Calendar
The Postal Service has put the Berkeley Post Office up for sale!!
The Postal Service has started to outsource Post Office services to Staples, replacing union jobs with low-paying, low benefit work.
And we’re fighting against both!
Come help us plan our next steps.
We’ve started a “Don’t Shop at Staples” campaign with some awesome… what else? … postcards to send to Staples management! Here’s the front of the postcard. The campaign has been adopted by Postal Unions, has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO, and has gone national!
All four Postal Unions have joined together to support maintaining full service, public Post Offices in every community, with expansion to include postal banking, and to oppose subcontracting and privatization of services. The California Federation of Teachers passed a resolution in support of opposition to Staples. We are trying to get the Alameda Labor Council to pass a similar resolution.
And we need to be prepared if the Post Office announces a sale! The Advisory Commission on Historical Preservation came out with its report, recommending that sales of Historic Post offices be halted until the USPS conforms with historical preservation law. Here is our response. Also the Office of Inspector General’s report on the sale of Historic Post Offices came out recently – anything could happen now since Congress’ “request” that no historic Post Offices be sold until it had come out has been honored and no further Congressional request or mandate has come down. Come help us plan our response.
We have joined with other activists in Berkeley to put a ballot initiative on the ballot to rezone the Berkeley Post Office and other areas in the Historic District to prevent privatization, and also to insure a better Downtown Berkeley. We succeeded in getting the necessary signatures; it will be voted on in November, but Tom Bates and the City Council have nefarious plans to undermine our coalition.
Encouraging articles have come out recently about using Post Offices as banking facilities for the unbanked. We held a forum on postal and public banking on March 29th on the Post Office steps.
THINGS ARE HAPPENING!
San Francisco Living Wage Coalition Meeting
(btw. Mission and South Van Ness #12, 14, 22 buses, or 16th St BART)
San Francisco Living Wage Coalition Meeting. The Living Wage Coalition is building a grassroots movement of low-wage workers and their allies to win economic justice. Anyone who works full time should be able to survive on what they earn and support themselves and their children. Come to be a part of discussing next steps in pursuing an economic justice agenda.
More information at http://www.livingwage-sf.org/
The Postal Service has put the Berkeley Post Office up for sale!!
The Postal Service has started to outsource Post Office services to Staples, replacing union jobs with low-paying, low benefit work.
And we’re fighting against both!
Come help us plan our next steps.
We’ve began the “Don’t Shop at Staples” campaign with some awesome… what else? … postcards to send to Staples management! Here’s the front of the postcard. The campaign has been adopted by Postal Unions, the San Francisco Labor Council and has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO, and has gone national!
All four Postal Unions have joined together to support maintaining full service, public Post Offices in every community, with expansion to include postal banking, and to oppose subcontracting and privatization of services. The California Federation of Teachers passed a resolution in support of opposition to Staples. We are trying to get the Alameda Labor Council to pass a similar resolution.
And we need to be prepared if the Post Office announces a sale! The Advisory Commission on Historical Preservation came out with its report, recommending that sales of Historic Post offices be halted until the USPS conforms with historical preservation law. Here is our response. Also the Office of Inspector General’s report on the sale of Historic Post Offices came out recently – anything could happen now since Congress’ “request” that no historic Post Offices be sold until it had come out has been honored and no further Congressional request or mandate has come down. Come help us plan our response.
We have joined with other activists in Berkeley to put a ballot initiative on the ballot to rezone the Berkeley Post Office and other areas in the Historic District to prevent privatization, and also to insure a better Downtown Berkeley. We succeeded in getting the necessary signatures; it will be voted on in November, but Tom Bates and the City Council have nefarious plans to undermine our coalition.
Encouraging articles are still coming out about using Post Offices as banking facilities for the unbanked. We held a forum on postal and public banking on March 29th on the Post Office steps.
We are planning our next event, ‘Jam the Sale.’ Come help us out!
THINGS ARE HAPPENING!
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon has called a special UN Climate Summit on September 23 to “catalyze action by governments, business, finance, industry, and civil society”. It’s unlikely any more will come of this meeting than came of the gatherings in Copenhagen, Cancún, Kyoto, and elsewhere. But a large number of environmental and progressive organizations are planning actions in New York City right before and during the UN meeting to call the world’s attention to the failure of world “leaders” to deal with the crisis. One of these actions, the People’s Climate March, will take place on Sept. 20 and 21. It is spearheaded by 350.org and endorsed by about 100 other organizations.
In solidarity, a Bay Area action is being planned. If you want to help plan the fall action, please come to this meeting. And spread the word.
The Politics of Debt Reading Group, a subgroup of Strike Debt Bay Area, meets every other week to discuss readings on debt and related issues agreed to from previous meetings.
This meeting we will be discussing Chapter’s 2 & 4 of Taibbi’s Griftopia.
Here is a PDF with the reading material (large!)
Meeting of the City of Oakland’s “Privacy and Data Retention Ad Hoc Advisory Committee” – open to the public.
When:
2nd & 4th Thursdays
6:00pm – 8:00pm
Where:
Council Chambers
Oakland City Hall
14th & Broadway
Read the announcement from the City of Oakland City Administrator’s Weekly Report (April 25, 2014):
This committee was created by City Council action during the discussions earlier in the year about the Port Domain Awareness Center (DAC). The goal of the DAC is to improve readiness to prevent, respond to and recover from major emergencies in the Oakland region and ensure better multi-agency coordination across the larger San Francisco Bay Area. The goal of the Privacy and Data Retention Policy is to ensure there are safeguards to protect against potential misuse of the data or violations of individuals’ privacy rights and civil liberties. The meeting is open to the public. For questions about the Ad Hoc Committee, please contact Joe DeVries, Assistant to the City
We need to show up to these meetings and pressure the City to adopt a privacy policy that makes privacy a priority, not only “security” or administrative convenience.
The KONO Community Benefit District invites you to an open meeting about Oakland First Fridays. The event will be hosted by KONO Board President Phil Porter, KONO Executive Director Shari Godinez and Oakland First Fridays Fundraiser/Coordinator Sarah Kidder.
Come find out more about the event-ask questions, bring ideas, share concerns. We’re also actively seeking volunteers to get involved with the workings of the event before, during and after the first Friday of each month on either a short or long-term basis. The meeting is open to anyone with an interest in the Oakland First Fridays.
We are always looking for new people to join us, and work on our many projects, which include saving the Berkeley Post Office, organizing for public banking in Oakland, getting funding from the city of Vallejo for nonprofit check cashing (and public bank study initiatives), working with the City of Richmond and other municipalities for eminent domain seizure of underwater mortgages from the banksters, and much more.
“Just as bosses are dependent on workers, so are lenders dependent on borrowers. If workers walk out, the enterprise stops. If borrowers refuse to pay their debts, the lenders could be in real trouble. Each side depends on the other. The millions of underwater mortgage holders, of student debtors and credit card holders, need the bank loans – but so do the banks need those borrowers, and they especially need them to cooperate by paying their monthly charges. Otherwise, the capital that the banks list on their books begins to drain away.” ~Francis Fox Piven
Check out our website, our Facebook,
and follow us on Twitter.
Check out the Berkeley Post Office Defenders website too.
The Postal Service has put the Berkeley Post Office up for sale!!
The Postal Service has started to outsource Post Office services to Staples, replacing union jobs with low-paying, low benefit work.
And we’re fighting against both!
Come help us plan our next steps.
We’ve began the “Don’t Shop at Staples” campaign with some awesome… what else? … postcards to send to Staples management! Here’s the front of the postcard. The campaign has been adopted by Postal Unions, the San Francisco Labor Council and has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO, and has gone national!
All four Postal Unions have joined together to support maintaining full service, public Post Offices in every community, with expansion to include postal banking, and to oppose subcontracting and privatization of services. The California Federation of Teachers passed a resolution in support of opposition to Staples. We are trying to get the Alameda Labor Council to pass a similar resolution.
And we need to be prepared if the Post Office announces a sale! The Advisory Commission on Historical Preservation came out with its report, recommending that sales of Historic Post offices be halted until the USPS conforms with historical preservation law. Here is our response. Also the Office of Inspector General’s report on the sale of Historic Post Offices came out recently – anything could happen now since Congress’ “request” that no historic Post Offices be sold until it had come out has been honored and no further Congressional request or mandate has come down. Come help us plan our response.
We have joined with other activists in Berkeley to put a ballot initiative on the ballot to rezone the Berkeley Post Office and other areas in the Historic District to prevent privatization, and also to insure a better Downtown Berkeley. We succeeded in getting the necessary signatures; it will be voted on in November, but Tom Bates and the City Council have nefarious plans to undermine our coalition.
Encouraging articles are still coming out about using Post Offices as banking facilities for the unbanked. The National Conference of Mayors just endorsed Postal Banking. We held a forum on postal and public banking on March 29th on the Post Office steps.
We are planning our next event, ‘Jam the Sale.’ Spread the workd and come help us out!
THINGS ARE HAPPENING!
Special Meeting with Andrew Chirwa.
“Bloody Thursday” July 5th commemorates the police murder of maritime workers in the 1934 Big Strike which provoked the San Francisco General Strike. All US West Coast ports are shutdown to honor the 6 labor martyrs killed during the strike.
In 2012, at the Marikana mine in South Africa, 34 striking miners were massacred by police. ILWU Local 10 sent a letter of protest to the ANC-led government. Andrew Chirwa, president of NUMSA, the largest union in that country will address workers about the massacre and miners strike, the longest in South African history, and the impending metalworkers stroke.
On July 1, both the South African metalworkers union and the ILWU longshore contracts expire. NUMSA is preparing for a “full-blown strike” much like the maritime workers did in 1934. Now is the time for international labor solidarity.
Organized by the Transport Workers Solidarity Committee.
What can we do about the growing Surveillance Industrial Complex? ”
“Surveillance is the business model of the Internet.” — Bruce Schneier
Technology and war have always been interrelated. Some historians see the intersection of science, technology and the US military during WW2 as the beginning of the modern Military-Industrial Complex. Yet mass communications technology has also been historically significant in transforming society, from the Gutenberg printing press, to Television’s connection to the 1960s political and social upheaval, to the rise of the Internet.
As the Bay Area tech industry becomes the de facto center of global technological innovation, its ties to the Pentagon and US intelligence agencies are becoming more and more apparent. Companies like Hewlitt-Packard, Google, Palantir, and Amazon all have close ties to the same military and intelligence establishment that Bay Area activists have been organizing against since the 1960’s. With our basic liberties, such as right to assembly, freedom of speech, freedom of Privacy and the right to a jury trial all under a concerted attack by the government, it should be of increasing concern that the companies we depend on for communicating and accessing information are also dependent on Defense establishment contracts and ties to appease their shareholders and continue their monopolies.
With the Internet becoming such a force for change and democratizing power, why is it under attack right now? The Internet as we know it, free and open, is being threatened by Federal government appointees. Many called Occupy “The Internet generation.” From the Arab spring to Occupy, the Internet and social media tools were key tools for communication. The Internet is a deterritorializing force that is upending the established modes of power and decision-making. This talk will delve into all these questions and more and what we can do to fight back and build the world we want to see.
Q&A and Announcements will follow. Donations to OccupyForum
to cover our costs are encouraged; no one turned away!
The Postal Service has put the Berkeley Post Office up for sale!!
The Postal Service has started to outsource Post Office services to Staples, replacing union jobs with low-paying, low benefit work.
And we’re fighting against both!
Come help us plan our next steps.
We’ve began the “Don’t Shop at Staples” campaign with some awesome… what else? … postcards to send to Staples management! Here’s the front of the postcard. The campaign has been adopted by Postal Unions, the San Francisco Labor Council and has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO, and has gone national!
All four Postal Unions have joined together to support maintaining full service, public Post Offices in every community, with expansion to include postal banking, and to oppose subcontracting and privatization of services. The California Federation of Teachers passed a resolution in support of opposition to Staples. We are trying to get the Alameda Labor Council to pass a similar resolution.
And we need to be prepared if the Post Office announces a sale! The Advisory Commission on Historical Preservation came out with its report, recommending that sales of Historic Post offices be halted until the USPS conforms with historical preservation law. Here is our response. Also the Office of Inspector General’s report on the sale of Historic Post Offices came out recently – anything could happen now since Congress’ “request” that no historic Post Offices be sold until it had come out has been honored and no further Congressional request or mandate has come down. Come help us plan our response.
We have joined with other activists in Berkeley to put a ballot initiative on the ballot to rezone the Berkeley Post Office and other areas in the Historic District to prevent privatization, and also to insure a better Downtown Berkeley. We succeeded in getting the necessary signatures; it will be voted on in November, but Tom Bates and the City Council have nefarious plans to undermine our coalition.
Encouraging articles are still coming out about using Post Offices as banking facilities for the unbanked. The National Conference of Mayors just endorsed Postal Banking. We held a forum on postal and public banking on March 29th on the Post Office steps.
We are planning our next event, ‘Jam the Sale.’ Spread the workd and come help us out!
THINGS ARE HAPPENING!
We’ll have read the Bank of England admitting that it’s own in inner workings are completely opposed to that of economics textbooks and a paper on Capital Controls. We encourage anyone to bring their own reading and video material that they think the group could benefit from. The more voices the merrier!
- For next class:
- http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Documents/quarterlybulletin/2014/qb14q102.pdf
- http://research.stlouisfed.org/publications/review/99/11/9911cn.pdf
- and the class after:
- http://www.imf.org/external/np/pp/eng/2012/111412.pdf
Meeting of the City of Oakland’s “Privacy and Data Retention Ad Hoc Advisory Committee” – open to the public.
When:
2nd & 4th Thursdays
6:00pm – 8:00pm
Where:
Council Chambers
Oakland City Hall
14th & Broadway
Read the announcement from the City of Oakland City Administrator’s Weekly Report (April 25, 2014):
This committee was created by City Council action during the discussions earlier in the year about the Port Domain Awareness Center (DAC). The goal of the DAC is to improve readiness to prevent, respond to and recover from major emergencies in the Oakland region and ensure better multi-agency coordination across the larger San Francisco Bay Area. The goal of the Privacy and Data Retention Policy is to ensure there are safeguards to protect against potential misuse of the data or violations of individuals’ privacy rights and civil liberties. The meeting is open to the public. For questions about the Ad Hoc Committee, please contact Joe DeVries, Assistant to the City
We need to show up to these meetings and pressure the City to adopt a privacy policy that makes privacy a priority, not only “security” or administrative convenience.
Sponsored by Berkeley Copwatch.
Come and help organize the resistance against more police getting more weapons.
Tasers kill!
A teenage artist known in the graffiti world as “Reefa” died of heart failure after a Miami Beach Police officer shot the 18-year-old in the chest with his Taser, the medical examiner has concluded.
The Postal Service has put the Berkeley Post Office up for sale!!
The Postal Service has started to outsource Post Office services to Staples, replacing union jobs with low-paying, low benefit work.
And we’re fighting against both!
Come help us plan our next steps.
*****>> NOTE OUR CHANGE OF
MEETING LOCATION FOR THIS WEEK <<*****
We’ve began the “Don’t Shop at Staples” campaign with some awesome… what else? … postcards to send to Staples management! Here’s the front of the postcard. The campaign has been adopted by Postal Unions, the San Francisco Labor Council and has been endorsed by the AFL-CIO, and has gone national!
All four Postal Unions have joined together to support maintaining full service, public Post Offices in every community, with expansion to include postal banking, and to oppose subcontracting and privatization of services. The California Federation of Teachers passed a resolution in support of opposition to Staples. Just recently AFCSME and UNITE HERE did too. We are trying to get the Alameda Labor Council to pass a similar resolution.
for the last two weeks the sidewalk in front of Staples has been ‘occupied’ 24/7 by an intrepid band of San Francisco occupiers with solidarity and support from BPOD members, and they plan to continue there, distributing literature and convincing people not to shop at Staples, indefinitely. Go by and say ‘Hi!’ and help them out.
And we need to be prepared if the Post Office announces a sale! The Advisory Commission on Historical Preservation came out with its report, recommending that sales of Historic Post offices be halted until the USPS conforms with historical preservation law. Here is our response. Also the Office of Inspector General’s report on the sale of Historic Post Offices came out recently – anything could happen now since Congress’ “request” that no historic Post Offices be sold until it had come out has been honored and no further Congressional request or mandate has come down. Come help us plan our response.
We have joined with other activists in Berkeley to put a ballot initiative on the ballot to rezone the Berkeley Post Office and other areas in the Historic District to prevent privatization, and also to insure a better Downtown Berkeley. We succeeded in getting the necessary signatures; it will be voted on in November, but Tom Bates and the City Council have nefarious plans to undermine our coalition.
Encouraging articles are still coming out about using Post Offices as banking facilities for the unbanked. The National Conference of Mayors just endorsed Postal Banking. We held a forum on postal and public banking on March 29th on the Post Office steps.
We are planning our next event, ‘Jam the Sale.’ Spread the work and come help us out!
THINGS ARE HAPPENING!
Information, discussion & community! Monday Night Forum!!
Occupy Forum is an opportunity for open and respectful dialogue
on all sides of these critically important issues!
Fossil Fuel Monopolies or Community Choice Energy?
Our Path to Renewables is Under Attack!
with Eric Brooks
Although carbon emissions are rising faster than efforts to curtail them, there are glimmers of hope. A growing number of networks including cities, states, regions and even markets are working together to implement climate plans. And costs of renewable energy, such as solar, wind, geothermal, cogeneration (and efficiency programs) are falling so quickly that large-scale deployment is practical. The public is ready to rally on climate change. It is now up to policymakers and industry to answer the call.
But as usual, fossil fuel monopolies and their henchmen are stalling. Community Choice Energy, (allowing local jurisdictions to offer energy-efficiency programs, develop local renewable energy resources, and buy clean wholesale electricity to sell to local residents and businesses) is being held hostage by large corporate incumbent utilities fighting tooth and nail to hang onto their business. Their efforts include disinformation campaigns, pitting ratepayers against each other, confusing ballot initiatives, and false “studies” of the grid’s capacity to handle solar, leaving Clean Energy’s prospective clients in limbo.
Yet Clean (renewable) Energy is burgeoning. The recent Intersolar North America Exhibition at Moscone Ctr. hosted approximately 600 exhibitors and 18,000 attendees, with a world-class exhibition of solar and wind solutions from across the globe, demonstrating the switch.
Meanwhile, in California, AB 2145, (a bill currently under consideration in the state’s legislature) would effectively prevent Community Choice energy programs in the state as the
Big 3 corporate utilities (PG&E, SCE, and SDG&E) and SF’s own Mayor Ed Lee attempt to crush Community Choice. Come to OccupyForum to learn about the political pressure against AB2145 and the push to implement the real fight to save the planet.
Release the children now! Children don’t belong in prison!
No more deportations! Immediate family reunification!
Full social, medical and physiological attention to all children and youth now!
Immediate access to legal representation!
Strike Debt Bay Area (@strikedebtba)will meet at Oscar Grant Plaza in the amphitheater or on the front steps of City Hall, Saturday, July 19, from 3-5:30 p.m. If you have specific questions for a smaller group, or just want to know a few people before the meeting starts, email us at the address above.
Activism on such a big issue – all unjust debt! – can use as many people and talents as we can find. If you are excited by the idea of Strike Debt, and/or our many projects, come join us! Our project include organizing for public banking in Oakland, participating in Occupy San Francisco’s third anniversary convergence, creating Strike Debt radio segments, a number of which have been broadcast on KPFA, securing funding from the City of Vallejo for nonprofit check cashing and public finance study initiatives, saving the Berkeley Post Office and stopping the Staples non-union takeover of good Post Office Jobs, working with the City of Richmond and other municipalities for eminent domain seizure of underwater mortgages from the banksters, and more.
From some of our past activities:
Information, discussion & community! Monday Night Forum!!
Occupy Forum is an opportunity for open and respectful dialogue
on all sides of these critically important issues!
The People’s Climate Curriculum
with Laurie Baumgarten & Anne Donjacour
Are you interested in helping people understand why climate change is occurring and what can be done about it? If so, come to our workshop and learn how the People’s Climate Curriculum is the tool you have been waiting for. It is easy to use and helps each of us become learners and teachers of basic climate literacy.
Every mass movement for change begins with a change in consciousness. It involves a leap forward into a consciousness that says, “I am a subject, not an object. I can act, I can do, I can create.” Educational tools which promote the development of this proactive stance are crucial to the work of popular education.
Our People’s Climate Curriculum educates through a method of teaching developed by Paulo Freire called dialogic pedagogy. The teacher/animator mingles among the participants. Together, through reflection, they critically examine social reality. Unlike traditional educational models in which participants are treated as objects to be taught, this interactive model attempts to counteract passivity and promote action.
Climate change is part of everyone’s social reality. Being literate in climate language helps us become empowered and thus, more able to solve the present crisis. Join us to learn more about our popular education campaign and how to use the People’s Climate Curriculum.
Laurie Baumgarten has been an activist since she was a freshman at Berkeley during the Free Speech Movement. She was active in the anti-war movement, the women’s movement and The Abalone Alliance. She was also a classroom teacher for 35 years in the Berkeley Unified School District. Laurie joined the climate movement about 2 years ago and helped develop the People’s Climate Curriculum. She now works with The Sunflower Alliance.
Our own Anne Donjacour has been a member of OccupyForum and the OccupySF Environmental Justice Working Group since the beginning. Her activism has branched out to other groups such as 350.org, the Unitarian Universalists, and many more. She is a professor at UCSF School of Medicine and is raising a passel of activist children!
Q&A and Announcements to follow.