General Assembly – Sunday, Dec. 4, 2011
Facilitator: Sebastian, Note taker: Ilse
20 people
Announcements:
New Year’s Revolution march. 30 December. Start 1pm Robinson Park. Route to be determined. Will connect with various groups. Planning meetings Saturdays and Mondays 2pm Yale/Ya Basta Park. Possibly aligned with both UnOccupy and Occupy, Summer could not say for sure.
“The Students for Justice in Palestine-UNM (SJP-UNM) is pleased to announce that Norman Finkelstein — political scientist, activist, and author — will be speaking on the University of New Mexico campus. Finkelstein will speak about the occupation of Palestine and other developments regarding Palestine’s prospects for statehood and peace. This event is FREE, but donations will be accepted and will go toward supporting future SJP-UNM educational events regarding the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. UNM Student Union Building Ballroom A and B. Information: 505-246-2231.” (from Peace and Justice site). Amalia, Maria, Sayra, and Bill will table. Set up 4:30. Amalia has some info material for table.
Students for Justice in Palestine will organise a mock wall campaign after Spring break. Summer suggested we get involved.
Info booth needs more volunteers to sign up. If can’t sign up to (wo)man the booth, you can help out with petrol money to cart booth back and forth.
SUB info booth Monday and Wednesday SUB lower level noon till 2 pm.
UNM is privatising dorms. Old buildings will be destroyed. KUNM has to be out of its current home by May. No new home has been found/assigned. There is talk of changing station’s profile to less community based. Sebastian suggested we get involved and put pressure to protect infrastructure.
12 December is the national Day of Solidarity closing ports. Is there a specific UnOccupy act planned? Also day of the Virgin de Guadalupe. Denver is using Walmart distribution centres as its port. There is a Walmart distribution centre in Los Lunas.
We should pay attention to the National Defense Authorisation Act. Dimitri suggested we make sure that the word on this is nationally distributed. Jason suggested that we prepare in case the bill is not vetoed.
Working group reports:
Sayrah suggested we organise a rotational system to participate in the national movement conference calls. Hershe will start a working group forum on this.
Bill was invited to talk about the Foreclosure working group at Roccupy Robinson Park today. Yesterday Christian introduced the event as both an UnOccupy and Occupy event. Bill said this could build bridges.
Camilo reported on the North Valley GA. Weekly meetings Thursdays 6-9pm. Sawmill Loft. Potluck. Everyone welcome but especially for people from the area. John stressed this info should be linked on our sites.
Friday night it was consensed on the Medicine by People for People working group. Monica will lead it. Meetings Frontier Wednesdays 6:30pm. 11 February there will be a health fair at Endorphine P Company (I might have gotten this name wrong, sorry).
Amalia reported that she has been making contact with various community groups also working on bills. On 24 January there will be a lobby on Medicaid issues at Round House, Santa Fe. Many community groups see us as a direct action movement. They can’t do certain things for fear of losing their funding etc but would support us shaking some trees. Amalia encourages us to go to community meetings, not as spokespeople for (un)Occupy, but as members of (un)Occupy . She emphasized that we are a leaderless group of leaders and offering to be conduits to pass info back and forth.
GMO Chile parade. Dimitri referred to the Journal article. Andy explained that it was an AP article reorganised by the Journal. The Chile group was not happy with the AP treatment. He reported that around 50 people marched. There was a lot of support from bystanders. There were two petitions: 1) to Obama and Congress that all GMO products should be labelled as such 2) to local business to not purchase GMO chile products
Foreclosure group meets this Wednesday 6:30pm at El Mesquite (San Pedro).
Sebastian reported that Santa Fe found they had been infiltrated. One person had to be banned from the camp. (Two things not necessarily related.) Camilo noted that LAPD had admitted that it had infiltrated the LA camp. Jason suggested we be completely transparent.
17 Jan Action:
• There will be a skyped planning conference call Monday (5 December) from 8pm. Sebastian asked that a member of the NM Action Coalition contact him so that a representative can participate.
• More groups want to be part of action. Las Cruces and Española not confirmed. Taos, Santa Fe, ABQ, Socorro all in.
• On action day groups will gather at 11 to mobilise at noon. A group will go inside. Some senators want to organise a press conference. Movement could possibly participate directly in that. There will be a GA on the steps. Perhaps two topics on agenda and then break into working groups. Either touch base with comparable groups or listen in at other groups to learn. First day will be short program at Round House but could possibly do a mike check. There won’t be public comment section.
• Santa Fe already working with legislators on possible bills to be introduced. Carmella will send Sebastian a list of topics under consideration and we will see how UnOccupy can get involved.
• Sayra noted that 17 Jan is Martin Luther King Day with all the symbolism involved in that.
• There will be an emergency call system to which people can sign up for notification of bills’ progress.
Agenda Items:
1. GAs during Winter Break:
• Will do Tuesdays (6pm), Thursdays (6pm), and Sundays (12:30pm) from 11 December to 3 January. Frequency etc will be revisited then.
• Kenneth found out the SUB is open Monday through Thursday 8am – 6pm during the break.
• Jason suggested the Frontier. Peace and Justice possibility if hours possible (Ilse will find out).
• Jason suggested we still retain presence in Ya Basta Park even if it is just with some people with signs. Sayrah liked the idea of a consistent presence. Jelena said having the info booth there might be enough.
• Camilo suggested a roving GA once a week. That suggestion turned into an action suggestion. Sebastian will lead discussion on that on Tuesday at working group meeting.
• Jelena might be able to book space in SUB for winter break.
• There will be no meetings 25 December or 1 January.
• Where info booth is concerned, Amalia will check with Lila on how she sees it.
2. Move to Amend Group:
Tom reported on the Move to Amend group. There is a national call for 20 January to “Occupy the Courts.” 39 cities involved. Tom asked for UnOccupy’s support. Once he has support from both UnOccupy and Occupy, he would be prepared to lead a working group on the action. The Federal Court house would be the target. Hershe noted that Lemoyne had said the We the People group wanted to work with other GAs so could not commit to UnOccupy – at that point the group was removed from the website working group forum section. We agreed that we liked the action idea Tom presented. Tom will keep us informed.
3. Arrested Speaking Out:
We postponed hearing people who had been arrested speaking about their experiences as we would like to not have it simply tagged on to a general agenda. We will have a separate event hopefully at the P+J. Ilse will find out availability for 9 and 12 December. Amalia will contact Brittney.
4. Liaisons with Other Groups:
Shifted to tomorrow’s meeting.
End of meeting
Is not Albuquerque’s port, the Sunport, just up the street from Yale Park and 504 Yale SE? It is even a shorter march from Loma Linda Park.
http://www.occupyoakland.org/2011/12/support-grows-for-occupy-movements-coordinated-west-coast-shut-down-on-december-12th/
I was actually told at the SUB info desk that the Monday through Thursday 8am – 6pm break hours were not finalized yet.
Hi all, just wanted to thank all of you who keep doing the work like taking notes, facilitate, tabling, reaching out to other groups, being at the info both, ect. Sometimes it seems like a lot of work and not enough people and other times it seems like nothing is happening. The truth is we are all doing our best and that is good enough. We just keep doing the work and it will speak for us.
with great respect, Amalia
I finally checked about reserving a room in the SUB in case they have the building open only for special events. The online reservation is pretty simple and tomorrow I will check with my student group if there is any obstacles for us reserving a room for the GAs. I will also call the SUB and confirm some details. Jelena
Just talked with a person who is doing scheduling in the SUB and here are important info:
1. The SUB is open for everyone from December 11 to 20 – except for Sunday, December 18. December 22 is also a day when the SUB will most likely be closed.
2. The Sub is closed completely from Dec 23 to January 2. Anyone who wants to schedule a special event needs to pay an opening fee ($100) and then the SUB becomes open for the public. The person I spoke to said that this fee applies even to the student organizations.
These are info that I got – maybe someone else who has been working with the SUB in the past knows a way around the fee.
Jelena