Save the Redwoods/Boycott the Gap
Reclaim the Commons Report-Back
Posted by Mary Bull (chalicenew@earthlink.net)
Tuesday, June 15, 2004
Greetings, Gapatistas and Racial Justice Activists!
Following is a report back on the RACIAL JUSTICE TRACK of the Reclaim the Commons G8 / Biotech Mobilization (Jan 14--Jun 9), which culminated in the racial-justice Teach-in panels and workshops (Jun 4--5), Racial Justice Day of Actions (Jun 7: all day), Biotech World Cafe (Jun 7: evening), and Day of Eco-Actions (Jun 9). First and foremost, a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who contributed to the success of this track and these culminating events! A summary of highlights of R-J media coverage is also included at the end of this email!
---R-J Track Overview (Jan 14--Jun 9)! The racial justice track of the RTC mobilization was with us from the very beginning when a core group of RTC organizers, black & white, decided at the Earth Activist Training in January that uniting the Racial Justice & Global Movements (note: Save the Redwoods/Boycott the Gap started as part of the movement for global justice and ecology) would be a priority in this mobilization, that this would be reflected in the RTC teach-in, in community outreach, support, and actions, and in community-supported eco -projects launched in low-income neighborhoods of color. Working groups were created for each of these areas. Several activists from the Community Actions Working Group (which later became the R-J Working Group) attended a Bayview Hunters Point (BVHP) Community First Coalition meeting on Jan 23, at the invitation of Kevyn Lutton, an RTC and CFC organizer, which kicked off our outreach efforts. HIGHLIGHTS leading up to the home-stretch of the mobilization (June 3--9) included organizing a weekend legal summit to help BVHP residents address US naval shipyard conveyance, pollution, and civil rights issues, the Redevelopment Agency, and gentrification (April 10 & 11); attending SF police commission hearings & press conferences, and co-organizing a protest with the Idriss Stelley Foundation (Apr 24) to lend our voices to the demand for an end to police and street violence in neighborhoods of color; joining the Books Not Bars Alternatives for Youth Campaign that is calling for a shut-down of all California Youth Authority prisons; participating in a myriad of Bay Area protests and hearings addressing a wide range of R-J issues, e.g., pollution, unemployment, inequality in schools, police brutality, the criminal injustice system, and so on; outreaching to r-j groups all over the Bay Area, inviting them to participate in teach-in panels, lead a workshop, help plan in the R-J Day of Actions, co-sponsor the Biotech World Cafe, and/or endorse the mobilization; and, finally, launching eco-projects that culminated in several wonderful actions on the RTC Day of Eco-Actions on June 9.
---R-J Teach-in Panels & Workshops (Jun 3--5)! Racial justice issues were featured in two panels and two workshops of the RTC teach-in: The Corporate Power Panel, where about 75 attendees heard, discussed, and made the connections between local and global issues with Michael Dorsey of Dartmouth College, Clarence Thomas of the ILWU, Anamaria Loya of La Raza Centro Legal, Hope Shand of ETC group, Juliette Beck of Public Citizen, and Skip Spitzer of Pesticide Action Network; the closing Resistance & Alternatives panel, where about 500 attendees gave STANDING OVATIONS to Van Jones of the Ella Baker Center/Books Not Bars who emphasized the necessity of uniting the movements, Vandana Shiva, & Jaime Castillo of Via Campesina--and the entire panel, which also included Antonia Juhasz of International Forum on Globalization and biotech author Luke Anderson! The Racial Justice Round Table co-facilitated by Maurice Campbell of the BVHP Community First Coalition and Michael Dorsey of Dartmouth College attracted about 35 ardent participants, and Ulysses Montgomery's Participatory Economics Workshop that focussed on African Eco-Villages and a proposed resident stock-ownership plan for the BVHP shipyard captured the imaginations of 12 participants!
---Racial Justice Day of Actions: KICK-OFF ACTION (Jun 7: 10--12)! The R-J Day of Actions was a bright, beautiful day that began with the arrest of our police liaison, Lori, at the Federal Building, where the first part of the kick-off event took place (this was a set-up, as Lori had been dealing with SFPD & CHP for three weeks prior to the event to secure the FOUR PERMITS we needed to make this a safe event--the matter was resolved, but only after three days of needless incarceration for Lori--THREE CHEERS FOR LORI!!) The goal of the kick-off action was to show the PARALLELS between ABU GHRAIB, the CALIFORNIA YOUTH AUTHORITY & other US prisons, post-911 Guantanamo Bay & INS abuses, and local racist police brutality. Despite the inauspicious opening, about 150 attendees, mostly global movement activists, were by turns moved and inspired by a FABULOUS LINE-UP of speakers & performers, which included Samina Faheem of American Muslim Voice, Lynx (hip-hop), Allen Feaster, parent of a boy found hanged with his cell-mate in a CYA prison, Will Roy, former CYA ward, Ying-sun (spoken word), Van Jones, founder of the Ella Baker Center, NION (an awesome high-school student, the youngest member of NION--she went by her first name only, which escapes me, and was a last-minute substitution), Mesha Irizarry & Sandra Juanita Cooper, founders of Idriss Stelley Foundation, and Carwil James of Anarchist People of Color (poetry). (There were a couple of last-minute program changes--so apologies if I left someone out). This part of the event ended with Mumia Abu-Jamal, the famous political prisoner on death row in Pennsylvania, who recorded a brilliant and inspiring commentary for the RTC mobilization & the Racial Justice Day of Actions that tied all of the issues together, including biotech, in about 6 minutes! The Crowd shouted "FREE MUMIA!!!" three times in his honor! FROM THERE, WE TOOK TO THE STREETS--we were given a lane of traffic--and MARCHED to the STATE BUILDING, with our STUNNING RED ON BLACK BANNER, "No Taxes for Torture at Home or Abroad," flanked by huge PHOTO BLOW-UPS of abuse at CYA & Abu Ghraib captioned, "Torture in California...", "...Torture in Iraq." Once at the State Building, David Kahn of Books Not Bars recapped the issues and demanded that California Attorney General Bill Lockyer prosecute the CYA prison guards caught on videotape viciously beating two bound and prone youths. Then SIX INTREPID ACTIVISTS shed their clothes and created a silent TABLEAU showing prison abuse at CYA, Abu Ghraib, and Guantanamo Bay, using burlap hoods, blankets, and signs hung around their necks.
---Racial Justice Day of Actions: CHALLENGING WHITE SUPREMACY Workshop (Jun 7: 2--4)! Next, RTC hosted a "Challenging White Supremacy" workshop back at the Convergence Center led by Clare Bayard, Ingrid Chapman, and Chris Crass of Anti-Racism for Global Justice. All three felt the workshop was very successful, with 45 global movement activists working on unlearning racism! This is the kind of result that has the most profound effects as far as uniting the movements go! Similarly, a beautiful global movement activist from Minnesota told me she was inspired by the RTC Racial Justice work and planned to start working along similar lines in Minnesota!
---Racial Justice Day of Actions: MARCH ON MEXICAN CONSULATE (Jun 7: 4--6pm)! After the workshop, about 35 of us marched to the Mexican Consulate to demand an end to the incarceration and torture of our Mexican colleagues, student protestors in Guadalajara who are being illegally held, raped, beaten, and tortured with electric shocks to the genitals for protesting an international trade summit there in May. (Please call the Mexican Embassy (202-728-1600) and the State Department Mexican Desk (main switchboard: 202-647-4000) and demand the release of these student protestors!)
---BIOTECH WORLD CAFE (Jun 7: 6--10pm). It is fitting that the R-J Day of Actions ended in this whole-community forum discussing the impacts of the proposed expansion of the biotech industry in San Francisco, in which African-Americans and Pacific Islanders of District 10 Bayview Hunters Point (BVHP)--an SF district that is already impacted by intense institutionalized racism--made up a significant portion of the participants, who also included government officials (including two supervisors), members of the media, biotech, health-care, and other professionals, business-owners, high-school students, and activists, among others--120 in all, of all ages, genders, and colors! BVHP, Dog Patch, and Potrero Hill are communities that have already begun to feel impacts of biotech expansion and a new boom on the horizon, with the creation of the UCSF Mission Bay Bio-Research facility, the expansion of the Third Street light-rail, re-zoning and Redevelopment Agency sleights of hand, and the beginnings of gentrification and displacement, amidst promises of jobs and plenty. The World Cafe technique of engaging in discussion with four people at a time at a cafe table; then rotating to different tables, and eventually into larger groups, made for a rich dialogue among people who don't often hear each other's opinions--in particular, members of predominantly white communities and communities of color. It was awesome and eye-opening for many! Participants want a follow-up!!! The organizers who bottomlined this amazing event--Karen Heisler, Marc Tognotti, and Kenoli Oleari---are also working in BVHP and elsewhere on neighborhood assemblies. They also facilitated the BVHP legal summit mentioned above.
---DAY OF ECO ACTIONS (June 9). Several eco-projects were launched in the Mission, BVHP, and the Tenderloin as part of the RTC Mobilization, these include a street-greening project and permie playground in the Mission District, a Memorial Redwood Grove for victims of police and street violence in BVHP, transforming the "Green House" complex--which houses the SF Bay View newspaper, the Idriss Stelley Foundation, and the Ratcliff residence, with plans for a community grocery store and restaurant, in the heart of the BVHP business district at Palou and Third Street--into a sustainable showcase and skills training center, and an intersection reclamation and repair project in the heart of the Tenderloin at Leavenworth and Golden Gate, an enclave of homeless people and homeless advocacy groups! On June 9, three of these projects were formally launched, when 20 RTC eco-activists transformed the Green House's cemented- in back yard into a lush container garden, complete with ponds, grape arbor, fig tree, herbs, veggies, oaks, and manzanitas; the event included an indy media press conference with the Ratcliffs that addressed R-J issues in BVHP and where sustainable alternatives fit in the vision for the community (unfortunately, corporate media was called to an emergency RTC press conference addressing the illegal arrests the night before)! From there, we moved on to Utah Street, where we were met by residents and two TV stations and proceeded to install fabulous food gardens up and down the street. At the same time, the Radical Family Collective was creating a cobb dinosaur in Garfield Park in the Mission District! All of these were awesome, joyous events--an appropriate ending for an incredible culminating week of actions and events focusing on racial justice issues or having an r-j component. Meanwhile, Evkha has been continuing to do awesome community outreach groundwork in the Tenderloin, culling much support for the intersection repair process and project! THESE PROJECTS ARE ONGOING!!! To subscribe to the SF Eco-Projects Working Group, please send an email to RTC-Eco-Projects-subscribe@yahoogroups.com ---and be part of What's Possible!!!
---R-J Media Highlights. The R-J track of the mobilization was central to THREE RTC PRESS CONFERENCES held prior to the R-J Day of Actions, and resulted in at least TWO CHRONICLE ARTICLES where R-J issues were mentioned (May 20 "Biotech meeting to be target of diverse protests" page 4 of Bay Area section) and featured (June 5 "Protestors pitching a big tent: Biotech conference viewed as raising issues from genes to jails"--front page of the Bay Area section) with an excellent ending quote from David Kahn of Books Not Bars and a lot of copy on the Biotech World Cafe and BVHP issues . The SF BUSINESS TIMES also RAN TWO FRONT-PAGE STORIES with photos and an opinion piece; the first, "City's biotech ambition hits resistance" (May 31), featured quotes from Potrero Hill and BVHP residents Kepa Ashkenasy and Maurice Campbell and focussed on the potentially negative impacts of industry expansion in those neighborhoods. Coincidentally, the BAY GUARDIAN ran a COVER STORY on Abu Ghraib-style abuses rampant in the CA state prison system on May 26--to make up for not addressing the CYA campaign in this article, they published a Letter to the Editor titled "Shut Down CYA" in their June 9 edition. Although there were four television stations, the Chronicle, and other corporate media venues at the R-J Day of Actions, I believe much, if not all, of the coverage was pre-empted by Ronald Reagan's death. IndyBay covered all the R-J events, as well, and I hear they are planning an upcoming article, "Racial Justice Day Should Be Everyday!" PLEASE let us know if there was any other notable coverage of our R-J actions and events!
THE R-J WORKING GROUP LIVES ON!!! To join the R-J Working Group, please send an email to RacialJusticeBrigade-subscribe@yahoogroups.com Post R-J actions and events announcements to this list or call for volunteers for your R-J action proposal! This work has only just begun. Please Join Us!!!
MUMIA PACKET!!! Last, but certainly not least, I'm putting together a thank-you packet for Mumia. Anything anyone would like to contribute, is welcome! PHOTOS especially needed (Chuck, any photos you took of the event would be awesome--especially a shot of the group marching to the state building--the banner and giant blow-ups, and a crowd shot during Mumia's commentary)! Mumia's courage and generosity under such extreme emotional and physical duress deserves our highest appreciation and greatest love!!!
See you once again in the streets, after a much-deserved rest!!!
(I'll see some of you bright and early tomorrow morning in court!)
Cheers and Solidarity!
Mary
Mary Bull
Greenwood Earth Alliance
Save the Redwoods - Boycott the Gap Campaign
252 Frederick, San Francisco, CA 94117 http://www.gapsucks.org
415-731-7924 chalicenew@earthlink.net
What you can do/resources:
***Nail environmental destruction, worker exploitation, and the privatization of public services & resources on the home-front, BOYCOTT the GAP, Banana Republic, & Old Navy!*** http://www.gapsucks.org
***Dismantle the Racist Prison-Industrial Complex!*** http://www.booksnotbars.org
***Take Direct Action to Stop the War and End US/Corporate Empire-Building!*** http://www.actagainstwar.org
***End Corporate Rule!*** http://www.ifg.org http://www.canadians.org http://www.citizen.org
http://www.foodfirst.org http://www.globalexchange.org
***Expose Corporate Greenwashing, starting with the Forest Stewardship Council, the NRDC, and the WWF!*** http://www.rainforestfoundationuk.org
***Join the Reclaim the Commons Mobilization!*** http://www.reclaimthecommons.net
For questions and comments please e-mail us!
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