STOP POLICE VIOLENCE

COPLEY, TOMORROW, 2PM

NATGAT ’14

The Ferguson Murder is part of the militarization of US that starts with one-on-one racism between police and the poor and ends with locking people up to make a buck. Occupy Nat Gat 2014 has called for

“A MONTH OF RESISTANCE TO MASS INCARCERATION, POLICE TERROR, REPRESSION AND THE CRIMINALIZATION OF A GENERATION!

For 2 generations, Black and Latina/Latino youth in the U.S. have been shipped off to prison in numbers never before seen anywhere in the world at any time. More than 2 million people, of all nationalities languish in prison — ten times the number 50 years ago. The U.S. has 5% of the world’s population but 25% of the world’s prison population! More than 60% of those in U.S. prisons are Black or Latina/o. 32% of Black men between the ages of 20 and 29 are in prison or on parole or probation on any given day. More than 80,000 people in prison are held in solitary confinement.

The Stop Mass Incarceration Network

http://www.stopmassincarceration.net/

In 1967 the Black Panthers called for the release of all imprisoned Black Men as part of their 10 Point Plan. Now it’s your turn.

DEMAND THE RELEASE OF ALL THOSE CONVICTED OF VICTIMLESS CRIMES.

Long live Treyvon Martin,

Aria Littlhous

DEMO DETAILS

As many of you have heard, teenager Michael Brown was killed August 9th in Ferguson, MO – shot multiple times by a police officer despite eye-witness accounts that he was unarmed and had his hands up in surrender. The police reaction? Refusing to interview the main eye witness, confiscating phones with videos of the incident, and declining to publicize the autopsy report or the name of the involved officer. As protests in Missouri heat up on both sides with protestor and police violence escalating, support from cities across our country is vital!

This peaceful protest is for Boston to show its solidarity with Ferguson and say that racialized police brutality is an American CRISIS that needs to be addressed. The slaughter of unarmed children cannot continue – every American citizen has the right to due process, and to be treated with dignity and respect.

Come to Copley Square this Saturday the 16th to make our voices HEARD! There will be plenty of signs, and I need YOU GUYS to help carry them all!

Please please share and invite. Michael Brown’s family deserves justice!

http://www.occupy.com/article/black-man-killed-us-every-28-hours-police

http://jezebel.com/this-is-why-were-mad-about-the-shooting-of-mike-brown-1619522935?utm_content=buffer98760&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer

http://gawker.com/anonymous-vows-action-over-shooting-death-of-unarmed-te-1619233440

http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/12/opinion/baez-police-garner-michael-brown-chokehold/

The next round of bread and circus should leave behind more than a giant bag of money for the 1%. Angling for the Olympics to come to Boston should start with a commitment to share the wealth created by the games as widely as possible.

And we don’t mean a Reagan-ish shrug and a coy “a rising tide lifts all boats” license here-pushcart-there-increase-in-commerce-yeah-you’ll get a little bit sharing. We mean WEALTH. We mean PROPERTY REDISTRIBUTION.

Building temporary housing for the cream of the crop, while the hoi-polloi sleeps in the streets is insulting, inhumane and in the face of ongoing environmental collapse just plain insane. Consider instead:

A Modest Proposal:

1. Build permanent multi-unit housing and sell it at cost to the poor who can in turn become resident landlords. It was good enough for the Irish; it’s good enough for us.

2. Leave behind a horticultural academy to care for Franklin Park.

3. Create a real underground transit system that reaches neighborhoods of color.

4. Food by small local restaurants.

5. Cleaning by small local businesses.

And when all else fails:

6. EAT THE RICH.

For the Earth,

A.

 Save the Alewife Silver Maples,

STAND UP FOR TREES, 6/28

 Fannie Mae Evicts Activists, see below.

Like lemmings off a cliff, those that believe in endless growth are building on the corpses of trees, evicting homeless families from empty homes and herding us all closer to a man made apocalypse.

Please be present either in person or by forwarding this notice wildly.

 For the Earth,

A.

Silver Maples

Friends of Alewife Reservation has been alarmed by the news that the 7 acre silver maple floodplain forest located off Acorn Drive in the Alewife Reservation may be clear cut by the end of the summer by Brian O’Neill Properties from Pennsylvania and that a curb cut had been granted. We are asking once again for you to sponsor  and/or join another activity related to the preservation of this forest. Please consider signing onto a demonstration at the Alewife T stop on

Saturday June 28th at 10am for a visibility showing and a march with giant Earth Mother and Alewife puppets to the silver maple forest to stand for 30 minutes in silence.

Families are welcome.
We will be handing out and getting post cards signed as well.

There will be many signs to hold from Green Cambridge and Friends of Alewife Reservation. In the past the following have been supportive of conservation of this magnificent “small river floodplain forest”, deemed so by the state’s Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Department. http://friendsofalewifereservation.org/2006_03_riverrestlessspirit_audubon.htm

We will be inviting other groups who are interested to sign on as well. We would like your recommendations as to additional endorsers.
Please consider endorsing this event.

Fannie Mae Evicts Protestors

193 NORWELL  STREET DORCHESTER

June 10, 2014

Community reclaimed home under banner of affordable housing, held rally and cookout for community, and set up a pirate radio station before being evicted

This this past Saturday, City Life/Vida Urbana and a local coalition of Right to the City Boston groups held a block party and cookout at 193 Norwell St. in Dorchester to celebrate the move-in of a family in need of stable, affordable, accessible housing after post-foreclosure eviction by an “investor.” We also celebrated the launch of a new community radio station broadcasting under the historic 106.1 FM frequency. The community came together to support the Adamson family’s taking up residence in a bank-owned home that had been vacant for months.  We had over 150 guests throughout the day, two local ministers came to bless the family in their new home, and the district City Councilor paid a visit. The event showed what the face of homelessness in our city really looks like; how the neglect that makes empty houses dangerous can be completely reversed with community effort; and the practical solutions to the housing crisis that we have at our fingertips.

It saddens us to report that around 2:00 PM on Monday June 9, 2014, the Boston Police came to193 Norwell St. At the behest of the realtor managing the property for the bank owner, Fannie Mae, the police emptied out the home, arresting one volunteer in the process. We urged law enforcement to tell Fannie Mae to negotiate with the occupants, who were quoted in the Boston Globe publicly offering to pay any reasonable rent. Instead, hours of police time were spent overseeing a move-out.  City Life/Vida Urbana condemns this waste of public safety resources.  At a time when family homelessness is a growing epidemic, our tax dollars shouldn’t go to enforcement of banks’ policies of keeping properties vacant to speculate on the price going up in the future.  An offer was put in months ago by a nonprofit organization to buy the house in order to rehab it and run it as affordable rental housing. Given its status as a publicly-funded, government-run bank, Fannie Mae should do its part to stabilize our communities.

As Mayor Walsh prepares his municipal housing plan and the state considers an increase in the minimum wage, Boston tenants and community activists will hold a press conference on the Right to the City “Rise of the Renter Nation” national report. The conference will be held in front of 193 Norwell St. on June 10, 2014 at noon, with a coalition of housing justice and low-wage worker groups. In this report, grassroots organizations detail solutions to the ongoing housing crisis in America. To read a digital copy online or purchase a printed copy of the national report, go to: homesforall.org

Heal

Invitation to Single-Payer Birddogging—5/22/14

& Zombie March–TODAY

Help stop the blood sucking vampires –aka for profit healthcare companies–that have made the United States healthcare system the laughing stock of the civilized world.

You  can make single-payer healthcare the top issue of the current Massachusetts gubernatorial campaign season!

“How?” you might ask — We plan to attend campaign events between now and the primary election in September and the general election in November to ask each candidate – Republican and Democrats – to commit to implementing a single payer system in Massachusetts if they are elected. We call this birddogging. Several candidates already support single-payer.

Why this strategy? Showing up at these events lets the candidates know that people in MA support single-payer. Plus, while they are seeking votes and trying to get elected, they are more likely to make policy commitments than when they are comfortably settled into their State House office. Students used this strategy during the 2008 presidential campaign to secure $50 billion in federal funding for global health and AIDS funding. It’s as simple as showing up, asking your question, and taking a picture with the candidate– as long as we repeat until our goal is reached!

Is there more to it? There is a little more to it — so we are inviting you to get trained and to meet other students and single-payer advocates on Thursday, May 22nd, at Harvard Medical School. We will also provide an introduction to what a single-payer system could do for MA, as well as background on the gubernatorial candidates. If you cannot attend the training, but are interested in future birddogging opportunities, please fill out the form below and we will keep you updated about the campaign.

What: Birddogging training and more on single-payer and the current candidates for Governor

Where: Harvard Medical School, TMEC 109, 260 Longwood Ave

When: 6:30pm on Thursday, May 22nd

Questions? Email Katrina (kciraldo@bu.edu) or Danielle (danielle_back@hms.harvard.edu)

 Capitalist healthcare is an oxymoron. It’s not about health and they don’t care.

NO COMPASSION FOR PROFIT. 

Zombie March: Today

4:00 PM, South Station

Volunteers Meet: 3:30pm

The Rules:

1. you may come as a zombie, a survivor, or a protestor, or anything else that ties in with the theme.

2. no physical contact with regular people, if they tell you to go away do it, try not to scare children as well.

3. weapon rules, nerf guns or water guns or cap guns only, melee weapons are allowed long as they are either foam or other kind of material which can not injure or you are not swinging it. if people ask you not to shoot them don’t, also DO NOT shoot anyone wearing makeup on places where they have applied said makeup, you can inadvertently undo hours of their hard work in seconds. I don’t care if your airsoft gun isn’t loaded do NOT bring it.

4. always stay on the sidewalk unless crossing, and break character when crossing, we don’t want the group to be split due to people shambling across the street.

5. Don’t get blood on storefronts/windows, or on the ground of South Station, they let us do this and all they ask is to not make a mess.

6. come introduce yourself and say thank you to myself and the volunteers, it takes about 6 months of solid work to make this happen every year and varying financial cost not to mention my sanity. it is a free event so all we ask is your appreciation, come say hi and give some feedback.