Calendar
Join Oakland Privacy Working Group to organize against the Domain Awareness Center (DAC), Oakland’s citywide mass surveillance center.
If you are interested in joining the Oakland Privacy Working Group email listserv, send an email to: oaklandprivacyworkinggroup-subscribe@lists.riseup.net
Through the end of January we will have General Assembly at the sudoroom on 2141 Broadway, Oakland, CA.
Here are instructions to access the room, the entrance is on 22nd Street:
https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Getting_there
This Sunday will be a Cryptoparty at the sudoroom, along with the third Sunday in January, these will be opportunities to update your digital profile so the government can’t easily track your every move. More blather on this to follow this afternoon when I have a moment.
Our General Assembly is a participatory gathering of Oakland community members and beyond, where everyone who shows up is treated equally and has equal decision-making power. Occupy Oakland’s General Assembly uses a participatory decision-making process appropriately called, “Occupy Oakland’s Collective Decision-Making Process.” Our Assembly and the process we have collectively cultivated strives to reach agreement while building community.
Autonomous Action & the General Assembly
The bulk of the work of Occupy Oakland does NOT happen in the General Assembly. It happens in various committees, caucuses, and associated groups that report back to the general assembly. Everyone participating in Occupy Oakland should be part of at least one associated group. Occupy Oakland encourages autonomous actions that do not require consensus from the General Assembly. This encourages political activity that is decentralized and welcomes diverse voices and actions into the movement.
General Assembly Standard Agenda
- Welcome
- Welcome Announcements
- Agenda Overview
- Forum
- Reports from Committees, Subcommittees, Caucuses, & Working Groups
- Action Announcements
- General Announcements
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.
In November the Planning Commission passed on to the Berkeley City a proposed Zoning Ordinance that would make the Post Office property less desirable to potential purchasers of the capitalist variety. We are still waiting for action on this from the City Council and are organizing to put pressure on City Council members to make sure this measure is brought up and passed.
The Postal Service has announced that they are contracting with Staples to provide Post Office window services inside Staples stores, using Staples employees instead of Post Office employees. There is already a pseudo Post Office operating inside the Berkeley Staples store (Shattuck & Durant). We conducted our first action against this privatization of postal services on December 21st.
Come and help plan our next actions in defense of our Post Office and against privatization and non living-wage jobs. We want to send a message to CBRE, the Post Office, Staples and Berkeley politicians that the sale will not be tolerated!
�
Despite powerful attacks, Richmond became the first municipality in the nation to beat back Wall Street threats, litigation, and a campaign dedicated to end the city’s program using eminent domain to help underwater homeowners. How was the community, led by Mayor McLaughlin, able to hold off the banks, asset managers and securities units of Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and AIG, the very same firms that caused the foreclosure crisis in the first place?
�
For decades, environmental justice groups including Richmond Progressive Alliance, West County Toxics Coalition, and Communities for a better environment have fought Chevron, one of the world’s top polluters and a major tax evader whose refinery has long dominated the city. Chevron’s toxic, explosive, and corrosive chemicals and toxic releases cause devastating harm. To add insult to injury, Chevron vehemently opposes paying its fair share of taxes. Last fall, the oil giant pumped $1.2 million into city elections “They have been polluting our democracy along with polluting our environment,” said McLaughlin. The City of Richmond is currently suing Chevron for damages from the massive 2012 fire and Mayor McLaughlin has called on Chevron to pay its taxes and create a new corporate culture by putting the health and safety needs of Richmond residents before its profits. At the press conference announcing the city’s lawsuit against Chevron, McLaughlin was clear: “This isn’t just about money, it’s also about a culture of abuse. This suit is a situation requiring Chevron to be accountable to our community.”
�
Richmond is on the rise. Mayor McLaughlin’s focus on working side by side with a community that has suffered decades of injustice is helping to showcase how an urban community is transforming itself in the 21st Century.
�
More info at:
http://www.saverichmondhomes.org/
�
Time will be allotted for Q&A, discussion and announcements. Donations
to OccupyForum to cover costs are encouraged; no one turned away!
Mothers in White will pleasd for justice for Andy at the January 7, Tuesday, meeting of the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, at 1 p.m.
A bi-lingual flyer about the event includes a photo of Andy’s parents Sujey and Rodrigo over his coffin. Mrs. Lopez apparently plans to attend the event and may speak to the supervisors as a mother whose innocent son was killed by law enforcement.
“Every member of the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors is staring into a moral crisis!” reads the flyer. “What kind of ‘policy’ permits the brutal killing of a 13-year-old child who committed NO CRIME?” it asks. It poses the questions, “To what length would you go if your innocent child or grandchild was brutally murdered?”
The committee reported its intention to “create a dramatic visual impact” of at least 50 Mothers in White, as well as their allies, including men in white and the group Women in Black, which has appeared on street corners around the world to bear witness to those killed by violence.
People are invited to bring mirrors to hold up to the supervisors to examine themselves. Supervisor Mike McGuire apparently said that Andy’s death was a time to reflect in the mirror. This peaceful event intends such a reflection.
The color white was selected because it was Andy’s favorite color. White is not the absence of color, but the mixture of all colors, which is what this mass movement for justice seeks.
http://stopsmartmeters.org/2014/01/03/fcc/
Protest FCC Chair Wheeler
Thurs. Jan. 9th SF Bay Area
WIRELESS MICROWAVE RADIATION KILLS
Thomas E. Wheeler, recently appointed by President Obama as Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), will be speaking in Mountain View and Oakland, CA on Thursday, January 9. Join planned protests and speak out against increasing wireless health damage.
Fox in Charge of the Hen House: From 1992- 2004, Wheeler headed the wireless industry lobbying group, the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA). During his stint at the CTIA, his own scientists told him that cell phones were causing brain tumors. He buried the data and fired the scientists.
Wheeler buried the truth. Now, we are burying the victims.
Mountain View Event
Wheeler will be speaking in Silicon Valley at the Computer History Museum – 1401 N. Shoreline Blvd. in Mountain View. Protest outside starts at 11am, event is from 12-1pm (it is a free Commonwealth Club event and is now open to the general public.) You must sign up in advance here.
Click “register” first. Where it asks for your membership number simply enter “non-member.”
WE NEED YOU TO COME WITH SIGNS AND YOUR VOICES! We would also like to see babies, toddlers, preschoolers, teens, etc at both events. A funeral procession will be held for the victims of wireless technology. Dress in Black! Media will be there and we need to get our message across.
Oakland Event
Wheeler will be speaking at the Preservation Park Niles Hall at 1233 Preservation Park Way in Oakland at 7 pm. We will hold a rally at the main entrance on 12th St. starting at 6pm. Tickets to this free event are sold out but the public is free to attend the rally- more information here.
Again, bring your signs, voices, children, grandchildren and friends. Media will be there also. A funeral procession will be held for the victims of wireless technology. Dress in Black!
What we want:
- adequate health warnings on wireless devices
- a complete ban on wireless radiation in K-12 schools
- a recall on ‘smart meters’
- repeal of the 1996 Telecom Act
- defense of our copper-based landline network
- research-based wireless health standards
- Chair Wheeler to step down from the FCC
- Most of all, we want people to be told the truth- WIRELESS KILLS.
Please join us and spread the word to as many as possible. We look forward to seeing you there! If you have any questions about these events, or you are a member of the news media please call 925-285-5437 or 360-201-3959
Thank you so very much & we hope to see you all next week,
Ellie Marks, California Brain Tumor Association
Josh Hart, Stop Smart Meters!
p.s. please spread the word through social media- we depend on grassroots efforts to make events like these a success!
Politics of Debt will be primarily discussing the Modern Monetary Theory vs. Austrian School proponents’ video debate. We will elaborate on what Modern Monetary Theory is and stands for.
A link to the public school webpage with the class info and reading/video links.
Community Rally and March to City Hall.
Stop the Crude Oil Storage and Raily Transfer Facility.
Keep Pittsburg safe and healthy.
Say NO to Toxic Racism,
Say NO to any more “DUMPS” in Pittsburg,
Say NO to Hazardous Facilities
next to Housing & Schools
We need to be righteously angry.
Let folks know we are mad as hell and
we ain’t gonna tolerate this.
On January 11th we will be holding a public forum to organize actions for March 15th, international day against police brutality. This forum will take place at the Alan Blueford Center for Justice, which is located near 25th on Telegraph Ave in Oakland.
Everyone is invited! We encourage approaching this forum as individuals rather than as an organization.
Hope to see you there!
Through the end of January we will have General Assembly at the sudoroom on 2141 Broadway, Oakland, CA.
Here are instructions to access the room, the entrance is on 22nd Street:
https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Getting_there
This Sunday will be a Cryptoparty at the sudoroom, along with the third Sunday in January, these will be opportunities to update your digital profile so the government can’t easily track your every move. More blather on this to follow this afternoon when I have a moment.
Our General Assembly is a participatory gathering of Oakland community members and beyond, where everyone who shows up is treated equally and has equal decision-making power. Occupy Oakland’s General Assembly uses a participatory decision-making process appropriately called, “Occupy Oakland’s Collective Decision-Making Process.” Our Assembly and the process we have collectively cultivated strives to reach agreement while building community.
Autonomous Action & the General Assembly
The bulk of the work of Occupy Oakland does NOT happen in the General Assembly. It happens in various committees, caucuses, and associated groups that report back to the general assembly. Everyone participating in Occupy Oakland should be part of at least one associated group. Occupy Oakland encourages autonomous actions that do not require consensus from the General Assembly. This encourages political activity that is decentralized and welcomes diverse voices and actions into the movement.
General Assembly Standard Agenda
- Welcome
- Welcome Announcements
- Agenda Overview
- Forum
- Reports from Committees, Subcommittees, Caucuses, & Working Groups
- Action Announcements
- General Announcements
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.
24 Hours to Save the Post Office! A Festival of Celebration and Resistance.
It’s happening Saturday starting at 11:00 AM at the Post Office and going for 24 hours.
In November the Planning Commission passed on to the Berkeley City a proposed Zoning Ordinance that would make the Post Office property less desirable to potential purchasers of the capitalist variety. We are still waiting for action on this from the City Council and are organizing to put pressure on City Council members and the Mayor to make sure this measure is brought up and passed. We collected 600 petition signatures so far as part of that pressure and are aiming for a lot more!
The Postal Service has announced that they are contracting with Staples to provide Post Office window services inside Staples stores, using Staples employees instead of Post Office employees. There is already a pseudo Post Office operating inside the Berkeley Staples store (Shattuck & Durant). We conducted our first action against this privatization of postal services on December 21st.
The US Chemical Safety Board (CSB) has chosen Richmond as the location for voting on its final report on the August 6, 2012, Chevron Richmond Toxic Explosion and Fire. The hearing will be at 6:30 p.m. in the Richmond City Council Chambers at 440 Civic Center Plaza.
Please join Communities for a Better Environment, APEN, RPA, ACCE, 350.org Chevron Watch and Bay Area, the Richmond Environmental Justice Coalitionand community representatives from Pittsburg, Rodeo/Crockett and Benicia at 5:30 p.m. for a rally in the Civic Center Plaza.
This is a MAJOR event for our communities, because the CSB is recommending a new standard for regulating Big Oil’s refineries in the US – the Safety Case regime. We demand Safety First! No new Permits w/o the Safety Case!!
Please come out and support the CSB, the people of Richmond and the Bay Area refinery towns!
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.
The Oakland Privacy Working Group will meet at the Sudoroom Wednesday Jan. 15th at 6:30 to organize to stop the planned building of an Oakland-wide surveillance grid to monitor the citizens of the East Bay.
Approval for a contractor to take over Phase II of the DAC contract from SAIC – summarily dismissed months ago for violations of Oakland’s Nuclear Free Zone Ordinance – is supposed to take place at the January 21st City Council meeting.
For more information on the insidiousness of the DAC and how it came to b in Oakland check out the DAC FAQ, the Oakland Wiki Domain Awareness Page and the Oakland Privacy WordPress.
OPG hopes to have a large presence and a big rally on February 4th in front of City Hall at Oscar Grant Plaza, and YOU ARE INVITED. We are planning to have potluck food & drink at the plaza at 6:15 before going in to the council chambers to voice our opinions on this spy-network. So far the City has always scheduled this skulduggery as the last item on the agenda, well after midnight, to try to discourage public comment, so we are planning to show movies in the Plaza to keep folks entertained while waiting for the item to come up. Let’s stop this fucking thing, privacy is an essential element of freedom.
Join Oakland Privacy Working Group to organize against the Domain Awareness Center (DAC), Oakland’s citywide mass surveillance center.
If you are interested in joining the Oakland Privacy Working Group email listserv, send an email to: oaklandprivacyworkinggroup-subscribe@lists.riseup.net
On line petition to stop the DAC
On line petition to stop the DAC
The Postal Service is still trying to sell the downtown Berkeley Post Office (and privatize the entire USPS). We’re still trying to save it. The Berkeley City Council will be considering a proposal in late January to help that effort, a Zoning Overlay Ordinance that will make the entire Historic District Area (including the Post Office) less attractive to private, commercial development.
To keep up the pressure on all concerned, and let them know that the people STILL do not want Post Offices sold, Berkeley Post Office Defenders invite you to twenty-four hours of activities beginning at 11:00 AM.
Activities will include
- petition signing and flyer distribution (11- 5)
- presentations, teach-ins (11:30 – 2:00)
- music (2:00 – 5:00), including the Funky Nixons, Phat Love and Fresh Juice Party!
- arts and crafts
- dinner and a movie (6:00 – 10:00)
- letter writing (11:00 – 2:00)
- an empathy circle
- a study group
- a free clothing box
- tents and signs
- light brigade spelling out slogans of resistance (around 7:00 PM)
Come join us! Bring your friends!
Berkeley Post Office Defenders.
Please join Share The Bulb for a weekend of actions against the pending eviction of more than 50 people from the Albany Bulb!
January 17th
—————
Residents and allies of the Albany Bulb will rally at Albany City Hall at 4PM, before marching up Solano Avenue. We will stage an overnight campout on Solano Avenue, illustrating the plight of the more than 50 residents of the Albany Bulb, who, if evicted, would be forced onto Albany’s streets.
January 18th
————–
Artists will flock to the Bulb for a day of participatory art, live demonstrations, workshops, and art tours. Join us for an Art Festival at the Bulb from 12-5PM!
*****
The campout is part a West Coast Day of Action to fight the criminalization of homelessness, sponsored by the Western Regional Advocacy Project (WRAP). Cities in the Bay Area and around the country have passed laws making it impossible for homeless people to live within the law. It has become a crime to sit or lie down, to sleep in public, panhandle or otherwise conduct their lives in public view.
The eviction would force Bulb residents back into the same social narrative of police harassment and criminalization of homelessness which originally drove many of them to the Bulb.
We have successfully prevented the eviction from going forward since October, and we’re ready to take the fight into the new year! Come join us, and find out how you can help preserve this unique Bay Area treasure.
If you’re interested in direct action related to local foreclosure defense, show up early and learn more.
The San Francisco Gray Panthers are very concerned about issues of mass incarceration, prison expansion, profiling of minorities and youth, and the criminalization of poverty. Particularly in San Francisco, with such extremes of wealth and poverty, it seems outrageous to build more jail space, when three-quarters of prisoners are there because they’re too poor to make bail.
We are helping to organize two important upcoming events to stop the new jail and we hope you will join us!
Here’s the details:
Saturday, January 18th: Attend our Town Hall meeting to speak out about the jail plan, and get prepared for the upcoming Supervisors meeting: 2-4 PM at the Redstone Building, 2940 16th Street (near mission). Download the event flier here.
Thursday, January 23rd: Speak out at the San Francisco Supervisor�s Neighborhood Services and Safety Committee Hearing on the Jail Replacement Project: 1-3:30pm, in City Hall Room 250.
Join Strike Debt Bay Area in working on some exciting projects locally and nationally to fight unjust debt.
– The latest on our coalition efforts to Save the Berkeley Post Office and fight the privatization of our commons.
– The latest on our efforts to help Richmond and NGO allies push for principal reduction for Richmond’s homeowners. Read an article written by two Strike Debt Bay Area members on the Richmond principal reduction / eminent domain case.
In addition, we are exploring the use of a public bank to help Richmond, CA and other communities escape the thrall of Wall Street.
– A report on FedUp, our action in coalition with Occupy SF and others to highlight (and Illuminate!) the Fed’s contributions to the ills of our economy and call for it to become unprivatized.
– Work on our radio segment on KPFA
– Other projects include efforts to fight against student debt in conjunction with peeps at UC Cal via a Debtors’ Union, a book group with semi-weekly discussions, investigations into the legitimacy of mortgage ownership and therefore the right to foreclose, efforts to thwart payday loan usury and 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.
Through the end of January we will have General Assembly at the sudoroom on 2141 Broadway, Oakland, CA.
Here are instructions to access the room, the entrance is on 22nd Street:
https://sudoroom.org/wiki/Getting_there
This Sunday will be a Cryptoparty at the sudoroom, along with the third Sunday in January, these will be opportunities to update your digital profile so the government can’t easily track your every move. More blather on this to follow this afternoon when I have a moment.
Our General Assembly is a participatory gathering of Oakland community members and beyond, where everyone who shows up is treated equally and has equal decision-making power. Occupy Oakland’s General Assembly uses a participatory decision-making process appropriately called, “Occupy Oakland’s Collective Decision-Making Process.” Our Assembly and the process we have collectively cultivated strives to reach agreement while building community.
Autonomous Action & the General Assembly
The bulk of the work of Occupy Oakland does NOT happen in the General Assembly. It happens in various committees, caucuses, and associated groups that report back to the general assembly. Everyone participating in Occupy Oakland should be part of at least one associated group. Occupy Oakland encourages autonomous actions that do not require consensus from the General Assembly. This encourages political activity that is decentralized and welcomes diverse voices and actions into the movement.
General Assembly Standard Agenda
- Welcome
- Welcome Announcements
- Agenda Overview
- Forum
- Reports from Committees, Subcommittees, Caucuses, & Working Groups
- Action Announcements
- General Announcements