SWOPblogger

Here is an open letter from 3 community organizations to the APS School Board urging them to diversify their commission and bring student interest into the discussion.

Safe Schools are Gun Free Schools.

Keep it that way and don't endanger our kids.

*******************
Dear APS School Board Member,

Many members of the community are concerned about the composition of the Safety Commission that has been established to make important decisions regarding school safety.

As community advocates, we find the lack of community input especially alarming. What’s worse is that after attending several Safety Commission meetings, we fear that only one perspective is being strongly represented. The obvious danger here is that it may be easy to overlook concerns that would be brought to the table if either a larger or more diverse group of people were included in the Commission.

As community organizers, we strongly urge all APS Board members to attend the last Safety Commission meeting, so that the general make-up of the commission may be thoroughly evaluated, and that all of these considerations are kept in mind when the recommendation is reviewed and final decisions are made.

Please attend the Safety Commission meeting on Thursday the 26th of July at the Albuquerque Public School Building.


Sincerely,

League of Young Voters Education Fund
Southwest Organizing Project
Sage Council

Labels: APS, Guns in Schools, Safe Schools

Check out KUNM 89.9FM tonight, Monday July 30th, at 8:00PM for a half-hour live interview with Eleanor Chavez, Director of District 1199NM National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees.

The Union has been fighting to negotiate a living wage for the University of New Mexico Hospital's 1200 support staff which includes housekeepers, nursing assistants, dietary workers, clerical, medical assistants, etc. The Union also represents licensed and technical workers. In all, District 1199NM represents 2500 workers at UNMH. Ironically, many support staff at the hospital earn so little that they themselves are forced to apply for state medicaid benefits. The Union is organizing a picket in front of the hospital on the morning of Friday, August 3rd at 6:30AM, urging UNMH to negotiate in good faith and to end conditions that organizers say have included economic oppression and racism against the affected workers.

Espejos de Aztlan has been on-air since 1979 and is part of the Raices Colectiva which conducts programming on news, culture and music from a Latino perspective on KUNM 89.9. For more information or to submit input about the Espejos de Aztlan, please visit the "Raices" link at http://kunm.org/culture/.

This Saturday SWOP members convened for our membership meeting, where we evaluated the People's Freedom Caravan (PFC), the US Social Forum (USSF), and talked about next steps for our organization.

It was exciting to see that the Caravan and the USSF is still on the minds of the delegates. It still resonates and still brings smiles to people's faces. Almost all of the delegates had on either their PFC or USSF t-shirt, without coordinating before.

Be on the look out for e-mail, blogs, and flyers that inform you of the official report back on the USSF and the PFC. There is an excitement in the air about local social forums, starting with a NM social forum and possibly growing to a South by Southwest Social Forum.

We're building movement people, we're building movement.

We also talked about our Campaign for a Better New Mexico. October 2nd is Election Day, so also be on the look out for our Swopista door-knockers who will be encouraging you to vote.

If you would like to volunteer let us know: 505-247-8832

At each membership meeting, Rosina Roibal our Jovenes Unidos Program Coordinator organizes an activity for the youth that isn't just about day care, it's about politics and art.
In collaboration with Out Ch'yonda, the kids performed a dress rehearsal for their upcoming show. It was great to see the kids faces after they had worked on the music, lights, and performed for the audience.

Out ch'Yonda Live ARtZ Studio
929 4th St. SW
385-5634

We hope you like the pictures. We work, but we also have fun!

Labels: SWOP membership

by Darryl Lorenzo Wellington

Imagine a racism workshop--not a touchy-feely "prejudice reduction" workshop but an all-out emotional and cathartic conversation on race. Now imagine a church service--not a solemn devotion but the kind of rocking, joyous communion that shakes the floorboards. Now imagine, lofted above the congregation, a sea of protest banners. The orations are secular; the pulpit is political.

This pretty much captures the spirit that dominated the first US Social Forum, held in Atlanta June 27-July 1. Having appropriately fine-tuned the World Social Forum motto to fit the host country ("Another World Is Possible, Another US Is Necessary"), this gathering-- with more than 900 workshops conducted in the Atlanta Civic Center, local hotels and theaters, and drawing some 12,000 registered attendees--made only partial concession to dry political strategy; it was a locus of progressive dreams and activist chutzpah.

Read the rest here: The Nation

Labels: The Nation, United States Social Forum, US Social Forum, USSF

This is great. I recommend you read the entire article, but better yet, read the comments at the end. Bottom line there is still hate in the air, but it's good to know change happens in light of it.

I know there will be challenges to this ID program, but what I like about it, is that its for everyone in the city. Who knows how many people who aren't undocumented will use it. Let's hope its many so that others don't get singled out.

********************************************

City ID Plan Approved
by Melissa Bailey |

Calling it a move towards "social justice," aldermen overwhelmingly approved a plan to issue identification cards for all city residents regardless of immigration status. Click on the play arrow to watch the emphatic applause for the plan, the first of its kind in the nation.

The so-called Elm City Resident Card has drawn boiling condemnation from outsider activists but overwhelming support inside city limits -- click here, here and here for background on the card, introduced by Mayor DeStefano.

In a 25 to 1 vote Monday, aldermen approved acceptance of $250,359 in private funds from the First City Fund Corporation to support the mayor's plan. The Elm City Resident Card, originally designed to help undocumented immigrants avoid getting robbed or assaulted, will be a combination of identification, debit card, library card, and a way to pay the parking meter, for all city residents young and old. The city plans to roll out the new cards in July.

Read the rest of the article here: New Haven Independent

Eric Griego: Infectious hope
U.S. Social Forum in Atlanta makes me feel optimistic for first time since college By Eric Griego

Albuquerque Tribune
July 13, 2007

http://www.abqtrib.com/news/2007/jul/13/eric-griego-infectious-hope/

The last week of June, I, and about 10,000 other lunatics from around the country and the world, braved the brutal Atlanta summer weather to take part in the first U.S. Social Forum.

Man, it was hot. But I have to say that a sunburned neck, projectile sweat and the constant threat of heat exhaustion were worth being part of what I believe will go down in history as the launch of a new American social movement.

The forum was more than just a collection of idealistic or disgruntled lefties. Sure, there were lots of those. But most of the 10,000 attendees spent the few days in serious discussion, dissection and, I hope, direction-changing of U.S. policy on several domestic and international issues.

The forum tackled social justice, health care, public education and the environment, as well as several foreign policy issues, the most prominent of which, not surprisingly, was the Iraq War.

Why Atlanta? As one of the battle fronts in the civil rights movement, organizers felt that many of the issues discussed in the forum - such as immigration, racism and economic justice - were part of the ongoing struggle for civil rights for all. It was appropriate that so many citizens and leaders took to the streets in the forum's opening march, in what had to be the most diverse, if not the largest, peaceful demonstration since the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

The men and women, old and young, gathered in Atlanta's Civic Center were literally of every color, race, religion and social class. For anyone watching, the myth of an angry, white, middle-class-liberal-led progressive movement was dispelled once and for all. Regardless of their places in society or their pigmentation, what most people there shared was a philosophy that the United States and some of its like-minded allies are leading the world alarmingly down the wrong path.

The U.S. Social Forum was part of the larger World Social Forum series that began in 2001 in Porto Alegre, Brazil. There was much discussion about what attendees were against - the Iraq War, U.S. policy toward Cuba, the flawed immigration bill. But there was an equal if not greater amount of discussion about alternatives to the status quo and the kind of institutions and organization that would be required to carve a different path.

To generalize, attendees broke down along three lines: About a third were activists who were against the current U.S. and world order but had few realistic plans for changing it; about a third were there just to commiserate about how bad things had become since President Bush has been in power; and a solid third were there to find real, serious solutions to moving the United States in a different direction.

I tried to spend time with the third group as much as possible. It was fun, and sometimes infuriating, listening to the other two groups. But in the end, I was looking for some new ideas that might work back here in New Mexico and maybe in Washington.

After five days in the blistering Atlanta heat, I was ready to get back home to the blistering, but much drier, Albuquerque heat. On the plane back, shivering from the air conditioning, I more hopeful than I've been since my college days. Back then, I thought a small group of people or even 10,000 could change the world if they believed they could.

Maybe Atlanta will mark the week that change began. I hope so.

Griego is an Albuquerque writer and former Albuquerque City Council member.

E.W. Scripps Co.
© 2006 The Albuquerque Tribune

Labels: atlanta, US Social Forum, USSF

Voices from USSF2007 and the People's Freedom Caravan.

As the caravan left NOLA, Che Lopez reflected on the day...and looks forward to the evening's activities.

Then, Hollis Watkins talks about media and the civil rights movement.

CheLopez6.26.07.mp3

6_26_07HolisWatkins.mp3

Labels: People's Freedom Caravan, US Social Forum, USSF2007

Background:

US Social Forum Interview (8 parts):
Pt1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XLYq6Vx6IY
Pt2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYEWBYsZOy0
Pt3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4GkxUNJ8wM
Pt4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3hQh9e9jVw
Pt5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VfdnA39arWQ
Pt6: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0hdzh1x-ttY
Pt7: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v2n9rh825I
Pt8: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UG4ewejNSto

USSF in Action:

Power to the People
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKgsDzXcSY4

US Social Forum
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kncStfnpJxI

USSF Opening March
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYENUhPlwsE

March from Capitol - US Social Forum 01
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoPw6FgHpgg

March from Capitol - US Social Forum 02
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L68SwmoBB-I

US Social Forum Opening March (Atlanta, GA)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoVHD42stwI

A Few Pictures from US Social Forum March
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zkvXhhTpVo

USSF 2007 June 27 Disability Action
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nq5L6PILws8

Protesta en el Forro Social de Estados Unidos (1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nB2ve9cLMU

Protesta en el Forro Social de Estados Unidos (2)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGdkoYT9nNU

First US Social Forum in Atlanta!!!, Pt. 1 (Democracy NOW!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKEITFBtgNE

First US Social Forum in Atlanta!!!, Pt. 2 (Democracy NOW!)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsBfkzfqC_w

Democracy Track 1 - U.S. Social Forum, 6/28/2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbFTQ1mH20U

Democratizing the Constitution - US Social Forum June 29, 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAqi1fAQOWo

Youth Media Council Slide Show
http://www.youtube.com/user/YouthMediaCouncil

Using the Media: Make Noise (Atlanta activist, Gloria Tatum, discusses how to use the media in the struggle to end the war in Iraq.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSzeYZUshp4

Using the Media, Part II (Matthew Cardinale, editor of Atlanta Progressive News, discusses the role of independent media in counterbalancing the inaccurate, biased reporting of corporate media)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_iF55mF_wI

Spread Health Not War
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6x0NzKkaiE

DTN Nora Callahan at US Social Forum
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPdXA8BWVcU

DTN-Aaron Dixon of Center House in Seattle (at the USSF 2007)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxpzKam1JSA

Kelly Love Jones performs at the Rock Against War/Rock Against Globalization (
RAW/RAG) event in East Atlanta Village. June 28, 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_xnS9tdgw4

Emma's Revolution at the US Social Forum (Friday Concert)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEcNAepozVA

lyeoka for United States Social Forum
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6HKJFDO6qA

Pre-Forum Pieces:
Welcome to the US Social Forum
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBbwMuPuXbU

USSF 2007 promo video housing is a human right
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khBU4IGFOCc

DC Episode: Mission USSF 2007
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjHpak0g_Bs

On the Way:
Is Another World Possible, Frantszis?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzP0mtoHiPg

Is Another World Possible, Binh?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajyf3IYabpE

Is Another World Possible, Xtian?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBfZMtgajYQ

PHOTOS!!

YES! Magazine USSF 2007 photos
http://www.flickr.com/groups/yes-ussf/

Peoples' Freedom Caravan Pics
http://flickr.com/photos/pfc2007


Lazy approach to finding more .... follow these searches (some overlap):

USSF2007 (search)
http://flickr.com/search/?q=USSF2007

US Social Forum (search)
http://flickr.com/search/?q=US+Social+Forum&m=text

United States Social Forum (search)
http://flickr.com/search/?q=United+States+Social+Forum&m=text

Labels: United States Social Forum, US Social Forum, USSF, USSF2007