the thoughts are always bubbling over with her, but this one was particularly inspired. Why not replace the rotting tree stumps in her frontyard with benches as a way of inviting neighbors to take a breather, talk and get to know one another? That was Part One of the idea, which took shape about two months ago. Part Two was a note to visitors from Uncle Ruthie - who has graced the planet for 82 years - encouraging them to take pen and paper from pouches pinned to the tree and share their thoughts.

The neat, blue signs in the Macintosh typeface tell the whole--if misspelled--story: ALL PROGRAMMERS--THERE HAS BEEN A DRAMATIC SHIFT IN FCC POLICY .. .. The warnings paper the walls, windows and bulletin boards throughout the worn and tattered North Hollywood studio of KPFK-FM.

A radio news reporter for KPFK-FM in Studio City was shot to death execution-style in South Los Angeles, Los Angeles Police Department homicide detectives said Monday. The body of Michael Taylor, 45, of Los Angeles, was found last Tuesday in a vacant lot off South Victoria Avenue, said Det. Alex Moreno of the LAPD's South Bureau. Residents of the area heard gun shots near the railroad tracks there about 1:30 a.m. and called police, he said.

Friends described him as a man on a mission to capture the voices of the disenfranchised: gang members, welfare mothers, junkies. Whenever he could, Michael Taylor shoved his clunky tape recorder into the faces of ordinary folk on the street. Even as he battled homelessness and a drug habit, Taylor enrolled in 1993 in radio station KPFK's 18-month apprenticeship program. There, he found a new life as a street reporter.