G.A. Minutes 11-29-14
We’re at the Amazing Grace Café again. Again it is quiet and almost empty. We order bowls of their delicious soup and sit down at the big table by the fish tank.
The first thing we do is get a copy of the café’s music schedule for the month of December. We are all music lovers but we find it difficult to hold a meeting when there is a band playing on stage. We have to practically shout at each other in order to hear and of course, it’s extremely rude to be talking while musicians are performing.
It looks like most Saturdays will be available while most Tuesdays will be showcasing live performances. We decide to make the Amazing Grace our temporary winter quarters as much as possible and concentrate on finding alternatives when bands are playing.
Next Tuesday is one of the times that the café will not be suitable. An Occupier offers the use of his apartment for our next meeting and we gratefully accept.
An Occupier gives a quick rundown of upcoming December events. Another Sunday Sermon will take place tomorrow November 30th, 6pm at the Red Herring. It’s rumored Mr. Nice is going to show up and that he is considering running for public office again. Mr. Nice is such a fun guy.
On Wednesday December 3rd at 6pm the Jefferson People’s House will show the film “Breaking the Spell” a documentary about the 1999 WTO protests. After the movie they intend to have a discussion about property damage and civil disobedience as tactics for social change. We all plan on attending as this topic is right up our alley.
The next Idle No More/Northwoods Wolf Alliance meeting will be on Friday, December 5th 1pm at the Duluth Indian Center.
The Washington Studios Artist Co-op will hold its annual Holiday Show on Saturday December 6th from 11am-5pm. The Occupier couple live at this co-op so will be working at the show. They ask that the Occupiers please hold their Saturday meeting in the couple’s home so as to allow them to make an easy transition. We all agree this will be a good thing to do.
Loaves N Fishes will hold their annual Christmas party on Sunday December 14th from 2pm-5pm at St Paul’s Episcopal Church.
An Occupier asks, “Do you guys want to hear the scandal of the day?”
We say, “Sure, why not?” and she continues,
“So Jay Fosle, probably our most right leaning City Councilor, wrote on his Facebook page that the protesters in Ferguson are ‘savages’ and should be dealt with accordingly. When I was alerted I went to his Facebook page but it had already been deleted. It looked like a lot of stuff had been deleted. As you can imagine, many people are very offended by his comment”.
Another Occupier says, “So the African American people of Ferguson are savages but the police who have oppressed, abused and made their lives hell for many years are not? I know his term is up in about a year. I hope this comes back to bite him if he runs for reelection”.
Someone else replies, “I wouldn’t count on it. A lot of his supporters are probably racists too. Racism is alive and well in this country and also in this city”. We wish to ally with the African American community in Duluth but so far have not been told what is needed of us.
The Occupiers who are regular attendees at INM/NWA gatherings give a brief report on the progress of the timeline information being researched. They say, “We plan to show that wolves and other species were removed from the endangered species list in order to pave the way for mining, logging and other earth destroying projects. The delisting of wolves actually had nothing to do with the behavior of wolves at all. All that stuff about wolves killing too many livestock, attacking humans etc. is just a smokescreen.
“We’re finding a lot of evidence, in fact, so much that it’s going to take a while to organize it all”.
One of the Occupiers adds, “I’m told our senator Amy Klobuchar was a major supporter of the MN wolf hunt. I haven’t had time to check out this allegation yet so will have to get back to you when I get the facts.”
Some of the Occupiers attended the Citizen’s Review Board open house last Tuesday. One of them reports, “It wasn’t exactly what I had expected. Of course, the people from the DPD took charge of everything. They didn’t have an actual question and answer session like we were led to believe. There were quite a few people, including many black folks, present. People were divided into 5 groups and each group went around to 5 separate tables each of which was monitored by 1 or more members of the DPD.
Each table had a specific topic to be addressed like: What constitutes militarization of the police? How does the CRB operate? How does one file a complaint about a police officer? ….. and some other topics I can’t remember. All the groups were supposed to come back together for final discussion at the end but that didn’t happen. I think the final conclusion from all the citizens attending was something like, “Isn’t the system for complaints that is currently in operation pretty much like the fox guarding the hen house?”
The cops didn’t have much of an answer for that. They just said, “Yes”.
On that note we’re ready to call it a night. November has been a very busy month and we’re all pretty tired.
We’ll meet again next Tuesday at Michael’s apartment, 2021 W 2nd St #204. Ring the buzzer and he’ll let you in.