Date Tuesday March 14
Time 3:00 PM – 9:00 AM
Location Details Join the fun in front of City Hall at 809 Center St. on the brick entranceway to the “City Hall Courtyard”from Tuesday Afternoon through Wednesday mid-morning. The area was declared a “park” to give Parks and Recreation Rangers power to exclude homeless folks guilty of nothing but sleeping there at night in an unprecedented due process-free process on pain of a year in jail. Food and festivities will begin near (or perhaps inside) City Council chambers. The Gang of Seven will finalize an empty Sanctuary law that provides no enforcement provisions, nor accountability for Chief Vogel’s concealment of an ICE agent for the last 8 years. While Council creates a phony “Sanctuary” for the undocumented, real sanctuary for the local homeless isn’t even on the table.
Event Type Protest
Organizer/Author Keith McHenry (story by Norse)
Email keith [at] foodnotbombs.net
Phone 575-770–3377
CAN’T DRIVE OFF THOSE FREEDOM SLEEPERS
Freedom Sleepers will be returning Tuesday afternoon and evening as the weather turns warmer with videocam capability at the ready to discourage and document abusive behavior and false statements by cops and rangers–who have freely stolen homeless gear and lied to protesters about their rights.
POLICE THIEVES STILL HOLD HOMELESS GEAR
Homeless survival gear has not been returned to Lawrence MacGregor or Dreamcatcher–a large tent in Lawrence’s case; ID, a mobile carrying cart and many other items for Dreamcatcher.
PHONIES PROPOSE TOOTHLESS LAW WITH THEIR POLICE SHUTTING OUT THE LARGER COMMUNITY
Item #14 on the Afternoon Agenda is the 2nd and Final Reading of the Sanctuary Ordinance which “forbids” city employees (including police) from “requesting, disclosing, or maintaining” immigration status information or aiding in enforcement (with plenty of exceptions) as well as informing City Council (but not the community) AFTER but not BEFORE immigration raids occur. There are no penalties for those who violate the law and no right to sue the City if it acts contrary to this law.
The Council meeting will again be held in the City Council chambers instead of the larger Civic Auditorium–this time in mid-afternoon. This means a large crowd of people can be excluded, as happened last time with a heavy police presence and folks kept out in the cold while the Council presented its fluffy resolution and law as a figleaf to cover SCPD collusion with ICE/DHS abuses.
MEMORIAL PLANNED FOR APRIL 11TH FOR HYPOTHERMIA VICTIM AT FREEDOM SLEEPOUT #92
Keith McHenry notes “53 year-old Micheal Mear died of hypothermia on February 17, 2017. Medical staff reportedly told his sister his body temperature was only 70 degrees when a motorist found him unconscious on Potrero Street. He died soon after from cardiac arrest at Dominican Hospital.”
Photos and commentary on Michael Randell Mear June 21,1963 – February 17, 2017 at https://www.facebook.com/keith.mchenry.fnb/media_set?set=a.10154959373258820.1073741880.691903819&type=3
“STARVE ‘EM OUT OF SIGHT” BIGOTS ERECT CHAIN LINK FENCE AROUND DOWNTOWN POST OFFICE
“Protect my $140,000 condo downtown” may be the real motivation for Janet Fardette’s petition to drive away Food Not Bombs from its Saturday and Sunday meals on the sidewalk near the main post office. While Fardette’s on-line petition has only cleared 100 names, McHenry’s counterpetition boasts of over 1000.
Freedom Sleeper activists, grateful for Food Not Bombs regular feedings at the Tuesday Freedom SleepOuts, encourage folks to stop by the SleepOut as well as the Saturday and Sunday meals outside the Post Office (4-6 PM) to sign letters to the Postmaster, emphasizing the importance of the Food Not Bombs meals and community gatherings.
To read more details on the Post Office’s most recent uglification campaign erecting a “separation fence” as well as the festive community response, go to “Anti-Homeless Fence Decorating Party”at https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2017/03/13/18797382.php
Berkeley and San Francisco have resisted profiteering attempts to privatize local post offices successfully erecting and sustaining homeless encampments in front of the threatened buildings. The protests sprang from First They Came for the Homeless [FTCFTH]–which evolved from the Occupy movement. Assembling and refusing to stay dispersed next to these buildings has been the tactic used. It’s unclear whether Santa Cruz will adopt a similar strategy, but one Berkeley activist has declared himself ready to “hop on the next bus down” to support such a move. FTCFTH has now gone two months without a warning or bust after being threatened, harassed and/or attacked by police more than 15 times.
CITY CLAIMS TO WANT “COMMUNITY INPUT” IN SEARCH FOR NEW POLICE CHIEF
Go and make your concerns about the SCPD’s collusion with ICE/DHS, its “shoot to kill” policy, its failure to hold individual officers or the chief responsible for human rights abuses by attending meetings: Wednesday, March 15th in the Police Department Community Room (155 Center St Santa Cruz) from 7:00-9:00pm. and Thursday, March 16th at the Beach Flats Community Center (1333 Leibrandt Ave. Santa Cruz) from 7:00-9:00pm. Both events will be bilingual.
You can also fill out a “Community Survey” on line.
English – https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/TM3VF99
Spanish – https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/B9SXTVW
In the past, only large numbers of people have gotten even a limited response from the police and their politician friends as happened February 14 when shouting activists disrupted a Council intent on gagging a speaker victimized by the ICE/DHS raids the day before.
TO READ AND MAKE COMMENTS, GO TO https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2017/03/14/18797413.php
Much of the anti-homeless legislation, priorities, and attitudes in the last thirty years can be traced to an entrenched reactionary staff headed by City Manager Bernal, City Attorney Condotti (and before him Barisone), and other department heads who earn the big bucks. To excuse their behavior is to justify and perpetuate the abuses against poor people outside.
A PHONY REPORT
The Final Report of the Homelessness Coordinating Committee on the Council’s May 9th Evening Agenda is a bad joke. [http://scsire.
A better report is the Final Report of the Santa Cruz City Homeless Issues Task Force – at http://sccounty01.co.santa-
Mayor Chase’s report is fluffed up with flowery and political correct blather about “ending homelessness” through “smart solutions”, more future plans, shifting responsibility to the County, and other false hopes. It is a complete facade that attempts to cover over and divert our attention from the actual behavior of city authorities towards unhoused folks to the glistening good intentions of two-faced politicos. To afford it any credibility and waste time “discussing” it is to play into the hands of those whose interest is in getting rid of the visible homeless, pandering to neighborhood bigots, and serving merchant interests. I.e. shifting the focus from what they’re doing to what they’re saying. Preserving the status quo.
It’s also a small clue, that the three Councilmembers who cooked up the report all voted last March to maintain the absurd and abusive 11 PM – 8:30 AM Sleeping Ban and have not changed their position.
WELL-MANNERED ACTIVISTS DON’T MAKE HERSTORY
As for the idea of “making nice” with the Council on Tuesday night (or thereafter).
Consider City Council’s recent history of almost continuous expansion of anti-homeless legislation, its contraction of support for shelter space (i.e. ignoring the conversion of the Homeless (Lack of) Services Center into a Homeless Prison/GrantGrabber), and its support of police mythology criminalizing homelessness and propagandizing the community with “public safety” nonsense and measures (closing the levee, intensifying Parks and Rec powers, winking at Bernal and Vogel’s attacks on activists).
It’s important that the community be made aware of this, not misled into believing that the Council is actually doing anything real or planning to do something real. The community has to be spurred to understand the legitimacy of outrage, and the need to ACT on that outrage. That is done by clearly defining the issues –clarifying who are the heroes and who are the villains. Whose actions show themselves to be the enemies of reform, and those who are waging the struggle.
BRING BAGGAGE AND FRIENDS
We need to take sleeping bags and blankets into City Hall and lay them down.
I was told that two trucks hauled away houseless folks property from City Hall two days ago and disposed of sleeping gear, blankets, and cloth as “trash”.
There can be no meaningful dialogue until there is the power of visible commitment. I have my doubts about pretty speeches and a one-night sleep out having much impact. In fact, they may fit quite well into the Council’s “see how democratic we are!” stance as they send cops and rangers in the next day to steal survival gear from those who remain after we liberals have gone home.
The “incremental” approach failed a year ago (in the token Sleeping Ban repeal vote). The notion that being “moderate” will attract the timid and tame the Neanderthals is simply wrong here. The Democrats have been proving that for years on the national scene. It’s a form of surrender before the struggle has begun.
SUPPORT THE SURVIVAL SLEEPERS
Meanwhile Survival Sleepers at City Hall are taking the real heat while we engage in media posturing. It is their nightly struggle, however unpretty and unpopular with the powerful that needs to be supported. As long as they choose to make it. That’s where our energy needs to be going as best we can.
Contact HUFF at 831-423-4833 to offer help to the survival sleepers. Suggestions are at https://www.indybay.org/
A GOOD EXAMPLE
Black students up at UCSC have shown that direct action gets the goods.
And Reclaiming City Hall might be a very good start.
See you Tuesday night. With bag and bathrobe.