Calendar

POLICE REFORM:  Alameda County Urban Shield/UASI Task Force   

For six years, Bay Area activists have pushed to repurpose Homeland Security disaster preparedness funds away from the hyper-militarized training exercise Urban Shield. Finally the Alameda Board of Supervisors agreed and convened a task force to end “Urban Shield as we know it”.  The  task force has provided dozens of recommendations to do exactly that.

There is lots of pushback and lots more coming, according to the SF Chronicle, which announced the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department is “primed for battle“.  But this is our taxpayer money to protect us and help us recover from disasters like catastrophic wildfires. We get a say in how it is spent.

You can view some of the proposed recommendations here and here. The recommendations follow years of problems with racial profiling, right wing vigilantes, and environmental abuse. Your physical presence on the 26th is important, but you can also use this easy action alert to tell the Supervisors not to buckle to the pressure and really change Urban Shield. Now:

Easy Action Alert

This training is in preparation for a nonviolent direct action March 18 in San Francisco but everyone is welcome, even if you can’t participate that day. With wildfires and weather disasters all around us, and just 12 years left to address the climate crisis (per IPCC report), we’ll have many opportunities to stand up for future generations and a sustainable world. We especially encourage anyone willing to serve in support roles (not risking arrest) to join us.

The action will occur during our March for Fossil Fuel Freedom culminating rally, noontime Monday Mar 18 at “Oily Wells” Fargo headquarters, to spotlight the bank’s role as a leading funder of climate chaos. Participants need to attend one of two mandatory training sessions. Click link to RSVP and learn more:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSexjCjWP46xrrXUuDqKj5Dn3OaQRhHDprcp8UbvMmF3WJxAuQ/viewform

March for Fossil Fuel Freedom details and registration: https://oilywells.com/

RSVP FOR LOCATION.

East Bay Community Energy’s Local Development Business Plan is the Green New Deal for the East Bay. While our National leaders are scrambling to get a policy together, we have the opportunity to build energy solutions that center justice at home, in the East Bay.

On Monday, April 1 at 7pm (details tbd by EBCE), East Bay Community Energy’s Community Advisory Committee (CAC) will be having a special study session on the Early Actions for Local Development. Join us at this study session to speak to the Community Advisory Committee about our priorities.

You might recall that Local Clean Energy Alliance hosted two in-depth workshops in 2018. In July, we created curriculum on the Local Development Business Plan and in November we created and presented curriculum on the Early Actions for Local Development highlighted in the business plan. The format at the Community Advisory Committee will not be like ours, but much of the material might be familiar. This will be both an opportunity to review the material and advocate for the pieces that most benefit our most vulnerable communities, including:

Energy Efficiency
Community Innovation Grant
Community Net Energy Metering
Community Shared Solar

Now is the time to show the rest of the country what a green new deal looks like — how it can be done, who is at the table, and who sees the benefits – . But it will take your voices and your advocacy to make it happen for real.

Will you join us on April 1?

What skills, tools and approaches are useful in encouraging white people to sustain balanced engagement with anti-racism/racial justice education and work? How can we cultivate resilience (as opposed to white fragility) in ourselves, our communities, and our movements?

White Fragility is defined by Robin DiAngelo as “A state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable, triggering a range of defensive moves. These moves include the outward display of emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and behaviors such as argumentation, silence, and leaving the stress-inducing situation (2011).” What skills, tools and approaches are useful in encouraging white people to sustain balanced engagement with anti-racism/racial justice education and work? How can we cultivate resilience (as opposed to white fragility) in ourselves, our communities, and our movements? Resilience is, in part, defined as:

1. Staying with the conversation

2. Giving and receiving information and feedback from facilitators and peers without becoming highly defensive, reactive, or shut down/dissociated for long period of time

3. Managing the guilt and shame that can arise in learning about the history and current reality of race and racism in the US.

This workshop will explore the role of the body, community, spirituality, intellectual knowledge and other themes that you bring from your experience. We will cover basic information about how the brain and body responds to perceived threats, and explore how to work with this toward greater resilience in moments of challenge.

This workshop is for all experience levels. Participants will be invited to discuss in small groups, move around the space, and hold their bodies in different shapes for 1-2 minutes if available. Content will be presented in both verbal and written formats.

Sunrise is building a movement of young people to make climate change an urgent political priority and support the #GreenNewDeal to safeguard our generation’s future, create good jobs and transform our economy.

Check out more at www.sunrisemovement.org. Register here: https://forms.gle/LC7Ho9JGugEvq8eh9.

> WHAT TO EXPECT FROM THE TRAINING <
1. A deep dive into the Sunrise strategy, story, and structure that make up the movement’s 4-year plan (This is a 9 hour training, with breakfast and lunch provided. We ask people to attend the whole training to get the full experience, and it’s a ton of fun! We promise!)
2. Lots of time to have fun and get to know other young people from around the Bay Area.
3. Hands-on practice and skill building to strengthen your climate organizing skills.
4. Time to dig into the Sunrise Bay Area strategy for making the #GreenNewDeal a political priority and join a team/sub-committee to help make it happen.

> WHO IS THIS FOR? <
It’s for YOU! Whether you’ve come to Sunrise Bay Area events and meetings before or whether you’re just finding out about Sunrise and the Green New Deal and are inspired to learn more, you are welcome!

This is a movement of young people – that means we have members of our hub who are high school students, college students, non-students, working young people, and more (generally between 16-35). People of all identities and backgrounds are welcomed and supported in this space. We are stronger when we join together, and we believe we need all of us to win. Join us.

What if the internet wasn’t about connecting to Comcast, AT&T, Google, or Facebook? What if it meant connecting directly with your friends, neighbors, and community…? Come over to the Oakland Public Library West Branch’s auditorium for the Build Your Own Internet (BYOI) workshop. Let’s discuss how the internet works, and how you can be part of the People’s Open Network, an open, community-owned mesh network.

* No technical expertise needed. Technical curiosity very necessary. *

The City of Oakland is planning to push homeless West Oakland residents onto a sanctioned site on May 14th. Residents that do not comply run the risk of arrest and having their property confiscated.

Join up with homeless residents, people in the area need support be it moving their things or in not complying with the city of Oakland unreasonable request

The new site is small and lacks many of the services that homeless residents have been demanding.

Monday, May 20, 2019
6:30 pm SHARP Rally
7:00pm Speakout
During Public Comment Period
at the City Council Meeting

Pittsburg City Council
65 Civic Ave
Pittsburg, CA 94565
(One block North on Railroad Ave Exit off HWY 4)
(Railroad Drive Stop at End of Line BART Extension Trolley)

Contact Info: 510-674-8181 or 925-565-8393 or email: oscargrantcomittee.ogc@gmail.com

Demand Number One: FIRE KILLER COP DILLON TINDALL
The people of Pittsburg are NOT safe with trigger happy cop Dillon Tindall on the police force. He has shown bad judgement in killing Terry Amons without just cause. At the very least, he must be fired to prevent further tragedy.

Demand Number Two: PASS THE RICHMOND ORDINANCE
District Attorneys work closely every day with the police and rely on them to get convictions. More often than not they turn a blind eye to police misconduct. We need laws and policies that hold trigger happy cops accountable. The Richmond City Council, responding to public pressure, passed. an ordinance to have an INDEPENDENT INVESTIGATION of all police killings, to avoid this conflict of interest. Pittsburg and other cities must pass similar laws as a first step to justice.

Terry Amons, Jr., a 43 year old Black man, was. shot and killed by Pittsburgh police late Friday night on January 12, 2018, while eating dinner inside his car outside of Nations Burgers in Pittsburgh, as was his habit before going to work on his night shift job as a delivery driver for Presidential Propane Company. The police claim that Terry was reaching for a gun, but body cam video, which clearly shows Amons attempting to comply with shouted contradictory orders from two cops with guns drawn and aimed at him. At no time did Amons make any move toward the holstered pistol that was in plain sight in the central storage area between the front seats.

The video shows Amons complying with orders to place his hands on the steering wheel, then attempting to comply with frantic commands to “get out of the car” before being senselessly gunned down while attempting to comply.

We hold the Pittsburgh PD responsible for murdering an innocent Black man. Terry’s mother, Sandra, said: “They executed my son. The Pittsburgh Police Department (PPD) illegally, without a warrant, searched Terry’s home after they killed him.”. The PPD did not provide Terry’s family with the names of the officers involved. The Law Enforcement Officers Bill of Rights is the legal justification for withholding this information. Only months later did the Oscar Grant, Committee learn the names of the Police Officers involved: Dillon Tindall, who fired, the shots, and Jesus Arellano. According to the East Bay Times, the body cam video, shows Terry being shot by Tindall after. shouting “Do not reach for that fucking gun.” As Terry falls out of the car he continues fo say, “I wasn’t reaching for nothing, swear to God.” Then the officers handcuffed him. Terry died at John Muir Medical Center in Martinez.

The police claim they were responding to a drug dealing complaint that provoked the initial contact. No drugs were found on Amons or in his car.

The family is considering filing a lawsuit.‘ Family and friends of Terry Amons have launched an on-going struggle for. . Justice4Terry, along with the OGC, SURJ (Stand Up for Racial Justice), and others. So far, three monthly protest actions have been held with up to 60 energetic people involved. Monthly meetings to plan ongoing events are open to the public.

Join the struggle, for more info contact: 510-674-8181 or 925-565-8392
Or email: oscargrantcommittee.ogc@gmail.com

Click on Image to download PDF flyer

The Oscar Grant Committee . Justice4Terry Amons Committee

You can help! Join the Oscar Grant Committee Against Police Brutality and State Repression
Born from the struggle for justice for Oscar Grant, murdered by BART police on Jan 1, 2009. We organize working class resistance in support of families whose loved ones were murdered by police.
JOIN US, our meetings are normally on the First Monday of every month at 7:00 PM at the Niebyl-Proctor Library, 6501 Telegraph Avenue in North Oakland
Confirm time at: www.oscargrantcommittee.org . oscargrantcommittee.ogc@gmail.com

Join Berkeley Copwatch for a training.

KNOW YOUR RIGHTS
– On the street
– When observing/recording
– Safely assert your rights
– What/how to document
– Respond to police misconduct
– Effectively observe the police in your community

This is a free event; snacks will be included! Bring your bodies and your buddies, as well as questions, concerns, stories, resources.

Check out the Berkeley Copwatch Know Your Rights Pocket Card here: http://www.berkeleycopwatch.org/resources/pocketguide05.pdf

Who or what is driving gentrification? How has gentrification played out in Oakland in particular? And what can be done to address the crises of displacement and homelessness caused by gentrification? Join East Bay DSA’s Socialist Night School on Tuesday, July 2 to discuss these questions and more.

Accessibility: The venue and restrooms are wheelchair-accessible.

Required Readings

See the readings that we’ll be discussing after a brief introduction from our members.