Immigrant rights activists, community leaders and people who have been directly affected by the immigrant detention system will gather in front of the West County Detention Facility (WCDF) for a people’s tribunal to hold Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Contra Costa Sheriff’s Office accountable for their culture of secrecy and systemic abuse.

The tribunal is one of a series of coordinated people’s tribunals across the country as a part of the #ICEonTrial campaign. The campaign comes with a rise of retaliation by ICE against activists, as the agency is emboldened to be less transparent and unaccountable and to act with increased impunity under the Trump administration.

Justice comes from the people!
La justicia viene del pueblo!

Who: CIVIC (Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement); Detention Watch Network; Pueblo Sin Fronteras; Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity; Let Our People Go

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CIVIC (Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement) is devoted to abolishing U.S. immigration detention, while ending the isolation of people currently suffering in this profit-driven system. We visit and monitor 43 facilities and run the largest national hotline for detained immigrants. Through these windows into the system, we gather data and stories to combat injustice at the individual level and push systemic change.
www.endisolation.org

Detention Watch Network (DWN) is a national coalition of organizations and individuals working to expose and challenge the injustices of the United States’ immigration detention and deportation system and advocate for profound change that promotes the rights and dignity of all persons. Founded in 1997 by immigrant rights groups, DWN brings together advocates to unify strategy and build partnerships on a local and national level to end immigration detention.
www.detentionwatchnetwork.org

Pueblo Sin Fronteras is a collective of friends who decided to be in permanent solidarity with displaced peoples. For more than fifteen years, members of Pueblo Sin Fronteras have been reaching out to the most vulnerable immigrants in the United States and to migrants and refugees on the move. We accompany migrants and refugees in their journey of hope, and together, we demand our human rights. We provide humanitarian aid to migrants and refugees on the move. Our dream is to build solidarity bridges among peoples and turndown border walls imposed by greed.
www.pueblosinfronteras.org

The Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity works to achieve an equitable, inclusive and healthy society, culture, and economy where the most vulnerable, disenfranchised and marginalized have equal opportunities and access to the resources and tools needed to achieve a dignified quality of life.
www.im4humanintegrity.org

Kehilla Community Synagogue’s Immigration Committee holds a monthly multi-faith, one-hour protest on site called Let Our People Go, on the second Sunday of every month. Let Our People Go is a youth-and-elder-friendly, accessible action that opposes the detentions/deportations and mass incarceration with activist debriefs, music, art, stories and representation from different faith communities (including faithful and faithless humanists).
www.kehillasynagogue.org/immigration-committee

Summon Alameda County Sheriff Gregory Ahern to Appear at a People’s Tribunal

On Saturday, May 5, 2018 immigrant rights activists, community leaders and people who have been directly affected by the immigrant detention system will gather in front of the West County Detention Facility (WCDF) for a people’s tribunal to hold Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Alameda and Contra Costa Sheriff’s Office accountable for their culture of secrecy and systemic abuse.

The tribunal is one of a series of coordinated people’s tribunals across the country as a part of the #ICEonTrial campaign. The campaign comes with a rise of retaliation by ICE against activists, as the agency is emboldened to be less transparent, unaccountable and act with increased impunity under the Trump administration.

Justice comes from the people!
La justicia viene del pueblo!

Who: CIVIC (Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement) and Detention Watch Network

The SF Living Wage Coalition invites you to our spring art and literature gala.  A celebration of cross-border unity and taking back the TRUE meaning of the holiday. MUSIC/ART/FOOD.

We will celebrate the two hundredth birthday of Karl Marx (b. March 5, 1818) with discussion led by three volunteers who will share their views on the contemporary significance of Marx: Antonio Trossero, an Argentinian labor leader and political exile living in the Bay Area; Eugene Ruyle, Emeritus Professor of Anthropology, Cal State Long Beach; and Raj Sahai, our ICSS member from India, and longtime Bay Area resident.

Sun, May 6, 2018: 1-2 pm
Planning Session
We get together after the morning session on the first Sunday of every month to discuss things in general and plan the schedule for our Sunday Morning at the Marxist Library forums. This is an open meeting. Everyone is welcome to help plan our future sessions. Please come with suggestions and concrete plans. Newcomers and Old Timers welcome

Wealth & Income Inequality: A Two-Part Workshop by Strike Debt Bay Area

Everywhere we look, everything from the headlines to our paychecks to the tents under the freeway remind us that rich people are getting richer and poor people are getting poorer. But it can be hard to understand exactly how and why that is happening. If we can’t understand it, we can’t change it. And change it we must!

After a look at the causes of runaway inequality in Part 1, we’ll talk about some fairer ways to provide economic security for all in Part 2. What do alternatives to corporate capitalism look like?

Part 1: How Corporations Move Money from the Many to the Few
Sunday, April 29, 11:00am to 12:45pm

Do you wonder what role racism plays in wealth inequality? Do you wish you understood exactly how Wall Street exploits Main Street? The answers are not terribly complicated, but they are shocking. We’ll learn about stock manipulation, financialization, strip-mining, redlining and more.

Part 2: How We Can Build a More Just Economy for All
Sunday, May 6, 11:00am to 12:45pm

Using our shared understanding of the problem, we will examine past and existing movements for change: what they are, how they work, and how they can grow. We’ll talk about better ways to make sure all have access to the basic necessities. Then we’ll discuss how we can keep the wealth we create in our communities instead of paying it into the bank accounts of global elites. In sum, what might a fair, sustainable, and joyful economic system look like?

We’d love you to RSVP to strike.debt.bay.area@gmail.com so we know how many people to expect.
This workshop is free.
We’d love you to come to both parts if you can.

Wealth & Income Inequality: A Two-Part Workshop by Strike Debt Bay Area

Everywhere we look, everything from the headlines to our paychecks to the tents under the freeway remind us that rich people are getting richer and poor people are getting poorer. But it can be hard to understand exactly how and why that is happening. If we can’t understand it, we can’t change it. And change it we must!

After a look at the causes of runaway inequality in Part 1, we’ll talk about some fairer ways to provide economic security for all in Part 2. What do alternatives to corporate capitalism look like?

Part 1: How Corporations Move Money from the Many to the Few
Sunday, April 29, 11:00am to 12:45pm

Do you wonder what role racism plays in wealth inequality? Do you wish you understood exactly how Wall Street exploits Main Street? The answers are not terribly complicated, but they are shocking. We’ll learn about stock manipulation, financialization, strip-mining, redlining and more.

Part 2: How We Can Build a More Just Economy for All
Sunday, May 6, 11:00am to 12:45pm

Using our shared understanding of the problem, we will examine past and existing movements for change: what they are, how they work, and how they can grow. We’ll talk about better ways to make sure all have access to the basic necessities. Then we’ll discuss how we can keep the wealth we create in our communities instead of paying it into the bank accounts of global elites. In sum, what might a fair, sustainable, and joyful economic system look like?

We’d love you to RSVP to strike.debt.bay.area@gmail.com so we know how many people to expect.
This workshop is free.
We’d love you to come to both parts if you can.

Mobilization to Submit Reports to the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination

It comes as no surprise that the Trump administration seems to have failed to submit its report to the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) by the deadline November 20, 2017. The Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute (MCLI) continues to reach out to the community to ensure that all forms of racism by the federal, state, and local governments in the U.S. are included in a shadow report to be submitted by MCLI and allies working in communities experiencing racism at the hands of the government.

With the election of Donald Trump racism in the U.S. has been amplified. The struggle of the Water Protectors at Standing Rock, the “Muslim Ban”, the repeal of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), the police violence against and mass incarceration of African Americans, harassment and criminalization of immigrant communities, and exploitation of immigrant labor are just some of the forms of racism that the MCLI would like to address in the upcoming report.

MCLI is holding this event to explain the process of holding the U.S. accountable for racism, to include the lived experiences of community members who have experienced racism at the hands of the government as well as social justice organizations working in communities of color, and to seek assistance compiling the report.

MCLI wants our shadow report to be as expansive and comprehensive as possible. The only way we can do this is with community input and assistance. Please come to this event to find out how your experiences can be included and how you can help MCLI compile this report.

There will be a presentation by organizers working with MCLI followed by a Q and A.

The People’s Community Medics teach basic emergency first aid skills free of charge “BECAUSE NO ONE SHOULD DIE WAITING FOR AN AMBULANCE.”

Currently, Sharena Diamond Thomas is the only first aid trainer at the People’s Community Medics and she has asked us, The Community Democracy Project (Oakland)* to help her find other folks in Oakland willing to help her do this incredibly important and life-saving work. We’re honored to help her out and invite YOU to come join us.

Feel free to bring food (and booze! because we’re also celebrating Shawn and Tia‘s birthdays!)

*The Community Democracy Project is an all-volunteer campaign working to turn the power structure right side up by putting the people of Oakland in charge of the city budget.

Come and hear co-authors, Mumia Abu-Jamal (who will call in during the event) and Stephen Vittoria, plus readers Pam Africa, Tyson Amir, Cat Brooks, Ayanna Davis, Aya de Leon, Emory Douglas, Derethia DuVal, Anita Johnson, devorah major, and others, recite passages from Dreaming of Empire.

This is the first in Mumia Abu-Jamal’s most ambitious work to date, a trilogy written as he struggles for life.
5-20 donation at the door, no one turned away for lack of funds

Socialist solidarity rally TONIGHT!
6pm, Bancroft and Telegraph
Wear green if you have it!

We are joining @norcalsocialism, @LaVozLITci, and @AFSCMELocal3299 pic.twitter.com/OtP9gG0cDW

— East Bay DSA (@DSAEastBay) May 7, 2018

EBC will host a mail night at our office to respond to the increasing amount of correspondence we’ve been receiving from people in prisons and jails across the country. We are getting lots of questions about prior ballot initiatives including Prop 47 and 57, advocacy support, requests for pen pals and EBC’s work at large. We will also be sending information to people inside about how they can get involved with our priority bills.

Please RSVP to Eric@ellabakercenter.org

Habeas Data chronicles the evolution of surveillance law in America over the last 50 years and argues that current law is insufficient for modern technology.

May 8 – Oakland – Laurel Books – 7pm (Launch Party!)

YOU ARE INVITED TO A COMMUNITY CELEBRATION!

Join the E12th Coalition and friends to celebrate the 3rd anniversary of the People’s Council (AKA Oakland City Council Take-over) and the spirit of the Public Land for Public Good campaign.

Three years ago this week, community members who’d had enough of Oakland City Council’s continuous failure to listen to neighborhood needs for affordable housing, took over the City Council chambers to prevent the sale of the E12th St public parcel to a luxury tower developer. What followed was a year of community organizing and participatory design that resulted in a beautiful plan for a 100% affordable project that truly reflected the values and needs of the neighborhood. The City ultimately failed to adopt The People’s Proposal, but the spirit of our fight for Public Land for Public Good is still alive and much needed today.

When we can’t count on City Hall, we know we can count on one another to serve the needs of those most vulnerable among us and show a model of land use and housing affordability that the City should prioritize.

We return to The People’s Parcel on E12th St to lift up some amazing community land projects taking place in Oakland today.

Share a meal with neighbors.
Participate in collective art making.
Hear community solutions on supporting houseless folks, building land trusts and public land policy for the people.

Please bring food or beverages to share, if you can. Most importantly, COME and celebrate community resistance and resilience with us!

This September in San Francisco, the Global Climate Action Summit will bring together leaders from state, tribal, and local governments, business, and citizens from around the world, to demonstrate how the tide has turned in the race against climate change, showcase climate action taking place around the world, and inspire deeper commitments from each other and from national governments in support of the Paris Agreement.

2018 is a turning point: countries and all of us must step up the commitments that were made in Paris and do more. The momentum we generate this year must lead to a climate turning point by 2020 in order to prevent the worst effects of climate change. It must be the beginning of a new phase of action and ambition on climate change.

In 1963 the waters began rising behind Glen Canyon Dam and 170 miles of the Colorado River slowly disappeared as the riverbed and surrounding canyons filled with water. Those who supported and those who opposed the dam considered it a longterm transformation; environmentalists mourned Glen Canyon as dead and gone forever. But it’s coming back, in a victory that is also the pervasive disaster of climate change.

“Lake Powell and the wreckage of where it used to be and will never be again was the right place to think about the madness of the past and the terror of the future, even amidst the epiphanies of beautiful light and majestic space,” writes Rebecca Solnit in Drowned River:  The Death and Rebirth of Glen Canyon on the Colorado (Radius Books), her collaboration with photographers Mark Klett and Byron Wolfe.

350.org executive director May Boeve talks about the near future of climate activism, including September’s Climate Summit.

NY Times bestselling author, Richard Rothstein, will discuss his recent book, The Color of Law, and the role of the state in creating and maintaining segregation, to the detriment of African Americans and society as a whole. This panel will situate the author’s work in West Oakland, a community that was created/disadvantaged by redlining, “urban redevelopment,” nearby industrial zoning, and other government actions. The panel will pull together activists, electeds, and community members, to reflect on how we got here and the role of government and private actors in remedying it.

Gentrification comes up constantly in the Bay Area, but few of us feel equipped to take action against it. Is it inevitable? What can we do now to prevent displacement?

Berkeley City Councilmember Cheryl Davila is hosting a SURJ workshop which will put gentrification and displacement in a historical context so we understand the racialized political and economic drivers. You’ll hear about past and current struggles led by communities of color to preserve their homes and communities.

Facilitators from SURJ – Oakland/Bay Area will present analysis based on the work of Causa Justa :: Just Cause. SURJ (Showing Up for Racial Justice), Bay Area chapter, is part of a national network of groups and individuals organizing white people for racial justice through community organizing, mobilizing, and education. However, all are welcome at this workshop regardless of identity.

We are asking for $5-$20 donation, sliding scale, which will go to support CJJC’s work challenging gentrification and fighting displacement. However, no one will be turned away for lack of funds.

Building Accessibility: Neyborly can accommodate mobility devices.

Scents: ask everyone to please arrive at meetings fragrance free to support access for folks who experience multiple chemical sensitivities and allergies. This means using only body products and laundry detergent that say “fragrance free” or “unscented” on the label and do not have scented ingredients.

More info on Causa Justa: http://www.cjjc.org/

SPREAD THE WORD, INVITE YOUR FRIENDS!

Come join Local Clean Energy Alliance and Rosana Francescato and Matt Renner from the Clean Coalition, who will explain what a microgrid is, the basics of how it works, and how Community Microgrids provide economic, environmental and resilience benefits to communities.

We will hear about the Clean Coalition’s plans for microgrids in fire-devastated parts of the North Bay, and in other areas, to create islands of power sustainability as part of the rebuilding process.

For a 90-second video on Community Microgrids, follow this link.

Tickets are free, but space is limited.  Get tickets at Eventbrite.

We all have a right to a healthy life. That means a right to healthcare, a right to clean air, clean water, and a clean earth, to healthy food, a right to a job and housing and the right to live a life free of discrimination and oppression.

WE NEED IMPROVED MEDICARE FOR ALL NOW. The U.S. is one of the only countries in the “developed” world that does not guarantee universal health coverage. We pay more for health care and have worse outcomes (http://www.commonwealthfund.org/interactives/2017/july/mirror-mirror/) because our system isn’t built to take care of people, it is built so that private health insurance companies and pharmaceutical companies can make more and more money.

Private healthcare in this country is bad enough, but Trump and the GOP are on a mission to make it far worse through cuts to the ACA, Medicare, and Medicaid. We need these programs, and much more.

Medical illness is the number one cause of personal bankruptcy in the U.S. There are 4 paid lobbyists for every single congressperson in Washington DC and health industry lobbying spending continues to rise as the expectation and discussion of healthcare and medicare for all grows. Both Republicans and Democrats at the state and federal level take millions from those who profit off of the sickness and suffering of US residents. The private health insurance companies don’t want to pay for the health care we need because it would impact their profits. IT’S TIME TO GET PRIVATE PROFITS OUT OF OUR HEALTHCARE.

In California, the Democratic Party has a supermajority, which means that they can pass any law they want. They control the Senate, the House, and the Governorship, but they have shelved SB 562, the bill that would guarantee healthcare as a right for all California residents. We need independent corporate-free representatives who will unapologetically support single payer healthcare.

A HEALTHY LIFE MEANS BREATHING CLEAN AIR AND DRINKING CLEAN WATER. West and Downtown Oakland residents have some of the highest asthma rates in the country, and have higher stroke, heart failure, stress, and diabetes rates than other areas. The higher air and environmental pollution exposes people living in these and other environmentally polluted areas of the Bay Area to worse Health outcomes than higher income communities in other areas (https://www.edf.org/airqualitymaps/pollution-and-health-concerns-west-oakland). Fossil fuel companies, including the 5 corporations that have oil refineries in the Bay Area, do not base their decisions around the health of human beings or the environment. They exploit resources and pollute our communities in search of greater profits.

A HEALTHY LIFE MEANS A LIVING WAGE AND A PLACE TO LIVE. That means enacting a minimum wage that is a living wage, a wage that allows us to purchase healthy food and afford to live where we work if we want to. 3 men in the U.S. have more money than half of the US population, over 160 million people (https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/nov/08/bill-gates-jeff-bezos-warren-buffett-wealthier-than-poorest-half-of-us). Corporations don’t want to pay workers a living wage because it would impact their profits, but they wouldn’t be able to make that surplus without profiting off of the real value that the workers’ create. Developers don’t want rent control and affordable housing because it would impact their profits. There are currently over 500,000 unhoused persons in the US at this time (https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/the-number-of-homeless-people-in-america-increased-for-the-first-time-in-7-years/) and there are more vacant houses than unhoused people.

A HEALTHY LIFE MEANS LIVING FREE OF DISCRIMINATION AND OPPRESSION. Institutionalized discrimination and oppression lead to economic inequality, higher stress, worse health outcomes and shorter life expectancy.

Our health needs are at odds with the profit motive of private health insurance, pharmaceutical companies, developers and fossil fuel companies.

Stop Trump’s Attacks on Our Health!
Fight cuts to the ACA, Medicare, and Medicaid.

We Need Medicare for All!
Release and pass SB 562 in California as a step towards nationwide Medicare for All.

No More Evictions!
Enact living wage laws, rent control, and publicly fund affordable housing.

Fight Climate Change and Environmental Pollution!
For a mass green jobs program to invest in renewable energy to replace fossil fuels.

No More Institutionalized Racism and Sexism!
Halt all deportations, full legalization for all US Residents, Equal Pay for Equal Work, Equal access to opportunity for all regardless of ability, race, or gender.

https://www.marchforourhealth.org/

Endorsements:

Healthy California
Health Care for All California
Socialist Alternative Bay Area
East Bay Democratic Socialists of America
Democratic Socialists of America: San Francisco
Physicians for a National Health Program
National Union of Healthcare Workers
UPTE-CWA Local 9119
California Alliance for Retired Americans
California Partnership
UC Berkeley Progressive Student Association – Our Revolution
East Bay Young Democrats
Our Revolution California
Our Revolution East Bay
Our Revolution Contra Costa County
Courage Campaign Contra Costa
El Cerrito Progressives